The Marketing Message Blog

A look back at customer satisfaction Feb 08: Still guilty of this?

I was thinking back to a post I wrote in Feb of '08 about a freakishly bad customer service incident I witnessed at a big retail chain store.  It got me thinking about whether sellers both online and off are 'freshening up' their customer service or just hoping the recession will end so they can go back to mistreating the customer. 

Read the post below and see where you fall on the customer satisfaction scale.  Although I hope that kind of thinking has been squashed by the economy, I'm not so sure.  What do you think?

Feb '08 post: I saw a very interesting customer service interaction in a major chain store the other day that I have to share. The woman ahead of me bought many items. The clerk handed her back a small shopping bag with all the items unappealingly squeezed in—almost bursting the bag.

When the woman asked for a larger bag, the clerk refused saying, Sorry I can only give you a bag that fits your items with no space or I could lose my job. The woman became annoyed (as I would have) and said, 'If I give you $5 dollars can I have a bigger bag?' At that point everyone in line joined the conversation and a larger bag was finally supplied.

When it was my turn, I asked the clerk why she could lose her job. She said the store was having theft problems and the way she was instructed to deal with it was to make sure that bags had no room to stuff extra merchandise.

Hmm, well that's one way to handle it—punish the customers who buy a lot. Make sure to think through your solutions to service problems, lest they have the opposite effect.

Marketing new technology? Avoid these top three mistakes.

Over the years I have worked with many technology companies who market their software, hardware or tools online.  I still see some of them making the same mistakes today that were made when the web was in its infancy. 

Here are some things to consider that may prevent a common misstep:

1. Don't assume anyone will know what your product does just because you put up a website. 

This is probably the most common mistake.  I will be asked to go to a website to evaluate a software product.  When I get there, I can see immediately that everyone who was involved with putting up the website knows exactly what the software does.  The secret is safe with them.  Without a clear idea of what it does to improve my life on the home page, I'm off to the next site. Before you launch your product make sure you ask several people who know nothing about it to look at your website and see if they can tell you what it does. Seriously.

2. Make sure you create marketing videos, audios, step-by step instructions, etc. 

If you have to rely on the customer spending time to figure something out, you've lost them to a vendor with an easier product, even if it doesn't hold a candle to yours.  You've seen it time and time again.  A mediocre product outsells a great one because the mediocre one came with instructions.

3. Offering a trial version of something is not the end of the sales process, it's the beginning.

Just because they downloaded or requested a look at your product doesn't mean they will take any action to review or evaluate it.  Keep in touch with your prospect to help them make it over the greatest hurdle which is actually looking at it with an eye to buy it.

The Value of Free

I'm always on the lookout for ideas that big companies use to great effect, that can be used equally well by small and medium size companies.  In the article "Loyalty at Work" by Kevin Zimmerman in the Sept/Oct issue of www.1to1media.com he reports on the success of Best Buy's Reward Zone program. 

Originally, when Best Buy conceived their 'points' program they charged a one-time fee of $9.99 to join.  In an effort to grow and revitalize the program, they made it free. "Membership jumped from about 8 million to just shy of 30 million."  This increased the buyer pool of customers looking at offers by almost 4-fold.

Ok, so you see the obvious benefit of 'free' in that case.  But perhaps you are struggling with the issue of 'bird in the hand' revenue for your business. You want to get the short-term revenue you derive from a one-time membership fee vs. increasing your potential buyer pool. 

How do you decide what's best for your business:

If you are in the position of trading a smaller one time membership for potential larger long-term sales, consider the latter. 

If you are thinking about an ongoing stream of monthly revenue in subscriptions vs. free, consider the former.  Make sure to apply the value of 'free' when it makes the most sense.  Not everything can or should be a free offer, contrary to what you are hearing online these days.

Should you launch that new product?

A "golden nugget" of information is reported in Business Week's Small Biz Feb/March 2008 issue.  In "What's for Launch" Doug Hall, small biz guru and CEO of Eureka Ranch looked into the issue of determining whether to go ahead with a new product launch.  I'm often asked questions about new product launches, e.g., how to decide whether to launch one product over another or to launch at all.

To answer this question, Doug Hall looked into his data archives of 100 product launches by his clients and academic articles to see if he could offer an answer.  He found that the single best predictor of success was meaningful difference or uniqueness.  Meaningful difference in this case refers to a blend of customer interest in buying and perception of how different the product is from competitors. 

The big takeaway here is that the marketing task for any product or service is to tell customers why it's not the same old thing.  There needs to be a real answer to that question, not just spin.  That means that if you are struggling to find the difference, or there really isn't one, reconsider launching it until it has one.  If you spin the product to appear to have a difference when one doesn't exist you'll get returns and unhappy former buyers.

Customer Service? You decide

I saw a very interesting customer service interaction in a major chain store the other day that I have to share.  The woman ahead of me bought many items. The clerk handed her back a small shopping bag with all the items unappealingly squeezed in—almost bursting the bag.  When the woman asked for a larger bag, the clerk refused saying, Sorry I can only give you a bag that fits your items with no space or I could lose my job.  The woman became annoyed (as I would have) and said, 'If I give you $5 dollars can I have a bigger bag?'  At that point everyone in line joined the conversation and a larger bag was finally supplied. 

When it was my turn, I asked the clerk why she could lose her job. She said the store was having theft problems and the way she was instructed to deal with it was to make sure that bags had no room to stuff extra mechandise. 

Hmm, well that's one way to handle it—punish the customers who buy a lot.  Make sure to think through your solutions to service problems, lest they have the opposite effect.

Good Websites Still Matter

Revenue Magazine's September/October 2006 issue cited a study done by Enterpulse.  They asked respondents what they considered 'the most important qualities of a great website.'  No great surprises here, but an excellent reminder about what really counts. 

The top five are: 1)updated frequently;  2)ease of use;  3)high-quality content; 4)respond to questions within 24 hours; 5)quick to download.  If your website is performing poorly, go back and check these five and see how your rate. 

The Word 'Free' Should Not Scare Small Business Owners

There is an interesting article in the October, 2006 issue of Business 2.0 by Katherine Heires called "Why It Pays to Give Away the Store."  She gives nine tips culled from venture capitalists and entrepreneurs about how a 'freemium' strategy can be successful. 

This 9 point list may scare some small online business owners.  They are already struggling with the fact that many of their potential customers expect everything for free!  I've spoken to many small business owners who marvel at the fact that their target audiences are shocked when they confront a "buy now" button. They believe everything should be free. 

The key to making a freemium strategy work is to plan ahead and never sway from your plan.  The article states, "once you've decided that a product will be given away for free, don't change your mind."  The free product should act as a good solid lead-in to an enhanced one.

The real key is to figure out ahead of time what you can do to enhance the product to entice paying customers.  Also, figure out how you can customize the product for specific audiences and sell to them.  Make sure that you interact with your customers and find out how they want to use the product and give it to them.  Giving away a free product is only a great risk if you haven't thought it through ahead of time.  If no one wants or needs your product, even a freemium costs too much.

Launching a New Product or Service

You’re launching a new product online and you’re expecting success. You’re excited and happy. But, unless you’ve done some preliminary planning, you may fail, even though your product is a strong one. Here are five things you must do before you launch.

1. Don’t launch before your marketing message is ready

I know you are eager to get the product out there, but if your messaging isn’t clear, your customers won’t buy. Ask yourself whether your website headlines support the product’s main benefits. Does your new product make the process faster or easier? Does it help simplify a complex process? What are you really offering your customer that they don’t have now? If you don’t present the message clearly, they won’t search for it and you’ve missed an opportunity.

2. Don’t launch before you have checked your shopping cart

This sounds simple doesn’t it? I assure you that after working with businesses on the internet for over 12 years, it’s not. It’s probably the single biggest reason products fail. Shopping carts are hard, sometimes impossible to buy from. Make it easy! Not only do you need to make sure the cart process is simple to understand, make sure it WORKS. You know this is a problem because you shop on the internet yourself. Make sure this is perfect before you launch. Hit or miss isn’t good enough.

3. Don’t launch before you’ve planned your advertising and PR

Oops, this one can be very challenging. That doesn’t mean you can skip it. You need to have the basics in place. Are you buying an ad in a newsletter? Are you writing an article to submit to content websites? If your budget is limited, it’s ok to start small, but you can’t ignore this completely or you won’t stand a chance.

4. Don’t launch without explaining to your employees what you are selling

This is important. Don’t assume they will know what you have in mind for the product unless you tell them. They are ambassadors to your customers. If they don’t understand the marketing pitch, they can’t explain it to your customers. Don’t assume they’ll read the materials you hand out. Meet with them and discuss it.

5. Don’t launch without planning to send discounts to current customers

Did you forget your current customers? They need to receive special treatment. They are predisposed to buying from you and they could provide good word of mouth. This entitles them to a discount, or special offer. Send them an email or special newsletter with the offer. Make sure you track the results so see how well your message worked with your current customers.