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Have You Tried Being A Customer Of Your Business Lately?

Written by: Ray Stewart

Article Overview: This may sound odd - but have you looked at how you treat your customers recently? I was discussing this earlier today with a client whose business has stagnated after he moved into a new office last year and we were looking at possible reasons why that would be. We looked at the products he was offering, how he was conducting his marketing, what factors locally had changed, was the "credit crunch" likely to be an influence, and so on..

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Have You Tried Being A Customer Of Your Business Lately?

This may sound odd - but have you looked at how you treat your customers recently?

I was discussing this earlier today with a client whose business has stagnated after he moved into a new office last year and we were looking at possible reasons why that would be.

We looked at the products he was offering, how he was conducting his marketing, what factors locally had changed, was the "credit crunch" likely to be an influence, and so on. We spent an hour or so brainstorming and quite by chance I asked him how people got in touch initially to make enquiries before becoming a customer.

His reaction was quite surprising. He said that the business had moved but he was using up the marketing materials and letterheads from before the move. Of course, the phone number and address had changed with the move but he was loath to dump his old literature. Instead he had a redirection of the phone and post and thought that would do.

On impulse, I picked up the phone and dialed the office number which was being redirected and guess what? yup, it was unobtainable. I then asked him if the bundles of re-directed post were still being delivered at the office and he thought for a moment and said they had seemed to dry up a while ago and he thought the new address must have filtered through to the customers.

Another quick phone call to the Post Office revealed that he had redirected the post for 6 months, but then not renewed it.

Here then we had something concrete. It is not surprising that business has been hard to come by lately - his customers could not get in touch easily. Those who had his mobile number were lucky, but others didn't, and any new prospects certainly wouldn't have.

The moral to this tale then... regularly check that all your lines and methods of communication are open for business all the time.

You should aim, at all times, to make it as easy as possible for people, customers and prospects alike, to get in touch - and keep checking them all regularly - just in case!!!

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Home > Accounting > Ray Stewart > Have You Tried Being A Customer Of Your Business Lately
Article Tags: credit crunch, impulse, letterheads, literature, marketing materials, methods of communication, mobile number, phone call, phone number, post office, prospects, redirection, something concrete

About the Author: Ray Stewart
RSS for Ray's articles - Visit Ray's website

Ray Stewart is the MD of Coalville Business Services Limited. He writes articles and reports about bookkeeping and business growth strategies, the two areas of business he is most passionate about. His bookkeeping business website is at http://expertbookkeeping.info and is a free resource for people looking for simple answers to bookkeeping questions and a chance to speak to him for free if you can't find the answer you are looking for. You can also visit his private blog at http://raystewart.biz and subscribe to the RSS feed there to keep right up to date.

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Have You Tried Being A Customer Of Your Business Lately


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