Wow! I’ve already gotten a lot of great feedback about the new “Theme” days I announced yesterday.
Remember, those “officially” start next week, but today’s email actually fits perfectly in the “Strategy Thursday” column. Seeing how it’s Thursday, I guess that worked out!
I was talking to a friend recently about a bad customer experience he had…
Actually, not quite a customer experience…
A NON-customer experience…
Because as a result of this experience, the sale was lost. He never became a customer.
And that means — at a bare minimum — $99 in lost revenue… And probably — because of the potential for future purchases down the road — at least $500 or more in total lost revenue, much of that profits.
All because of a stupid mistake!
You see, my friend used to work for a training company.
I don’t want to get my friend into trouble, so I’m not going to get too specific. It’s not important for the lesson, anyway.
Anyway, this training company has a great reputation.
High-quality training products — videos on a very specific career skill (NOT marketing training — if you’re reading my emails, you probably don’t know who they are).
And let’s just say things didn’t end well between my friend and this company.
So, for the most part, he’d be happy to never see them again.
Never do business with them.
BUT, he’s now working for a different company, and has an employee that happens to NEED the same training this company provides…
AND this employee LOVES the training the illustrious training company puts out.
Which put my friend in a bad place…
Here are what he saw as his options:
1. He could tell his employee that they had to go elsewhere for training, because of his own bad feelings (even though he knew this particular company makes high-quality training at a competitive price)…
2. He could let his employee figure out training on his own (ignoring what he sees as a crucial role of a boss — to make sure his employees are adequately prepared for the job they’re asked to do)… OR…
3. He could suck it up and go to this company — ignoring bad blood — to get the training his employee wanted.
He chose #3…
BUT — and this is a big BUT — he wanted to double-check the training first, knowing the industry as an insider…
Here’s where things really started to go downhill…
You see, this particular training is designed to help with career certifications. That is, in this industry, getting certifications for certain capabilities is highly-important to employers, recruiters, and is generally seen as a must-have across the industry.
And this particular training this employee needed was for one of those certifications…
And my friend, being an insider, knew that in the past the certification had been listed with the third-party certification provider as up-to-snuff…
So he hopped on over to their website to check it out.
He looked up the company name… Nada.
He looked up the trainer… Zilch.
Turns out what would have been completely normal in his day — a listing of “approved” from the certifying organization — was nowhere to be found.
And so, he wrote to the service and support department…
His email was something along the lines of…
“I know your training used to be listed here as APPROVED training… But now I can’t find it. What’s going on?”
A perfectly reasonable email.
An email the sales, support, AND customer service departments should ALL be trained to handle (and were, under my friend)…
An email that highlights a VERY common potential objection in the industry…
A buying signal if I’ve ever seen one!
And here’s how support totally screwed the pooch!
What my friend should have gotten back was a reasonable explanation walking him back from the ledge…
Yes, you’re right. It’s NOT listed today. And, it has been in the past.
The process for getting training listed there can sometimes take some time. And as of right now, our training has not yet been approved. We’re working on it.
But in the mean time, you can be confident that our experienced, professional trainers map all certification training to the exam objectives. And our thousands upon thousands of happy customers — as evidenced by our reputation in the market — are proof that our training does consistently meet or exceed objectives and expectations.
I’d be happy to answer any specific questions you have. You’re free to try out the training using the ‘Free Trial’ we offer on the website. And if you find that the training does NOT meet exam objectives, we will work with you to make it right.
What did my friend ACTUALLY get?
A short, curt email along the lines of…
No. I don’t know where you heard that.
Not only that, it took the support department something like THREE BUSINESS DAYS to write this one-sentence-and-one-fragment email.
THREE BUSINESS DAYS! Not for a good answer, but a bad one!
In short, this dumb support email lost the sale…
“THIS is what you get for sending support an email that we don’t like!”
My friend, despite his ill feelings and bad experience, was willing to give this company a chance because of the quality of the training.
And had his email been answered more like my example above…
And NOT like it was really answered…
He probably would have made the purchase.
That would have been at least $99 in immediate revenue.
And — for training for that employee alone, maybe $600 total over the next couple years.
Further, because my friend is a training decision maker, he could have brought the company thousands, or even tens-of-thousands of dollars in business in the coming years.
Not any more.
All because of one dumb, poorly-answered support email.
Selling goes beyond the sales and marketing departments…
Particularly today, when front-line employees have a thousand different ways they can interact with customers and potential customers.
Every touch or interaction a potential client has with your business is either BUILDING or ERODING the relationship.
Every person in your company should see their role as improving the company’s relationship with your market, customers, and prospects.
Everybody needs training in HOW to do this part of their job, in addition to the technical skills of their job.
Everybody needs CONSTANT and CONTINUOUS reminders that THIS is the most important role they play…
Because if ANYBODY kills the sale often enough, NOBODY has a job — whether it’s the support tech, the shipping person who puts off sending an order for a week, the customer service rep who can’t handle being yelled at for questionable service, OR the sales and marketing teams.
That’s why I believe EVERY business should plaster this on their wall…
“Every Touch Is A Selling Opportunity!”
Yours for bigger breakthroughs,
Roy Furr
Editor, Breakthrough Marketing Secrets
