Customers/Clients Archives - Page 23 of 35

If you can’t say something nice…

July 16, 2008

I had dinner with some friends the other night and I arrived first. After about 15 minutes of alone time, the waitress finally came over proceeded to tell me that they had over-filled her section and she was swamped. I assume that she told me this to explain why she had not stopped by until now.

We didn’t get great service as you might expect. But we did get an extra helping of TMI!

Do you do this? Do you share information with your customers or clients that they really don’t care to hear? If you don’t, my guess is that your employees do. They don’t mean to undermine your company – they’re just being friendly or trying to over-explain. But the damage is done, none-the-less.

Here are some classic "over sharing" remarks that can really tarnish the way a client thinks of your organization:

"Yeah, he’s so forgetful. (Or disorganized) But somehow, he always pulls the project through."

"We are so buried with work, I don’t know how we’ll get it all done."

"We’re always worried about machine #1. It’s constantly breaking down."

"You’d never know it, but they really can’t stand each other. It’s a wonder they can work on the same team."

You know the expression "ignorance is bliss?" Your customers do not want to hear about your problems. All is does is cause them to doubt your capabilities and wonder if perhaps your competitor has their act together more than you do.

I’m not advocating lying or even spinning the truth. If there’s a problem on their project or product, by all means, tell them. Full disclosure.

But do not air your internal dirty laundry. Make sure you and your employees understand the difference.

Are you tough enough to take it?

July 7, 2008

Most businesses have a heavy focus on acquiring new clients. Especially as we consider that we might be rolling into a recession. Everyone is sensitive to the importance of keeping new prospects flowing.

But we should remember that the way to get new prospects is to be smarter about how we treat current customers and even how we treated those customers we’ve lost. Getting smarter is a much better strategy than blindly lowering our prices to combat tougher times.

Losing a customer is inevitable. It happens to every business. But losing them for good is not inevitable. You can get a good percentage of them back.

One of the most powerful pieces of research you can do is a lost customer survey. This isn’t for the meek. It’s a little like being hit with a toxic gas. It can knock the wind out of you!

You need to be ready to hear some painful truths. They left for a reason. And the reason is rarely price. So something in your product, service or interactions pushed them into your competitor’s arms.

This is not something you can do effectively by yourself. Here’s a human truth that works both for and against us. People are basically nice. They don’t want to offend you or hurt your feelings. But you will be amazed at how candid (and sometimes brutally honest) they will be with an objective third-party. So, get professional help.

Once you hear the truth, there will be elements within your business that you will clearly want to change. Change them or put plans in place to change them. Then, craft a letter to your lost customers thanking them for their participation and sharing the results with them. Yes, air your dirty laundry. Then tell them about your plans to change the problems. Finally, ask them to come back. Give them an incentive to do so.

You won’t get them all. But you’ll get many of them back. Best of all, you have made changes that will keep more of your current clients right where they belong – with you.

One of the services we provide MMG clients is a customer satisfaction assessment. Every one of our clients who embarks on the research ends up changing the way they do business for the better. Hard to argue with results like that.

How do you drive traffic to your website or blog?

July 4, 2008

We all want readers.

Bottom line, that’s why businesses and professionals blog or put up a website. We want to connect. We want to share. We want to sell. And none of that happens without readers.

So I am curious and want to steal your good ideas.

How do you generate traffic at your blog or site? Do you have a written plan? A plan in your head? Do you have any techniques that make your numbers jump (hits in a day, new subscribers) and how permanent is the leap?

Do you have a few tried and true methods? Are you always experimenting or do you just chug along, creating good content and letting readers find you over time?

Let’s say creating good content is a given. What beyond that do you do?

If everyone shares a couple of their methods — we could compile quite a list and really help each other. So what say you?

Here’s interesting post from Ian at Conversation Marketing about StumbleUpon and how he uses it to earn new readers. Is that one of your tricks too?

Where in the world is your customer?

June 16, 2008

A client sent me some initial web copy that she and her team had drafted. It was copy for their home page and some other lead pages. I read through their draft and sent a very short e-mail back.

"Where are your customers?"

This, of course, triggered a phone call with a "what do you mean, where are my customers?"

Technically, there was nothing wrong with their copy. It was grammatically and factually correct. But, the copy was all about my client’s business. We were established in, we’ve got 4 offices in, our expertise is, our philosophy is, we believe…

You get the idea. We, us, our, we. But their customers were no where to be seen.

How do you feel about a person who just talks about themselves? Do you have a sense that they care about you? Do you want to hang out with them?

The same goes for marketing. Your copy needs to reach out and connect with the audience before you start talking about yourself. You want them to demonstrate that you understand who they are and what problems they are facing. After you’ve established that — then and only then can you begin talking about yourself.

How did I fix the client’s copy? I added four questions to the very beginning of their home page which asked:

Are you irritated when you…
Are you tired of having to pay for…
Does it grate on your nerves when….
What if it didn’t have to be that way?

And so on. You get the idea. I did some other tweaking of course…but started by adding the customer back into the copy.

You know what I am going to tell you to do next. If you’re brave enough, go check out your own brochures, websites, print ads, etc.

Is your customer there at all?

Update: Mark over at Really Practical Marketing has added to the conversation by offering some ideas on how you can make your copy more customer focused.

What are your customers tolerating?

June 9, 2008

The buzz today (and for the past few weeks) is that Twitter will be down for much of the day.
When you pull out of the fast food drive thru, you check the bag to see if they got the order right.
Your accountant takes two days to return your call.

We’re surrounded by mediocre service. It’s annoying. It frustrates us. And yet we tolerate it. And typically we tolerate it in silence.

That silence kills.

It kills trust. It kills loyalty and eventually, it will kill the relationship altogether. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that this is everyone else’s problem.

Do you know what your customers are tolerating? What do they find frustrating? If you don’t know the answer to that question (and aren’t repeatedly asking it) then you have customers who are slowly stepping towards the exit.

What are you going to do about it?

The ingredients of WOW!

June 2, 2008

When was the last time you raved about a business? Was it because their product was so notably superior? Or was it because something they did WOWed you?

Think of the companies that we hear about every day. Disney, Nordstroms, and Whole Foods comes to mind. We don’t hear about their rides, shirts or olive selection. We hear about something memorable they did or created. We hear about the atmosphere, the attitudes and the energy level.

We hear about the WOW.

Think about the last time you were WOWed. What elements were present? How did they create that moment that you couldn’t help but talk about?

Or….how do you create WOW for your clients? What do you do that absolutely delights them?

For me, one of the absolutes is surprise. it doesn’t have to be a big surprise. In fact, the more minute the detail, the better.

Once you’ve thought about it (and hopefully shared here) for a bit, check out this post by Michael Hyatt. He talks about his own experiment in trying to identify WOW. What do you think of his concoction of WOW ingredients?

Who is doing a stellar job of harnessing the power of their client base?

June 1, 2008

I gave a presentation on branding in Marco Island, FL (not a bad gig in January) and have since struck up an e-mail conversation with a gentleman from the UK who was there.

He asked me a question that I’m not sure I know the answer to….so I thought I would ask you. I am confident that you’ll know.

Do "we" know of some other B-to-B companies who are doing a stellar job of marketing to their existing client base to generate additional projects/revenue (in other words…turning clients into a referral source)?

What say you? Do you have some examples of work you’ve done for a client? Case studies you’ve read? Other blog posts you could point us to? Something you are doing inside your own company?

The elasticity of price

May 26, 2008

Gas prices are scooting over $4/gallon here in the states and yet consumption has not shown signs of significant reduction. How can that be?

That’s the question that reporter Gail Rosenblum of the Minneapolis Star Tribune posed to me late last week. Her article, Paying a lot for gas, changing lifestyles a little" appeared in Friday’s edition of the Star Tribune.

While I know this specific topic (gas prices) is on everyone’s mind, it seems to me that the conversation Gail and I had is even more interesting when you step back and look at consumer attitudes about prices in general.

Two years ago, we were in a tizzy over gas prices. We couldn’t believe they were going to be $2/gallon. We were outraged. We were going to cut back. (Of course, we didn’t) Fast forward to today. Imagine if I stopped people on the street and asked them what they would think of paying $2/gallon for gas. They would weep for joy. In fact, it would sound too good to be true and they’d ask me "what’s the catch?"

Ahhh, the elasticity of price perception.

Why do I think this is worthy of some thought? A few things to note:

The elasticity of price is a one-way street (we are never happy about going higher in price after the marketplace reduces costs.)

The elasticity of price is fast-acting (we get used to the higher price pretty quickly.)

The elasticity of price works best for necessities (we can cut back on stuff we don’t "need" but endure price hikes on stuff we think we do need.)

So how could you apply this thinking to how you set prices? If everyone in your industry is lowering prices because of the recession — how will this hold them back when they’re ready to re-raise their prices? How will it affect you if you resist the urge to lower prices now?

Be consistent. Be consistent. Be consistent.

May 9, 2008

Add to that, be predictable.

Why? It feels safe, trustworthy and comfortable. And, it creates an expectation in a customer or prospect that you can successfully fulfill.

Always remember…you get tired of your message much quicker than your audience does. You may not even get noticed the first few times someone hears from you. You just have too much competition for their attention. After six or seven times, there might be recognition, but perhaps they don’t need you yet. Typically it takes 8-13 interactions for your audience to really register that you are talking to them.

But what would happen if you stopped talking to them after attempt #7? Or if you speak to them differently each time?

We’ve been sending out a weekly e-mail marketing tip since 1999. We get calls from people who want to hire or interview us – some who have been putting our weekly e-mails in a 3-ring binder for several months or even a couple years, but they just hadn’t needed us until that moment.

Thank goodness we didn’t take them off the list after the first five contacts didn’t elicit a response!

Whether the magic number of contacts is five or fifty-two, make sure you are consistent and repetitive in your efforts to reach out for new customers.

What are you overlooking?

April 28, 2008

Everyone is scrambling to find the next new thing in marketing. How do we break through the clutter? What high tech wonder can we harness to get our customer’s attention? How can I be one step ahead of the competition?

Recently, I was reminded that sometimes we just have to look at things a little differently to find the answer. No new medium, no new gadget — just seeing something that was in front of us all along.

I know it won’t surprise you to learn that I was getting on a plane recently. I had changed my flight so I was in the last group of people to be called to board the plane. The line was moving right along and for some reason I noticed that people were actually looking at the gate agent. They were having a brief exchange of some kind. People were smiling. "How weird is that," I thought.

As I got closer, I could hear the gate agent. As he scanned each person’s boarding pass, he was greeting them by name. He varied the greeting…"welcome aboard, how are you doing, good to see you, thanks for flying with us"….but he ended them all with the person’s name.

Here’s a guy who was creating instant customer impressions. No marketing budget. No memo. No meetings. He just realized that everyone’s name was printed on the boarding pass and he could use that fact to create a "talk about" moment.

Sure, he called me Andrew instead of Drew (I just assumed I was in trouble!) so it wasn’t a perfect execution. And I’m sure he knew that every once in awhile he was going to mispronounce a name. But he forged ahead anyway. And it was absolutely noteworthy.

Our names have been on boarding passes for years. This is the first time I have ever had a gate agent call me by name as I passed by. It doesn’t have to be a big thing to be a remarkable thing. Think of the thousands of gate agents who could have done the same thing, but it never occurred to them.

What have you overlooked?

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