Don’t give people a reason to eliminate you.

My outgoing voicemail message states, “Please leave a one minute message at the tone.”

A sales rep cold called and left a five minute message. Normally, I never go back and listen to a message this long, but he did something I couldn’t believe he did. So I went back and listened to it again.

Sure enough, I was right. He left a five minute message...and he never left his phone number.

He’s probably wondering to this day why I never called back.

Golden rule: don’t give people a reason to eliminate you. Don’t do and say stupid things.