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Are You Focusing on the Right Thing?

Guest post by: Gary Jeffress

Article Overview: In this article Gary explains that many companies focus on their sales and product before anything else and suggests that maybe this needs to be reviewed.

Are You Focusing on the Right Thing?

Customer service is too often “on the chopping block” when it comes to making budget cuts. Many companies focus on their sales and their product before they focus on anything else. They do this because service level is primarily an intangible thing that is difficult to measure. Hence there is a general failure to understand how customer service affects the bottom line. To some finance departments, it seems like a “pure overhead:” it is treated as an expensive department whose job, is to answer customer questions and complaints. Consider this: - 45% of people who pick up the phone to call a company do so because they intend to make a purchase. - 70% of those customers are put on hold. - Only 12% of callers stay on the line if all they hear is silence. - 34% of callers who hang up never call back. - 41% of most marketing budgets are spent handling calls. The other 59% of those companies are spending 96% of their budget enticing customers to call in. You have to say, it makes no sense to spend so much money getting people to call in, only to handle them badly once they respond to your careful marketing? Does it make sense to chase off potential buyers before they’ve even purchased anything - especially when so many of them were ready to get out their wallets before your bad service chased them away? In short, you spend money, lots of money to have them take notice of you and when they decide to take a closer look, you chase them away with bad service. Which means that same calculation should work the other way as well? If you ‘knocked their socks off’ with your service quality, you would have a customer for life.

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Article Tags: budget cuts, business, business budget, business growth, customer service, sales



Related Forum Posts
Re: Great start, but no finish - My advise is FOCUS on your business. Focusing is the main factor to succeed on business. If you have a great idea, then follow it only, don't look anywhere else. It is especially essential in an online business. Because there are a lot of mind blowing sales letters promising millions dolllars or overnight success, people find it difficult to concentrate on one business and they lose their energy. Concept is simple. 1- Have a good idea; 2- Build your business on it; 3- Monetize your business; 4- Promote it; 5- Build list of responsive customers; 6- Maintain You Business. Focusing and not fearing from competition (instead you can learn from competitiors) are main tips of billionaires ,BTW. Orxan
Re: Fill in the blank: The best decision I ever made with my bus - Focusing on my Internet Marketing Business
Re: What is your biggest challenge? Today? - Focusing... and finding time to focus! Maybe they are related!
How do you know if you have a good idea? - [quote="orxan":3118uboz]My advise is FOCUS on your business. Focusing is the main factor to succeed on business. If you have a great idea, then follow it only, don't look anywhere else. It is especially essential in an online business. Because there are a lot of mind blowing sales letters promising millions dolllars or overnight success, people find it difficult to concentrate on one business and they lose their energy. Concept is simple. 1- Have a good idea; 2- Build your business on it; 3- Monetize your business; 4- Promote it; 5- Build list of responsive customers; 6- Maintain You Business. Focusing and not fearing from competition (instead you can learn from competitiors) are main tips of billionaires ,BTW. Orxan[/quote:3118uboz] Thanks orxan! But how do you know if you truly have a good idea or not? If we ask ourselves, we may be suffering from tunnel vision. On the other hand, friends/family may try to discourage us from pursuing a small business because of their own fears, while others will simply give us an empty "you can do it!" line.
Re: Service Or Product? - Very insightful, and I totally aggree, service first... it is a substantial foundation for any business. Products and service go hand in hand to make a business really successful. Nevertheless quality control for both is also actually a must; you will never offer services that are not par with the standards neither with products. Focusing on the product aspect, in stores or in deliveries or in any other way you get to sell your products there is a pinch of service involved. Even after a product is sold "customer service hotlines" is another form of service buyers somehow expect from you. So IMHO service or product are like chicken and eggs... lol,,,


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