by Angela Taffs | Mar 16, 2022 | Business Success, Sales and Marketing
Have you been losing customers and not sure why?
If you’ve been losing customers, maybe it’s because you have been breaking promises you cannot keep.
“What?” I hear you exclaim! Me? Break promises? Never!
Well good on you if you don’t because I have discovered there are far too many out there who do. And I bet they are losing numerous customers because of it without even realising.
You can have the best product or service on the market and exactly what your customer is looking for, but if you let them down during the customer journey they will walk.
Over the past couple of months, I have been promised numerous things from thank you gifts for completing surveys, to information sheets following up treatments to trial samples of products. These are the small things you think may not matter. But if they fail to be delivered they matter a lot! The potential customer loses faith in your ability to look after them.
And then there are the bigger ticket items where a potential customer has asked for a quote. You promise to get it to them within 48 hours and two weeks later they are still waiting!
At first, I wondered if it was just me. But then I started to notice a few times on social media where someone had run a promotion, promised to send the prize to the winner, but had failed to do so. The winner had turned from being delighted to being somewhat snarky and having to ask publicly when they were going to receive their prize.
And I’m seeing more and more on social media and hearing first-hand of people who have been let down.
And I have to be honest when someone promises me something that I haven’t asked for I am delighted and excited. But when the said item fails to materialise, I feel a little narked. Why did they bother offering anything in the first place? And if I’ve expressed an interest in buying from them and asked for a price or samples to try before I buy, if I get radio silence in return rather than what I was promised, I get seriously miffed and vow never to use them again.
Get organised and stop losing customers
Before you go making quick off the cuff promises to impress, think carefully if you can actually deliver on your promise. And if you can, get organised!! Carry a notebook or diary at all times and write down what you have promised to do. And then do it!
If you don’t keep your promises, you could well be losing customers. In fact, I almost guarantee it.
I purchased from a lady recently and was fully prepared to buy again. When chatting with her she promised to send me a free gift to try first. When it failed to arrive, I felt that she didn’t really care about my custom and didn’t really care if I went back and purchased again or not. So, I didn’t. And I am sourcing someone else to buy from.
I could give you a shedload of other examples from buying a car, a new kitchen, new flooring, a holiday, a spa day and the list goes on.
If you don’t keep up your end of the bargain, buyers will lose trust in you. They won’t believe that you will be able to deliver in the future and so may take their hard-earned money elsewhere. And the knock-on of this is they will tell others how you let them down gaining you a bad reputation. A survey back in 2020 by Forbes showed that no less than 96 of customers would leave a company if they experienced bad customer service. Another survey in 2017 by American Express stated that customers who have a bad customer experience tell an average of 15 people! And I bet you it’s way more than that now with the increase in social media being used to out companies.
But the worrying thing is that whilst they are telling anyone and everyone who will listen, they may not be telling you about their unhappy experience with you. You simply don’t understand why they haven’t come back to buy. That’s if you remember them at all of course.
Stop over-promising
The interesting thing is that research shows the companies who break promises tend to be repeat offenders. This could be down to bad organisation or they are just way too busy to deliver on their promises. If you fall into this category, be honest with people and stop making those promises. You have more chance of selling to someone who isn’t expecting something you can’t deliver on.
We all know the old adage of ‘under promise and over deliver’ so stop setting unrealistic expectations and making promises you can’t keep.
Go back and look through past prospects and clients. Did you promise anything that you failed to deliver? If so, see if it’s not too late to rectify the situation and gain that trust back.
And for the future, set yourself up with a simple database. Every time you have contact with someone, go update their record and set yourself a task to do what you promised to do. It’s not rocket science.
And look on the flip side. If you do keep your promises, give great customer service and make your customers feel valued, you can create repeat customers for years to come.
by Angela Taffs | Mar 25, 2016 | Sales and Marketing
Guest blog from Vicki Nicolson
Vicki Nicolson Branding Therapy
When you first started out in business I bet you thought, right, I’ll press my publish button on my Facebook page, launch my site, set up all my different social media accounts and then BOOM I’ll get loads of clients. And as soon as you did all this you got a few likes from friends and well wishes but not actual paying customers, am I right?
So here’s the thing when it comes to your lovely business, you really are the only one who cares about it more than anyone else. You are your biggest fan because you believe that you can do great things, change people’s lives and make a real difference. So why aren’t you telling anyone? Why are you sitting looking at competitor websites, pages and posts? Whilst in the back of your mind there is a little voice telling you, OH MY GOD THIS IS NEVER GONNA WORK, YOU ARE CRAP and YOU CAN NOT DO THIS.
This is called being normal! Brands build their reputation and recognition over time. There is no such thing as an overnight success. Speak to anyone in business and they will tell you the same thing. Crickey, Apple were literally on the verge of going bankrupt until Steve Jobs returned to Apple. They had to work mighty hard to get to where there are now.
So how can you too become a brand magnet and stand out from the crowd? Here are my 3 simple steps to help to magnetise your brand and supercharge your business.
Step #1 – BE YOU
Your brand is all about personality. You know already what makes you different but sometimes we just don’t have the guts to show our true colours and confidence holds us back. Find something you love doing, be YOU and be consistent and I guarantee you will feel more at ease with your brand and your biz.
So just be YOU. That is the one piece of advice I give on a daily basis. Stick your name in your biz name. This is key advice, especially for the coaching market. Right now I see a lot of coaches entering the market, using your own name makes you unique and will make you stand out in an overcrowded marketplace. Sticking you name right in there in your business also makes you look passionate about your business too. You love it so god damn much you put your name to it. This also works, especially if it is just you in the business.
Write your copy for your site the way you want to. Post on your FB page when you want and not on the basis of your insights – I get way more engagement when I don’t even take notice of my insights stats. And tell your brand story – tell people how you came up with your business idea, what your passion is and how you help them. People are intrigued by how you can help them. The whole brand building process is about building an emotional connection with you so that ultimately they buy from you.
Step #2 – Use eye-catching images and don’t blend in
First impressions matter – it takes milliseconds for your potential customers to form an opinion about your website, logo and visual branding, font, colours, spacing, symmetry etc so your brand image is everything.
Using eye-catching brand images will enhance your brand’s image ten-fold. I know the hard part can be finding just the ‘right’ image for your meme, Facebook cover or brochure but the biggest secret behind captivating your audience is to follow some of my simple basic steps to help you pull some images together fast.
- Try to choose images based on the relevance of what you are posting and writing about.
- Don’t blend in. So for instance, if you sell ethical products then it would be obvious to use all things green and eco related right? WRONG! Go down a different path, choose a different colour, like pink with a use of teal and yellow instead, and images of laughing women seem to get the most engagement on my own Facebook page. Try it and see.
- Use quirky images that pop and don’t just copy and paste other people’s quotes when you are posting memes, find your own voice and write your own quotes based on your own opinions.
- Use well-composed images that ooze greatness and that are well thought out.
Overall think about the emotion you are trying to communicate. How do you want you tribe to feel? You want to build an emotional connection with your brand, how will you communicate that?
Step #3 – Professionally brand yourself
We’re all drawn to visual gorgeousness. It attracts interest and it creates desire for something. If you want to make more money in your business right now then you need to create an exciting and irresistible brand identity for your biz. A well-developed brand identity is key for clients and customers in their decision making process. According to Google research, users spend most time focusing on your logo before moving on within a website – it’s 6.48 seconds – yup that’s more time than anywhere else on your site! Yikes! You literally have seconds to win them over. 94% of first impressions are design related. Google research, overall, said this, “invest in design – it’s what matters the most for pulling users in.”
The benefits of having a good logo are tenfold:
- It makes you look established, bigger, committed and reputable
- Conveys you are professional
- It explains your company name
- You will stand out from others in a similar field or explains an unusual line of business
It’s a no brainer to get yourself a good logo and consistent branding across all your marketing materials and that includes things like photoshoots, your office space and even down to what specific piece of clothing you wear. I am known for my love of all things pink – I wear a lot of pink. So my brand is pink. Nails are painted pink… Professional branding identity will boost your business and your confidence.
Once you nail these simple steps you will start to ask yourself, how can I do more with my brand?
Your brand will evolve over time but you need to be committed, consistent, be your biggest fan and be hands on in your brand. It needs daily maintenance, it needs love and your customers need to be engaged. So be prepared to look after your brand. Post every day, mingle in groups, get your name out there, be the expert, stand out from the crowd and be in it for the long haul and I guarantee it will supercharge your sales.
Author
Vicki is a creative branding stylist, designing magnetic branding for women in business throughout the world.
Vicki has two decades of graphics, marketing and communications expertise. She enjoyed a lucrative career working as an in-house designer for international corporations and when her son turned four she decided it was time to take the leap and follow her dream of running her own business.
Using her power of creativity Vicki helps women stand out from the crowd by branding businesses in such a way to target desired clients and help convert customers into paying ones.
For more information visit: https://www.vickinicolson.com/
