Over the years I have had many business come to me for advice on how to increase their business and get more revenue in the door. Sadly most seem to have little interest in improving their service, getting smarter about what they sell or offering more value, because this seems a little ho hum. Instead they want a big campaign to advertise or promote their business. So they go off, spend thousands of dollars, attract some new customers, but wonder why they can’t keep them.
If a business has “issues”, particularly in terms of service, the more new customers that it attracts, only to be disappointed, the more anti-customers that are going to be created. And we all know that people are very vocal these days, particularly on social media platforms, about their disappointing experiences.
One example I want to share is with regard to a plumber whose services I tried to use recently. I saw an advertisement for the business in the local paper, called to get them to come over and fix a few leaks. Firstly the phones rang out, several times. Then I got through to a message bank, where I left a message. No response. I did this again. No response for 5 days. Finally a call and I was advised that someone would come out in 2-3 weeks. Of course no one has turned up and no follow up has been done. We’ve all had experiences like this.
My point here is why on earth would this business bother to advertise instead of getting their act together internally, making sure their service is excellent? Surely they must know that their service is lousy? Maybe they are making that much money they don’t care? I doubt it very much. From my experience a business that is this disorganised doesn’t make money. It goes along in a crazy, frantic and messy way until if finally disintegrates.
We need to get our businesses right before we try to attract new customers. We have to make certain that our systems are working, that are our products and services are 100% right and that we have the capacity to do extra work. Then we can go and chase new business.
This is not something that we do once, we need to be constantly assessing our business, ensuring we are delivering on expectations. A big part of this is having very open and honest discussions with our customers. We need to ask for feedback and be prepared to take it. Very few businesses are good at this.
The reality is that we all need to put just as much money, time and energy into our existing customers and business operations as we do into business development and attracting new customers. Don’t spend a cent on external advertising or marketing until you can put your hand on your heart and say that you can deliver on the promises you are making. Master this and your business will be way ahead of your competitors and you will create enormous word of mouth referral, and ultimately, you won’t need to spend a lot of money on business development because people come to your business anyway.
Until next time,
Andrew
PS My next Professional Presenters Bootcamp will be held in Cairns on March 29th – here is a link for more information or to book. I will be running these one day workshops around Australia this year and I will confirm dates over the next few weeks. PROFESSIONAL PRESENTERS BOOTCAMP
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