Professional ‘ghosting’

You put out a request for proposals; you need a supplier, a designer, a copywriter, an agency or a web developer. You get started, do some research, shortlist your favourites and ask them for a quote. On the other side, a team sits down, analyses your requirements, assesses the timelines, calculates the costs and draws up a bespoke proposal for you.
They send it to you, and suddenly… absolute silence.
The dreaded professional ‘ghosting’. A practice that, sadly, has become all too common in the business world.

Behind every quote lie hours of work

There is a misconception that drawing up a quote simply means ‘giving a price and that’s it’. But in the services sector and the creative industries, a quote is a project in its alpha phase. It involves preliminary research, strategy, resource planning, timelines…
When someone sends you a proposal, they are giving you their time in the hope of starting a working relationship. The least that effort deserves is a reply.

A ‘No’ doesn’t hurt; uncertainty does

Sometimes we don’t reply because we’re in a rush, because we’re short of time, or because we can’t be bothered to deliver bad news. We think: ‘Well, as I’m going to have to say no, I’d better not say anything at all and they’ll just have to figure it out for themselves’.
Big mistake. In the professional world, a timely ‘No’ allows you to close files, free up the time that had been set aside for you and reorganise the firm’s resources. Knowing that a project isn’t going ahead helps with planning the month. Silence, on the other hand, only creates uncertainty.

Let’s make empathy the new norm

Responder a un correo no cuesta nada y vale muchísimo. Dice más de la cultura y la educación de una empresa la forma en la que rechaza un presupuesto que la forma en la que celebra una venta.
Cuidemos el ecosistema profesional. Detrás de cada bandeja de entrada hay personas que han invertido su tiempo en ti.
Si tú también has sufrido el silencio tras enviar una propuesta en la que te dejaste la piel, comparte este artículo.