Ideal Marketing Company Blog

Marketing Seminars – Keeping Customers Happy

4. Avoid misunderstandings.  The quality of your verbal communication is very important in keeping a customer happy by making sure that everything is understood.

5. Value for money.  You may be expensive, but if you represent value in the eyes of the customer, then they will be happy.  Take a restaurant.  We expect to pay one price for a lunch in a burger chain and quite a different price in an exclusive restaurant.  Both experiences of eating are very different, but both can represent ‘value for money’ as it is the overall eating experience we pay for. 

6. Listen to what your customers tell you.  People value being listened to very highly.  If you can be one of the few people who will listen carefully to what your customer wants, and show that you understand by delivering their request, you will stand out amongst all of their suppliers.

For more marketing ideas come to our next free marketing seminar on February 9^th  Hothorpe Hall, near Leicestershire – see the seminars page for full details.

Marketing Seminars – Keeping Customers Happy

7. Really care about your customers.  Take notes about when their birthday is, who their children are, hobbies and interests etc.  This creates a far deeper level of communication and shows that you are interested in them as individuals.

8. Encourage complaints.  Do you know what most people do when they hear a customer complain?  They think of a reason why the complaint is not valid.  When a customer complains, they are telling you that they want to keep using you despite the problem, but would prefer to do business with you if you could sort it out.  For every customer that TELLS you about a problem, 10 customers may have experienced the same problem and gone elsewhere or are getting progressively more annoyed by it.  When a customer tells you something is wrong, listen and then ask them if anything else is wrong.  Most people treat complaining customers with contempt, when in fact, they act as an early warning system alerting you to the majority of customers who will sit in silence and then quickly leave you ‘for no reason’ one day.

9. Avoid confusion. If you have a contract, make it so simple that it can be explained in a paragraph.  If you are doing work on a customer’s behalf, make sure that they understand exactly what you are doing and when.  Don’t do anything that you think will confuse or frustrate your customer – just keep things simple and clear.

For more marketing ideas come to our next free marketing seminar on February 9^th  Hothorpe Hall, near Leicestershire – see the seminars page for full details.

Ways to Create Happy Customers

Marketing Seminars – Keeping Customers Happy

1. Encourage feedback at all stages so that you can discover what the customer is really thinking.

2. Keep in touch.  Most customers leave because of ‘perceived indifference’- that means that you didn’t necessarily do a bad job, it just means that you didn’t keep in touch enough.  You might not have the time to call every customer personally, but you do have enough time to send out a newsletter, an e-mail newsletter or even a postcard to customers on at least a bi-monthly basis.

3. Web site and information – added value.  If you are good at what you do, the chances are that you know things that are useful to your customers. By keeping all that information to yourself, you might think you are being clever, but in fact by sharing at least a portion of that information with your customers you do two things in their eyes.  First of all, you demonstrate what an expert you really are and secondly, you appear generous.  Newsletters, seminars and websites are all places where you can share that knowledge with your customers and potential customers to enhance your reputation.

For more marketing ideas come to our next free marketing seminar on February 9^th  Hothorpe Hall, near Leicestershire – see the seminars page for full details.

What is a Happy Customer Worth?

Marketing Seminars – Keeping Customers Happy

But first, I want you to consider – how much is new customer service worth to you?

Let’s start with an easy question.  How much one does badly handled phone call cost you? Perhaps the enquiry is for a simple job – it isn’t worth much. You, or your receptionist, are busy and the caller doesn’t receive the attention they deserve. They decide to go elsewhere and use one of your competitors.  You already have plenty of customers anyway, so it’s no big loss.

How much has that cost you?  £100? It’s no big deal.

Here is another way to look at it.

Imagine that call is handled well and the customer orders from you.  Because you did a good job, they then continue to order from you again – say on average, twice a year.  This pattern continues for the next ten years.  Let’s also assume that, because of the good service they receive, they recommend your services to just two people a year who also become customers. 

The first year, this totals £200 from the original, customer plus £400 from the other two new customers – £600 in total.  Not quite so easy to shake off. Perhaps a few more minutes on the call would have been justified? 

The second year, the customer still spends £200, and recommends you to an additional two customers, plus the two recommended from the previous year. This now comes to £1,000 worth of business.

By the end of year ten, this now totals £4,200 worth of new business generated by that one original customer. In fact, over the ten year period this works out at an amazing £24,000 worth of business. From one neglected phone call. 

The really amazing thing is that this does not take into account the extra business that the additional recommended customers bring in if they start to recommend your service to friends and colleagues.  If each of the recommended customers kept on recommending you at the same rate to people who spent the same amount, by the end of year ten you would have 19,683 customers and total sales over the ten year period of £5,904,800, with a turnover of £3.9 million in year 10 ! And that’s without inflation.

Now, not everybody will recommend your services, and not every customer will stay with you for a decade, but as you can see in this illustration, even by year two, the customer was effectively spending ten times as much with you as you thought they were initially worth. So, it pays to make sure that the phone is answered properly, and that any new enquiry is treated appropriately. Each customer, or potential customer will then be given the attention they deserve.

Just to flip this argument on its head, in 1996 I had a problem with a computer printer from a well known high street computer retailer.  I had never been impressed by their customer service in the past, but on this occasion they surpassed themselves.  Mild mannered chap that I am, I ended up having a major argument with the Branch Manager because he refused to swap my faulty printer as it was more than three months old. As a result, I have never walked inside one of their shops since.  I’ve spent a lot of money on cameras, computers and the like in that time, so the attitude of that one badly trained and rude employee could easily have cost the company thousands of pounds over the years – and will continue to cost them.  I have also told many friends about the incident,  It’s probably very petty of me, but you can be sure that many people hold grudges when they are badly treated, and they are quite happy to tell anybody who will listen about their experiences.

Do you appreciate now how important it is getting customer service right? 

For more marketing ideas come to our next free marketing seminar on February 9^th  Hothorpe Hall, near Leicestershire – see the seminars page for full details.

Marketing Seminars – Keeping Customers Happy

When I run my marketing seminars, I always tell delegates that whilst most people focus their marketing activities on winning new business, they should really be spending between 25 – 50% of their marketing budget on their existing customers.  Why?  Because if you look after your existing customer base well, you will hardly need to look for new business because your existing customers will stay with you for longer, spend more with you and be happy to refer you to their contacts.

If you have an unhappy customer base who think badly of your company, you will forever be recruiting new customers.  Every customer who leaves you for your competition will take with them their harsh words and resentment.  How much better is it for your business to have kind words and repeat business? 

Together, we will look at 37 ways to assist you in:  

• Keeping your customers for longer
• Making customers keen to spend more with you
• Making customers want to refer business to you

Imagine what a difference these 3 changes will make to your company, so start thinking about how important it is to put your customer first in your organisation at all times.

For more marketing ideas come to our next free marketing seminar on February 9^th  Hothorpe Hall, near Leicestershire – see the seminars page for full details.

Olympic Champions – a case of mind over matter?

This entry was written by a client of The Ideal Marketing Company – Trevor Silvster who is MD of The Quest Institute www.questinstitute.co.uk  

The body is a marvellous thing and the lengths to which it can be pushed never fail to amaze me. The sportsmen and women who will be competing in Bejing next month have spent years of their lives in prepation for an event which lasts only sixteen days. These elite athelets may only have a few moments to achieve their ultimate goal of Olympic victory – and in these tense seconds it is the power of the mind that will really make the difference.

So what are the ingredients that combine to make an Olympic champion? Undoubtedly the hours they spend practising and honing their skills. Obviously genetics, dedication and physical prowess also play a vital part. But ask any champion and they will tell you that it is the proper mental preparation that separates bronze from gold.

As a cognitive hypnotherapist, I deal in the realities our brains create in response to a range of situations. In simple terms, I work out why one person acts a particular way in a specific situation, whilst another responds in a completely different way. So what enables Justin Gatlin (2004 Olympic 100 metre sprint champion) to storm away from the blocks whilst others are slow off the mark? It is only by uncovering the pattern behind the behaviour that it is possible to help effect real change.

As a cognitive hypnotherapist, I deal in the realities our brains create in response to situations that occur around us. In simple terms, I work out why one person runs away from a dog someone else is happily stroking, why someone can speak up confidently in some situations and feel a complete fool in others, and why one person can kick accurately anywhere, anytime, and another can’t. By uncovering the pattern behind the behaviour I use the most effective method to assist them in changing.

Sport is full of examples of highly skilled people who are let down by their mental processes. One most recent example is that of John Terry who missed a crucial penalty in the European Cup Final. It seems inconceivable that someone earning what he does for being able to kick a ball should miss something that most 12 years olds could score from. So, what went wrong? I suggest it was his mind, not his eyes or his feet, that let him down. And we’ve seen it many times before, with the likes of Tim Henman, Jana Novotna (unkindly dubbed the lady from Chokeoslovakia), Greg Norman and any England football player called to take a penalty. So what goes on? What turns a superb athlete into a choker? And what can be done about it?

In any situation your brain (in simplistic terms, your unconscious thought) is working out the likely consequences of the actions you could take, it then selects the one most likely to bring you the result it believes is most beneficial to you. This is your brain. Your unconscious works using a simple, reflexive form of thinking; its fast but can sometimes be wildly inaccurate. If the calculation the brain makes of your future is negative it will release chemicals into your body that were originally intended to protect you from sabre-toothed tigers. They increase your heart rate, your respiration, stop digestion and, if strong enough, shut down those parts of our brain responsible for logical, considered thinking.

This puts you into a state best described as a trance. Not one that will get you to dance like a chicken, but one that will cause you to sky the ball over the cross bar, or forget your name in an interview. Anyone who’s ever felt ‘hijacked’ at such moments will know what I’m describing, a loss of feeling in control – truly, strong emotions make us stupid. It’s this fight or flight response that causes someone to run from a friendly dog, shake in front of an interview panel, or fluff a shot at match point, all because our brain looks at the present situation and calculates the likely consequence. As you stand ready to make your serve, do you foresee an ace, or the laughter of your friends as you hit yourself on the head? As you stand to make a sales pitch do you foresee an enthusiastic reception, or a mass of shaking heads?

Context is highly significant: you could be cool as a cucumber serving for the championship at Wimbledon, but a nervous wreck afterwards at the prospect of speaking at the press conference. This is because the meaning of the present situation you’re in (whether it’s good or bad), and its anticipated outcome is based on calculations the brain makes based on your past.

For example, if a young child trips over at the school play they will feel disoriented by the surprise and will look around her for what it should mean. If she spots her parents looking supportive and encouraging she might interpret the crowd’s laughter as something positive, shake herself down, and carry on happily. If they look disapproving or embarrassed then she’s likely to interpret the laughter as being humiliating and perhaps run off the stage in tears. A dozen different children experiencing that same moment could end up with different interpretations, mainly based on a split-second interpretation by the brain.

This moment may become what is called a hub memory, one that is used by the brain to calculate the meaning of present or upcoming events. So, the next time she is in a similar situation – the brain foresees the possibility of future humiliation and begins to trigger the flight or fight response hormones to help her get ready to run away from it. This is likely to be experienced as nervousness, something that grows stronger the nearer she gets to the event.

By the time this new event arrives the nerves are so strong that it’s likely to cause the predicted outcome to come true – the idea of self-fulfilling prophecies has a strong element of scientific validation. She’s so nervous she feels a fool all over again and is unable to perform well.

Now imagine a string of such calculations stretching up to adulthood. Each subsequent event would mould the context so the same event could be the cause of interview nerves in one person, or sports performance anxiety in another, or both in someone else; the permutations are endless, which is what makes my work as a cognitive hypnotherapist so fascinating – every day is a detective story.

So if the brain creates a version of reality that causes people to underperform, what you can do about it. Most people do is to try to wrest control back from the brain and ‘deliberately’ serve, or kick, or run. In other words we try to consciously perform an action that is so practised it’s almost completely unconscious and make a hash of it. We need something to keep us out of our own way and leave our unconscious to perform the actions we’ve practised.

Method One: Anchoring

Has a record ever come on the radio that reminded you of a past event and left you feeling a particular emotion? These are called anchors and work on the stimulus-response mechanism first identified by Pavlov. Basically the principle is that if, at the moment you’re experiencing a strong emotion, a stimulus is paired with it (a song playing, a group of people watching you, a dog running at you), then the two become wired together in your neurology and one will trigger the other off in you. Those examples were negative, but they can also be used beneficially by pairing a stimulus or trigger with an emotion relevant to your performance. A powerful trigger is a smell because the response to it can’t be controlled – even if you know something is going to smell bad you’ll still recoil from it.

British athletes have used this for a while. During training, whenever they get into a good performance state – run a personal best, feel full of energy or confidence – they’ll focus on their feeling and inhale a smell that’s impregnated on a wrist band. The smell itself is usually just something they like, although some natural products have been shown to have particular effects (peppermint improves short-term recall). They’ll continue to ‘stack’ these states over a period of time so the smell becomes strongly evocative of the emotional state that accompanies a good performance. On the big day, before serving, or settling into the blocks, or….taking a penalty…they take a deep breath and reaccess the positive state. Try it. Songs are another good trigger, and physical pressure like squeezing a finger and thumb also work well. All of a sudden the mannerisms of top athletes might take on a different significance – ever notice Tiger Woods twirling his club?

Method Two.

If I tell you not to think of a blue tree what happens? If I tell you not to think of…missing that penalty…the problem is that the brain has to process a negative; it has to think of the blue tree to not think of a blue tree. A key maxim in any situation where you want to perform is to think it how you want it. Before a game rehearse how you want it to go, see yourself performing well – make it a picture where you see yourself in it, rather then through your own eyes, because research shows that makes it more compelling. Fall asleep thinking of a positive aspect of your performance because it will prime you to notice your qualities and not your faults. If you play a sport where you have a moment to prepare, like tennis, golf or set pieces in football or rugby, then ‘play forward’ the next thing you’re going to do in your mind – while firing your performance anchor – precisely the way you want it. So, as John Terry approaches the penalty spot he pauses, takes a deep breath of his wrist band, and sees himself running up and placing the ball in a precise part of the goal. It will probably help if he closes his eyes so the goalie doesn’t get a clue from where he’s looking. For Arsenal footballers that line will magically disappear and you won’t remember reading it. Repeat that rehearsal until the effect of the anchor feels strong and then take shot, get in the blocks etc.

Method Three.

Imagination is one of your most powerful tools. I work with the mind/body connection everyday and know of its power, but you don’t have to take my word for it; researchers have found that old people given the task of spending time each day imagining bench pressing actually got stronger – and put on muscle! Imagine that, changing your body shape just by thinking. Also, an experiment was done where basketball players of equal ability were separated into three groups. One practised shooting hoops, one imagined shooting hoops, and one sat around reading magazines. After the allotted time they were put back on the court and their ability re-accessed. Who do you think had improved the most? Those who imagined, because they sat and rehearsed shooting perfect baskets and their mirror neurons – neurons which imitate the actions of others (and in our imagination we trick the brain into treating ourselves as an ‘other’) stored this ‘map’ of shooting a hoop and used it when it was next performed physically. Those who’d physically practised failed on some of their efforts so the map was more flawed. So, practise doesn’t make perfect, it makes permanent, so make sure that what is being made permanent in your muscle memory is the best possible representation of your skill. Set aside 10 minutes a day to mentally rehearse key aspects of your game. As before, see yourself doing it – you have to represent yourself to your brain as an ‘other’ – and really focus. That’s why I suggest doing it for no more than 10 minutes, any longer and your concentration tends to drift.

There are many other things that modern psychology can teach us in order to improve our performance, and often they come from unrelated fields of study. One thing is for sure, in any contest between evenly matched opponents it’s going to be the mind factor that makes a difference – and sometimes it will against someone who is physically superior to you – remember Buster Douglas against Mike Tyson? So if you want to make headway, do head work.

Predictions of an economic slowdown or even a full blown recession have been rumbling for months. For the business owner this inevitably means a time to re-evaluate budgets and tighten up on spending. The first casualty in a recession is often the marketing spend – but this may prove to be a short sighted approach. Advertising Guru David Ogilvy asked question in his book Ogilvy on Advertising “What should you do in time of recession, when you need every penny to sustain your earnings? Stop advertising?

He points out that if you stop advertising a brand which is still in its introductory phase, you will probably kill it — forever. Studies of the last 6 recessions have demonstrated that companies which do not cut back their advertising budgets achieve greater increases in profit than companies which do cut back.

In a Morril survey of 40,000 men and women involved in the purchase of 23 industrial products over five years, it was found that share-of-market went up in bad times — when advertising was continued.

He goes on to point out that the American Business Press that had pie charts of sales of companies which cut back their advertising expenditure during the 1974-75 recessions compared with companies that did not cut back. The companies that did not cut their advertising budgets had more than doubled their sales 2 years later while sales from the companies that cut their advertising had barely gone up 50%. Three years later sales were down for companies that had cut their advertising while it was up for those that did not. The net income for these companies also followed the same suit over the same period of years — those companies that did not cut their advertising had more than tripled in sales, while companies that did cut back during the recession had barely doubled.

Ultimately, you want your business to grow whatever the economic climate, and marketing is a key tool in achieving this. Instead of panicking, the small business owner should focus on these seven key areas. Get these right and your business should not only ride out the economic storm, but actively thrive throughout.

Here are 7 marketing areas that you should be focussed on over the coming months:

1. Remember you company’s most important asset. Your existing customers are your best bet for bringing in more business- and making more profit. Maintain good communication with your satisfied customers; let them know about everything you offer and what you can do for them. Reward their loyalty by offering new products or services at a preferential rate and give them a reason to spend more money with you.

2. Make your own headlines. Some companies seem to be forever in the newspapers or on the TV and radio. But this doesn’t happen by accident – it happens because they actively pursue publicity. If you have something that present or potential customers might be interested in, tell them about it. Surveys, predictions and articles that link into a topical issue are particularly newsworthy. If you sit back and think, you will be able to find something that you do, or make that will be of interest to an audience of potential customers.

3. Give it away for free – then reap the reward. Use the law of reciprocity in your favour: if you give a customer something, they will have the urge to give you something in return. Take food samples at the deli counter. You try the product, you like it so you are more likely to buy it. Following this principle, try offering special reports, insiders’ information, free talks or tips booklets – anything that may be useful to the prospect. Ideally it will cost you very little, but will be of value to the recipient – they now have an implicit obligation to give you something in return.

4. Become the ‘go to’ guy. Instead of trying to appeal to the widest market possible, develop a niche. In reality, the more specialist you are, the more people will seek out and buy from you. One way of achieving this is to create a specific brochure for every sector of your market. This rule also applies to direct mail letters, e-mail shots, sales presentations etc.

Work out what the problems are in your target markets and create a product to address them. This shows the customer that you understand their problems and have the solution to help them. Work out the specific benefits for your customers and you will unlock the real sales potential.

5. Make sure you know your customers. Put a reference code on every type of marketing that you produce and ask people to quote it when they call you up. Make it company policy that any new business enquiry is checked to find out where the person heard about you. Also, bear in mind you want to know how much a customer’s lifetime value is, not just how much they spent with you in one transaction.

6. Spend time online. It’s no longer good enough just have a brochure website – it needs to constantly be updated if it is to feature in the rankings and pique people’s interest .The simplest and easiest way to do this is to put a blog on your website and keep it regularly updated with news and views. By creating regular content and referencing articles from other sites that you think are of interest to prospects, you will find that you can increase your site’s Google ranking dramatically.

7. Don’t give up. If you have a product or service worth selling, believe in it. When someone says ‘no’, they may mean ‘not yet’ or even ‘I don’t know enough about the benefits of what you are offering’. Clients are not always ready to buy now and they don’t always respond to the same messages. Create a target group of good customers and hot prospects and keep in touch with them for months or years. If you’ve got your targeting right, they will buy from you – in the future if not now.

If the economic forecasts come true, many small businesses will not survive the next decade. I believe that those with the foresight to look long term and maintain their marketing activity will be the ones who most successfully weather the storms ahead.

Caption everything. A photograph without a caption is a puzzle to the reader. You may know that it is a photograph of your Managing Director, or a group of staff from your call centre, but the reader will not have a clue. Always put a caption on any photograph in your brochure.

Testimonials and case studies – it makes sence to ask all of your staff to get involved in creating case studies and gather these up where possible. In theory, almost every satisfied client could be the basis for a quote about their experience. In some cases, the company they worked for may not allow the name of their organisation to be used, but even in those cases it is worth gathering a few sentences of their thoughts during post candidate placement.

When testimonials are in an important sector or with a well known client, it may be worth developing these into a short case study. In this case, allow the client to talk about issues such as:

Specific recruitment problems they have had in the past

Why they choose to use you

If they were sceptical about what you could offer

These quotes can then be passed along (with some background information about the company and the specific position filled) to an external marketing company – such as The Ideal Marketing Company or can be written up depending on what is decided. As a general rule, about 30% of the case study should be quotes directly from the client. By writing case studies, you are showing that you can do the job well, your customers think you are exceptional and that there is no logical choice other than to use you.