Do You Make These Mistakes In Your Business?
By Anna Johnson on July 18th, 2008Here’s a true story. As you read it, please ask yourself: Do you make these mistakes in your Internet business?
If you don’t: great! If you do: even better! Because when you fix these mistakes, you’ll make more sales and profits with almost NO cost or effort.
On with the story…
Last week I wanted to buy a certain software product. However, I needed to know if it had a specific feature. Since the software vendor’s website didn’t give enough information on this, I thought I’d find a store that sold the software and ask them.
Being an avid online shopper, my first inclination was to search the web for an online store that sold the software and call or email them with my question.
Well, I found a store that specialized in the software and actually provided lots of helpful information. Great!
Now, this store actually sold the software at a higher price than it was retailing for at a “real” store I knew of. But, seeing all the helpful information this Internet store was providing, I felt much more comfortable doing business with them. I was willing to pay a little more if they could give me some more care and attention.
In short, they had the sale in the bag. I just wanted them to answer my question first…
So I sent them my question via their online form and waited for a response. And that’s when they totally lost the sale – and any future sales – from me!
Here’s how they blew it:
- Mistake #1: I sent them the question on Thursday. They didn’t reply until the following Monday. NOT GOOD ENOUGH!
- Mistake #2: I got a short, blunt answer. You’d think they’d be eager to provide me with plenty of help, offer to call me to discuss my needs, see if they could help in any way… but no. NOT GOOD ENOUGH!
- Mistake #3: I sent them a reply to their initial email asking for more information. This was a second chance to save the sale! But, again, I got a short, blunt answer. NOT GOOD ENOUGH!
So I bought the software elsewhere.
Every time a customer contacts you out of the blue, you should be rejoicing. Not only have you paid virtually nothing to get them to your website or in touch with you, but they are already presold!
All you have to do is close the deal. And being warm, reassuring and helpful may get you the sale EVEN IF YOU CHARGE MORE FOR EXACTLY THE SAME THING the customer could get elsewhere!
And yet, the only thing this particular company could have done worse was to fail to reply to my email in the first place. And plenty of companies do that too!
Whatever YOU do in your Internet business, don’t let hot prospects fall through the cracks like this!
Train your support staff – and yourself – to view EVERY interaction with a customer or potential customer as the chance to deepen the relationship with them, if not to make a sale.
And the fantastic thing is that if you start doing this, you’ll make more money. And it doesn’t cost you anything except a little more effort.
