Listen instead on your Monday Morning Drive:

Several years ago, I walked into a new client’s office for the first time. Papers were piled on top of the receptionist’s desk. Unopened mail covered the surface. Nobody was sitting in the chair.

To the right of the door sat a fish tank. I walked over to check it out. A third of the water was gone. Dead fish floated at the surface. Somebody must have cared about it at one point, but those days were gone.

I did what I always do and wandered in a little deeper. Out of 16 or so cubicles in the bullpen, eight of them were full of trash. Literal bags of garbage in one. Dead equipment in another. I saw ancient pieces of gear that belonged in a dumpster, not an office.

Eventually, I found my client in one of the windowed offices along the perimeter. Those rooms were tasteful, clean, and tidy. They didn’t reflect the chaos I’d walked through to get there.

I walked across that threshold almost 20 years ago, and I’m still talking about it. That’s how brand perceptions get formed.

That wasn’t the only time I’ve walked into a client’s space and questioned whether I was in the right place. It happens more often than you’d think.

My question for you today is simple: What do people see when they walk through your threshold? And does it tell them, “These are the people I want to work with”?

Marketing Creates the Opportunity

If I talk about one topic more than any other, it’s marketing.

Most people in our industry don’t understand it. It’s not their trade. My audience knows so little about marketing that they still laugh when I recycle the oldest joke in advertising: “Half the money I spend on marketing is a waste. I just don’t know which half.”

That joke is 120 years old. People in our industry hear it for the first time every week.

It’s not their fault. They entered this business to work with technology and get shows done for their buyers. They’re in show business, not marketing business.

That’s fine if people keep finding you and word of mouth continues to work. But when it doesn’t, you’ve got a problem.

The purpose of marketing is to create an opportunity for a conversion event. A conversion event is when somebody chooses to engage with you. They reach out for an informational call, set up a meeting, send you an RFP, or make some sort of inquiry that asks you to respond.

Sometimes we create conversion events by reaching out to our audience and inviting them to engage. Either way, that moment of engagement is the threshold.

The Power of a Physical Threshold

The threshold concept is metaphorical, but it’s literal, too. One of the best moves many of you could make is to get a prospect across the threshold of your building. Invite them to you.

Back in my early days at Alford Media, our third building wasn’t a showplace, but it was very nice. It sat on its own property out in the suburbs, surrounded by fine homes on a commercial lot. A prospect would pull up and think, “I’m in the right place.”

They’d walk through the offices and see the reception area, the bullpen, and the spaces around it. Everything looked intentional and professional.

People would say, “I had no idea this is what you were like.” They’d assumed we worked out of a stable or some industrial warehouse. The only way to fix that assumption was to get them across our threshold.

This became our strategy. If a prospect wanted to do business with us but needed convincing, we’d pay their way. Send an airline ticket. Arrange a car service from the airport. Take them to a steakhouse. Bring them into our building so they can see we’re legitimate and say, “Let’s sit down and talk business.”

When Your Office Has Dead Fish

The problem is that some of you have dead fish in your offices.

You built an office or warehouse to do work in, not to bring buyers into. I understand that. We don’t always want to show people where we work.

That’s a shame. Your long-term goal should be to create a space where you’re proud to bring buyers and clients to learn more about you and engage with your team. It’s one of the smartest investments you’ll ever make.

Today, you might not be ready for that. Maybe the next office will be the one. That’s fine. But it still needs to be the goal.

Your Boardroom Might Be the Problem

Most systems integrators and live events companies have a boardroom with a large screen, a microphone system on the table, and a control panel. Half the time, it doesn’t work. Somebody’s always crawling underneath to fish an HDMI cable through so a guest can plug in their laptop.

If you sell technology and your own boardroom doesn’t function, that’s your dead fish. Fix it before you invite anyone across that threshold.

Move the Threshold to a Show Site

If you’re not presentable at home (and you’re working on that), be presentable somewhere else. A show site is one of the best options. If you’re in the business of getting shows done, what better place to demonstrate who you are?

Invite your prospects to a show site. If you’re working with end clients, most would be happy to have you bring a prospect through. They’ll chat with them and tell them how wonderful you are.

Walk your prospect backstage. Show them where presenters get ready, where you help them review their slides, and where you attach their microphones so they get on and off stage properly. Let the prospect experience what it’s like when your team takes care of a show for them.

The prospect doesn’t need a brochure at that point. They need to experience what it’s like to work with you.

The Art of Extending Invitations

Getting people across your threshold starts with invitations.

An invitation doesn’t have to be fancy. It’s reaching out to someone and saying, “We’re doing this, and I’d love for you to come.”

People can turn it down. That’s fine. The point of the invitation isn’t the event. The point is the invitation itself.

Here’s a trick we used to play. Picture this: It’s Tuesday afternoon, and one of your salespeople comes in and says, “I’ve got a hot prospect coming Friday. I told them we’re having a pizza and cake day, handing out an employee award, and they’re welcome to join us and learn what we’re all about.”

Could you make that happen by Friday? Take the trash bags out, clean up the kitchen, order a cake, get some pizza, make up an award, hand it to somebody, and put on a little show for a prospect?

Of course you could.

Your space doesn’t have to be pristine. It has to be happy, lived in, and functional. How clean do you make your house before company comes over? You get it as clean as you can see it being clean.

It’ll never be enough for a clean freak. But it’ll impress most people.

Create Opportunities on Your Turf

Extending invitations, hosting company events, and getting people into your building or onto a show site all serve the same purpose: “Here’s who we are. Here’s our hospitality. Here’s how we create a space where we can service you, talk about your event, and expose you to our experts so we can do more business together.”

Sometimes your marketing message is simple: “We’re a good, old-fashioned local AV company that cares about our employees and our buyers. We take good care of our gear. We’re earnest about our work. And yes, we have a modest office.”

Nobody will begrudge you for that.

Start With a Walk-Through

Walk out the front of your office right now. Walk back in. Close your eyes for a second. Open them.

If you were walking into your space for the first time, what would you see? Is anyone greeting you? Most of us don’t have receptionists anymore. So, how are people being welcomed? Who’s jumping up to shake a hand and show someone around?

Many of us have locked doors and buzzers. We make it hard for anyone to interact with us. What are you doing to change that?

On show sites, your backstage, front of house, and any space where technicians and equipment interact with a buyer or presenter need to be professional and accessible. Safe places to walk. Places to set materials down. Access to the individuals your clients need to talk to.

Don’t build barriers where you’re hiding inside equipment. Don’t force a buyer to put on a headset at the front of house to communicate with your team.

Be welcoming. Keep backstage neat and tidy. Make space for your show’s presenters so they feel comfortable walking through that curtain from front of house to backstage. That curtain is a threshold, too. Treat it like one.

Your Threshold Is Your Brand

Think about every threshold in your business. Think about what you can do to improve the experience for people who may show up with low expectations, so you can impress them and still be exactly who you are.

Your space doesn’t need to be spotless. It needs to be intentional. That’s the best marketing advice I can give you.

Go clean your fish tanks.