Forced to be an Emergency Responder and Love Bombing

Forced Emergency Responders and “Love Bombing.”

Emergency Responders and the 2:00am call for a wooden spoon

When we think of emergency responders, we think of paramedics and ambulances and firefighters and police.

If you make widgets, no one is going to call you at three in the morning to tell you they desperately need a new stapler or a wooden spoon or any number of things that aren’t considered an emergency item. That goes for services as well.

Other businesses and services may have a little bit of an emergency aspect to them, but for the most part are still handled proactively. Is this emergency aspect optimal? No. You should of course, be as proactive and not reactive as you can.

If you have a client that has been one for a while, and an emergency—perceived or otherwise—crops up, I’m fairly confident you would handle it as an emergency and help them as best you can.

Emergency Responders and being forced to be one

When you call the fire department in the tragic event you have a fire, you may not have ever dealt with them before, but they answer the call with maximum effort because it’s their job.

If someone contacts you with no previous experience or connection to you, has never paid you, and also doesn’t know you from Adam, and expects you to respond to an emergency without any kind of established relationship, they are making you an emergency responder

In an almost-perfect world, there’s a chance that you can ride up on your metaphorical, big white horse and come to their rescue and save the day and this is now the moment they have you produce all of their spoons, handle all of their technology needs, or be their sole provider of napkins for their catering business.

But do people who want to establish a relationship with you, who have the forethought of being proactive, and aren’t the type to patch together things with bandages typically introduce themselves by forcing you to be an emergency responder?

Let’s go with “probably not.”

Love Bombing

Love Bombing in a relationship is when one party absolutely showers the other with affection, gifts, promises and the like. I have often said that the amount of attention one gets in the very early stages of a relationship is inversely proportional to how much they’ll get for the rest. My anecdotal evidence has been discussed with four separate women who have told me the exact story of a man who did exactly that—showered them with affection, flowers, etc. and then soon after marriage became neglectful, jealous, and worse.

Instead, it’s the low, realistic, burn and build that makes for a solid relationship.

Love Bombing in Business

if you connect with someone who is going to hook you up with contract work or hire you as a consultant, refer you, or even hire you directly, and they not only paint a near perfect picture of your relationship and what you’re going to get out of it, but also continue to add bonus after bonus and all of the other things they can probably do for you—the proverbial carrots…

The same phrase applies.

If they want to connect with you—and they start selling past the sale, and start promising all those extra things they can bring to bear, with their metaphorical dozen roses…

The same phrase applies.

As a side note, if YOU are doing this—meaning you start making lots of promises about all the other things you can offer if they would just say yes—then you probably don’t really believe in your product.

Or worse, you are not telling the truth about it.

Because if you truly believe in your product, then that’s all you talk about.

ps – We of course weight each opportunity separately, whether it is a personal relationship or a business opportunity. But you have probably been through this and learned the hard way.

Wisdom is like that.

*See The Status Game II and Beyond Status for a detailed explanation on this in the chapter of the same name.

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