Do your damn homework!

I got a call today from someone looking to sell me something. Something expensive. Something I may have wanted to buy. Something I would have been one of perhaps fewer than five potential buyers for.

And his first words to me after I introduced myself on the phone were “and Kirsty, are you one of the directors of the company?”

A 30 second trip to our website before calling would have told him that there are two directors of our company – I’m one of them.

This wasn’t a telemarketer, this wasn’t someone making thousands of sales calls, this was one chap, making five or less phone calls and he couldn’t be bothered to simply find out who he should be speaking to at each company he was calling.

When do you need to do your damn homework?

Do you need to do a LinkedIn search prior to heading to your next job interview? Do you need to Google the awesome person you met at the networking event last night? Do you need to find out what Facebook friends you have in common with the potential client you’re trying to land?

Where will 30 seconds extend your reach by 30 miles?

Kirsty Dunphey is the youngest ever Australian Telstra Young Business Woman of the Year, author of two books (her latest release is Retired at 27: If I Can do it Anyone Can) and a passionate entrepreneur who started her first business at age 15 and opened her own real estate agency at 21.

Now Kirsty does lots of fun things which you can read about here. Her favourite current projects are Elephant Property, a boutique property management agency, Baby Teresa, a baby clothing line that donates an outfit to a baby in need for each one they sell and ReallySold, which helps real estate agents stop writing boring, uninteresting ads.