A Lesson About Burning Bridges

by Laura Lake on August 27, 2008

When it comes to mar­ket­ing, adver­tis­ing or sales — you are only as good as your con­tact list and the rela­tion­ships you’ve kept.  Burned bridges can be a detri­ment in this field.  I worked for a com­pany once that it was my job in the begin­ning to build out strate­gic part­ners — one problem…I had the con­tacts, but the com­pany had pre­vi­ously burned the bridges.

We all make mis­takes — but the impor­tant things is to repair the bridge — you never know when you just might need that per­son for some­thing.  Per­haps it’s to help you to get in touch with a con­tact at a com­pany, maybe it’s for strat­egy devel­op­ment, or per­haps it’s just to save face so that you don’t find some­one talk­ing neg­a­tively about you and your com­pany at a later date.

It’s 4:00 in the morn­ing and I’m think­ing about burned bridges — and I’m also think­ing about those that per­haps I need to go back and repair.  I’m think­ing it may just be a good morn­ing to get right on that!

What ways have you recov­ered from burned bridges and were you suc­cess­ful at mend­ing it back together? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

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