“The key to this business is – personal relationships.” ~ Jerry Maguire

We’ve all probably seen the movie Jerry Maguire. We know the scene where Jerry is trying to convince his client, Rod Tidwell (Cuba Gooding Jr. in his Oscar winning role), that he should stay with Jerry as his professional agent and representative.

It’s the classic and endlessly quotable Show Me the Money scene:

Rod is looking out for the best interest of his family. He feels he’s sacrificed his body and his livelihood for the team he plays for and he wants to be fairly compensated. Jerry, who found out that he’s being fired due to a recent conscious moment about his profession, is trying to save his own livelihood by retaining some of his professional sports clients.

The phone call lasts for a few minutes and Jerry loses all of his clients, but he retains Rod. This is a key moment in the movie because from this moment forward, Jerry is entirely focused on doing what it takes to please his client and to make things right for both parties.

He creates a win-win situation for both himself and his client, Rod Tidwell. He accomplishes this by highlighting the successes of his client.

Let’s take a look at how sports agents highlight the successes of their clients to find their own success while attempting to create situations where all parties (including fans and management) can feel like winners…

Everybody wants to feel the love

Sports players are often portrayed as divas or self-serving as they sometimes seek to get the most money out of their situation as possible. But in reality, aren’t we all trying to do the same? It may not always be about the money – it could be about security, availability or anything that makes us feel good in life.

Our lives are all short and we all want to feel the love. We want to feel loved by our family, our friends, our professional peers and ourselves. We all look to surround ourselves with people who will serve our best interests. Generally we seek to surround ourselves with people who make us feel good and complement our lives in a way that drives us to our ultimate goal of happiness.

When it comes to business, your clients are looking to surround themselves with someone who will make them feel the love. Your customers want to feel like somebody else cares about their well-being. They don’t even care if you are doing exactly the same. They actually want to see that you’re driven to find success and happiness in your own life. This would be proof that you’re aware of the keys to happiness.

Show your customers the love.

If you sell advertising space on your blog or Website, give your customers extra exposure by talking about the success of a particular ad in a blog post. Talk about how great they are to work with in a tweet.

Feed your customers’ ego.

If your outfitting customer shoots a trophy, be sure to submit the trophy photos to the major hunting photo sharing sites. Be sure to highlight their trophy on Twitter. Be sure to add their photo to a major spot on your site.

Show your customers the love by highlighting their success.

By highlighting the success of you customers, you’ll help them find their happiness in life and help yourself find your own profit and happiness as well.

It’s not about you

Two examples of sports agents (I’m sure there are more) that understand that their business is not about them are Drew Rosenhaus and Jack Bechta.

If you follow @RosenhausSports and @jackbechta on Twitter you’ll realize that these two businessman love highlighting their clients. They love telling the world about the successes of their clients.

These agents could focus on their business and themselves with tweets about how they got their clients big contracts, but instead they congratulate their clients for the work the client did to get a contract or a playing honor.

Professional sports athletes have their best interest at heart when they play the sports they love. They realize that their team’s success is their success. They also are fighting for security in their own lives. They want to be as successful as they can be. They look to surround themselves with people who believe them and who will help them achieve greatness.

When sports agents show that they put their client’s first it proves to other current and potential clients that the agent is willing to do all that it takes to make the player successful.

What are you doing to show your customers that you understand that it’s not about you?

A way to highlight the success of your customers is to write a blog post about a successful project or a successful hunt. You could write about the success a client had while using your product. Say for example that you make tree stands. Ask your customers to share their stories of success. Then write a post about that success. You don’t even have to say that your tree stand was used. Simply highlight the customer. Other customers will see where your focus is and be drawn to you.

It’s not about you.

Summary

Sports agents sometimes get a bad rap. Fans often see all of the drama that surrounds professional sports, but from circus acts that go on throughout sports seasons there is something to be learned about the relationships between a sports agent their client.

Successful sports agents realize that everybody wants to feel the love. People want to know that those around them support their dreams. We all want to know that someone else cares about our success and our happiness. It feels good to be recognized for our achievements.

Customers of all businesses look for partners that understand it isn’t about the business at all. Customers are smart enough to choose to work with businesses that not only work at all costs to achieve strategic long-term goals, but choose to highlight the client’s achievements. Because in the end they are the client’s achievements, not the business’s.

Bonus

Here are a few extra clips from Jerry Maguire.

Enjoy.

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Image courtesy of Dplanet::

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