First day as a sales manager? Fear under control? Oh good. You don’t mind us asking do you? Well, get a load of this.
Inevitably you’ll be asked in your first meeting about your staffing requirements. After all, you can’t do everything yourself. So think through what you really need and separate that from the ‘nice to have but inessential staffing’. Do you really need a full-time personal assistant when a part-time one might suffice? http://venturelink.co.uk/staff-means-overheads/
“It is often said that consensus is time-consuming and difficult. Making complex, difficult decisions is time-consuming, no matter what the process. Many different methods can be efficient, if every participant shares a common understanding of the rules of the game. Like any process, Formal Consensus can be inefficient if a group does not first assent to follow a particular structure.”
© C.T. Butler, 1987
Q - I am a sales and marketing manager for a computer hardware retailer. I prefer the sales bit, and so I try to do more of that than the other. In all truth, I’m beginning to form the opinion that some customers are just too dim to be educated. What’s your view please?
A - Some would argue that the problem is that products are too sophisticated for all customers to understand. Cars are becoming ever more sophisticated – so could it be that the makers are inadvertently making life difficult for the dealerships? Similarly with computers, software and so on. My response is that this is an over-simplistic view.
The problem is that marketing people don’t believe that customer education is part of the marketing plan.
They would claim that they’re supposed to create desire for the computer but somebody else should deal with educating the customer. This demarcation is recipe for a pain-filled future for the hapless dealer who is the first point of contact for the frustrated owner.
However, far sighted companies are creating marketing quality managers. They do this because they’ve found that the way you market a product is a key factor in determining the level of customer satisfaction.
Currently this is the best I can offer. It’s a complicated situation with no clear answers. If you think customers, or at least some of them are too dim to be educated then for certain your body language will transmit this to the unconscious and yet deeply influential mind of the buyer. So try and stop it. Not easy I know.
Worse yet (I’m not in the habit of putting a positive spin on a situation that realistically is a futile gesture) the root of the problem is utterly beyond your control.
Corporate arrogance from giant suppliers means that in all probability your single-outlet retailer, the profit generated and the well-being of the staff are only of very marginal interest. That’s the reality in 2011. So what can you do?
You could do what I’ve done. Analyse the frequency of all post-purchase issues. Usually, and I have no idea why this is, 80% of the major hassles will come from just 20% of the purchases. Then on your website have a section called ‘Customer Support’. On that page, for each of the most frequent problems have a concise yet friendly, readable and practical response (by this I mean the sot of things that end-users can do for themselves) to sort the problem out for themselves.
Finally, make sure that your organisation stands behind everything they sell (tell, tell and re-tell) and that if the guidance notes don’t solve the problem then they should feel no hesitation in phoning you.
I suspect that this comparatively small effort and cost will dramatically reduce the depth and frequency of post-purchase hassles.
Has it struck you what you will have achieved by doing this? You’ve educated people without them knowing it. Terrific!
NB: Howard Popeck can be contacted directly on 07870 192618. Please leave a voicemail and your return phone number if he can’t take your call there and then. Thank you.
Posted in Your questions answered by Howard Popeck
Tagged Howard Popeck, marketing
Extract . . .
Are you a boss who struggles to keep meetings on track? If so, try the six tips below. They will help you bring focus to your team and run your gatherings in a smoother fashion.
Read more here:
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/8108443/bosses_six_tips_to_keep_your_meetings.html
Extract . . .
“These are early days for online meetings, so we can expect best practice to evolve, ingenious new features to be added to the available systems, and even cleverer applications to be discovered by those who have to put these tools into practice. At Onlignment, we have put a marker in the sand by developing our own set of rules for better online meetings, based on the best practice that we’ve been able to glean from around the world and from our own experiences as a virtual team.”
Read more here:
Posted in Internet/technology based meetings
Tagged Internet, online meetings, technology, Web conferencing
Now, now. There’s you, having expected everything to go so well in the networking meeting and yet – somehow – it didn’t. You just didn’t click with anyone, or was it that they didn’t with you? There, there. Get over it! Plan for the next one.
You can’t undo the past, but you sure can learn from it. Here’s how to get your thinking just right for next time.
If you can’t think of a way to give value, ask the one question that no one has ever asked me in a networking meeting: “What can I do to help you?” This will surprise and flatter the person you’re meeting. Even if they can’t think of anything, they’ll remember you.
Prior to that crucial face-to-face sales presentation meeting you should know why someone should buy from you instead of the competition. Find your unique selling points and know your competitors so that you can address all the issues. A prospect that has doubts after you leave the meeting is unlikely to become a customer.
Q - Hi. I’ve heard you in a lecture a while back use a phrase about avoiding hassle via customer education, or something like that. This was in the Q&A section at the end of the lecture. I remember agreeing with you but can’t currently access precisely what you said. I am currently a customer services manager in a retail business. Thanks.
A - Well, truth be told, I only vaguely remember this myself. So I looked up notes from 1995. Felt a bid odd then realising how many years back this was. Anyway, here’s the relevant extract from my notes from that lecture. I very much hope this is what you are referring to.
Through Education, Avoid Hassle
Observation in America shows that about only 20% of complaints are caused by customer dissatisfaction. The other 80% is generally divided equally between the company inadvertently planting ‘time-bombs’ into the system, and the customer doing stupid things. Here is an example from the computer industry – just to clarify the point.
At one time or another most computer companies have received tidal waves of phone calls from concerned customers complaining that their keyboards were defective. What happened in reality was that their computer screen said something like ‘push any key to continue’, and the customer then looking for the key marked ‘ANY’ failed to find one.
It could be argued that customer education is one of the finest investments a professional company could make. They could have avoided 10′s of 1000′s of calls, merely by putting a simple statement, in a prominent position, in the manual, the carton or whatever. They do now!
NB: Howard Popeck can be contacted directly on 07870 192618. Please leave a voicemail and your return phone number if he can’t take your call there and then. Thank you.
Posted in Your questions answered by Howard Popeck
Tagged customers, education, Howard Popeck, skills