The Cost of Complacency

I understand and respect the process of due diligence when outsourcing projects, such as internet marketing; however, once the process is complete and the decision is made complacency with that decision is nothing short of costly neglect. It is in the best interest of a company to review the performance of the company that they have outsourced to. Not just a measurement of performance to the previous year internally, but a measurement to an external standard of peers and/or industry average. Show me a company that tolerates complacency and I'll show you a company that isn't getting the biggest bang for their buck.

If I seem a little fired up, I am. Here is why... today while cold calling a business with a website not highly ranked in search engine results and basically off the radar. I asked to speak with the person in charge of internet marketing. The receptionist informed me of the marketing company that handles their internet marketing. When I asked to speak with the person who made the decision to outsource the work to the company, she hung up on me. Instead of moving on to the next company, it put a fire in my belly that this company was obviously not performing well in search results and what a difference my services could make for them. So, I did a little research to find out that their website was grading out as an F, as in "Failure" to be optimized for the search engines in order to rank them highly. I called a direct line to the company, but when I insisted on speaking to the person internally was told that I could only leave a message, and not a voicemail either. My gut tells me that even the phone is answered by a company outsourced to do so. So basically, this company is paying another company to FAIL at delivering them a high organic ranking and on top of this, is paying another company to answer the phone and hang up on anyone that tries to get in contact with anyone internally to let them know. I doubt this company has money to burn. I have this image in my head of someone in a fire safe office with the entire building around them burning to the ground and they don't even know it. Or at least I thought that was a better image than a person with their head up their own... well, you know. And isn't that really what complacency is? Comfortable while being oblivious to one's surroundings. At what point does the cost of complacency appear if no one is looking? Well, I'm looking because I'm not comfortable being complacent and I actually care about my clients success. AND, it is in my nature to be of service and to help people succeed. Here I am standing with the hose pointed at the building burning down to save it, but the switch to turn the water on for the hose is located in the same fireproof office as the one person is that I can't reach.