Small Business Marketing | Marketing for Entrepreneurs | Realtor Marketing » customer service

Small Business Marketing – WIFT (What’s In It For THEM)

Tara Jacobsen — Fri, 18 May 2012 17:22:48 +0000

So the other day I wrote a post about Small Business Marketing – A Call To Action and talked a little bit about WIFT (What’s in it for them) but I thought this warranted a bit more notice than a one liner!!!

What Is In It For THEM

I talk to A LOT of small biz owners and they are VERY serious about their product or service. They can go on and on (and on) about how wonderful it is, all the features it has and why you HAVE TO BUY IT NOW! Just the other day at networking, we had a fellow who did his 30 second speech in 3 minutes, waxing eloquent about what he had to offer…sigh.

So, this is what you need to do, shut up and listen! When you have a prospect in front of you, ask them questions about what they are trying to accomplish. Ask what problem they think you can help them solve. Take notes. Ask more questions and listen some more. Write down more. Do this with at least 5 prospects. NOW you have your sales message!

Take those notes and write out your marketing message backward. DO NOT talk about all your bells and whistles, talk about how you can take all of that pain and make it go away!

WIFM Examples

Social media marketing – I KNOW my peeps do not have enough time to blog, tweet, friend, like and all the other stupid things that business owners have to do in the new age digital marketing. Our marketing message is about saving time and getting customers NOT about how we post 5X per week or how you are updated whenever there is a change in the social media sites.

Selling software – I worked as a hired gun speaker for a Realtor software company. When we went out to talk to the agents, the other presenters ALWAYS said the software the software did EXACTLY EVERYTHING they needed to do. While I loved the company and the software, OF COURSE the answer was not always that piece of software and you could see the doubt in some eyes.

Direct sales – this is a biggie for me! Some of the people selling nutritional products may have the answer to all my health prayers, but I have NO IDEA what the hell they are talking about. They use industry jargon and technical terms that I do not understand, blinding me to whatever the stuff really does. Dumb it down! If you have to talk about the science at all make it general and, better yet, tell your prospects how it will help them! It will help you lose weight, get nicer hair, live longer, get more sex, whatever the outcome is, NOT the science of it all.

Well, hopefully that helps…knowing the WIFT, what’s in it for them of it all will help you get more sales and make you more money!!!

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Is Customer Service Letting Your Lead Gen Down – Lowes VS Home Depot

Tara Jacobsen — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 15:31:46 +0000

We spend a lot of time talking about lead generating here. Marketing is all about getting opportunities to sell your product to someone who has a need. BUT what if your customer service is letting your lead generating down?

Last week Lowes sent me a really great email newsletter with ideas about how to make my laundry room a fun and functional place. It painted the picture so well that I trotted out this weekend in search of some paint, shelving and baskets to use on the project. Now, since the idea came from the Lowes email, I decided to visit that retailer rather than Home Depot where I normally shop for these kind of items.

Differentiating Your Business From The Crowd

As most of us know, Lowes, Home Depot, Ace Hardware and other stores have the same kinds of products, much the same way that all Mary Kay reps, bookkeepers or Florists offer the same makeup, accounting or flowers respectively. So what can a small business owner do to differentiate themselves from the competition?

Offer ridiculously good customer service – With all the outsourcing overseas, it is rare that I call a company that has its call center in America. GoDaddy has GREAT customer service who are ridiculously patient with non-techy people. Most small business owners are the ones to answer the phone and make decisions about how problems are to be handled. What if you decided that each request or problem from your customers was a chance to make that relationship better?

Note – I started going to Home Depot because of marketing. Tony Stewart (a Nascar driver) is my favorite and he represented Home Depot for years so marketing got my feet in the door. What kept me coming back was the fact that all those orange people constantly ask if they can help me and then walk me over to exactly what I was looking for, that is customer service HELPING your lead generating efforts.

Keep Your Marketing Word – If you are going to promote the “best something ever”, it better be! Many times buyers remorse comes because the marketing promise is not delivered in the actual product. My pal Seth Godin always talks about how the marketing department should be on the development team. This makes total sense for small business owners. When you are developing a product or service to offer, make sure that your company is good at doing that function and that you have systems in place to assure that the same great experience happens each time for each customer.

Set Realistic Expectations – I see more small biz owners tearing their hair out because of their unrealistic clients. Funny that, most times it is because the business owner did not frame the product in such a way as to assure that the client gets a value and the business owner makes a fair wage. Too many times small biz owners want to make the lead generating sale and worry about the implementation later. The BEST way to have happy clients is to make sure they know what they are buying and you know what you are selling!

NO One Offs – Last one! Stop changing your business to fit the needs of your clients, it won’t serve you well and it will just wind up annoying them. For example, we make small biz blogs on GoDaddy. Now is that the best host, maybe not BUT we have a 6 page document that details a step-by-step process for setting up a blog perfectly on GoDaddy. A couple of years ago someone came to us and wanted to use a different web host and said that they would not hire us unless we used their choice. It was tempting to say, “well maybe we will get more people who like that host too”. We did not take the project and in the ensuing YEARS, no one has ever asked for that host again. There was a good chance we would have done a poor job because we did not have a system in place AND I can guarantee that it would have taken twice or three times as long as usual since we would have to learn a new system.

So what does all this say about lead generating and customer service? You better make sure all of the pieces of you small biz marketing puzzle are on the same page or your efforts will just be churning and burning more unhappy customers.

PS – Because I am so happy with Home Depot, I thought Lowes would be comparable. Their products might have been, but their customer service was lacking. 3 people were at the paint station but only one (somewhat incompetent and grouchy) lady was actually help mixing paint so it took almost 20 minutes to order a gallon of paint. Then the shelving lady was barely mobile and took a 10 minute phone call in the middle of selling us some shelving. I thought I was going to have peel my mother-in-law off the ceiling, she was so mad at being ignored. Needless to say, we are back at the depot now and will just take all the great lowes ideas there!

Lead Generating – What Is A Lead And Are You Following Up?

Tara Jacobsen — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 22:57:04 +0000

Lead generating is an art not a science. You need to try all different kinds of things before you will find a couple that will work for your business.

Leads come from a variety of places including referrals, websites, social media, in person networking, public relations, open houses, putting your business card on a bulletin board, teaching classes and many other places. If you are a good lead generator, your leads should be showing up from all different sources. Our current clients come from speaking, Facebook, my sphere, a referral, networking, a referral, past client and more!

Having you client base come from a variety of sources means that you can never lose all of your leads at one time. If all of your leads come from the internet and your site goes down, you are out of business. If all your leads come from your networking group and it shuts down, bam, you are back to square one.

Additionally, make sure that the contact number you use in your marketing goes to a salesperson, not the switchboard or an answering service. The warm fuzzy that sales people give them is PRICELESS!

What is a lead?

I was talking with a client today and she said she had not gotten any leads from her website. WEIRD – she had told me of at least 3 or 4 people who had called or emailed her requesting more information about her services. Well to her, a lead was someone ready, willing and able to sign up for her services with one phone call – that doesn’t happen too often to many of us!

So let us break down what a lead is – In your sales process, a lead comes in and then you take them down a progression of steps that could look this:

A call comes in requesting information
You send them an email with your info
You send them a nice postcard thanking them for asking about your services
They do not call back
You put them on your email list and drip on them
You call them again and leave a nice message
They do not call back
You call again and hit them at the right time for them to buy – cha ching!

All those steps are vital to getting the sale. If you send one email or make one phone call and do not follow up, you lead could fall prey to someone else who is more aggressive about staying in touch!

How Should You Follow Up On Your Leads

There are many ways to follow up on a lead, here are some that I have used or heard about!

Phone them once a week until they die or buy! My friends who are aggressive prospectors say this. The best line I get from them is that they are pleasantly persistent.
Send a card or postcard in the mail. I use a database that allows me to send out postcards for about a buck. This is a good way to make them know YOU are interested in THEM!
Email them a personal note talking about your services.
“Friend” them on Facebook and keep in touch that way.
Invite them to an event you having.
Send them your email newsletter with great information.

Basically do anything you can to stay top of mind with this person. They have expressed an interest in your services or product, do not drop the ball now!

PS – In talking further with my client, we found out that she is as bad at followup as I am. If you think this all sounds like too much to bear, hire a sales person. Many will work for commission or a stipend with bonus paid for signups. The really good ones are worth paying outright AND adding a bonus!

How DISC Personality Types Affect Customer Service Models

Tara Jacobsen — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 12:42:16 +0000

Your DISC personality type affects what your customer service models are and how we can use them to our advantage. When it comes to customer service for our small businesses though, oftentimes we throw that information out the window and forget it!

In a brief synopsis of the DISC personality types, “D” stands for driver, direct and determined, “I” stands for intuitive, inspiring and interacting, “S” stands for stable, steady and supportive and “C” stands for cautious, compliant and careful. Find out more about DISC personality types and small business marketing.

It is always important to me that my small business marketing customers and ongoing clients are happy. That is the easy part, this wish. To make great customers service a GOAL we need to put some milestones and metrics behind it. If great customer service is a goal for your company, you need to look at your CUSTOMERS not at YOUR COMPANY to make it happen. And how does this match the DISC?

Customer Service Done By Personality Types

High â€œDâ€ business owners are very direct and to the point, frequently solving problems or delegating, but not following up to make sure that their customer is happy. They tend to focus on the task of fixing something after the fact rather than finding out what caused the problem in the first place. High â€œDâ€ business owners need to be especially aware that everyone does not think that just doing their work is enough, they must keep their customers in the loop throughout the entire process.

High â€œIâ€ small business owners tend to have the best intentions about doing great work, only fixing problems after the fact. That having been said, they tend to lack the focus required to make sure that the entire project is done and putting systems in place so that their customers know what has been completed. They should be aware that their clients are often disappointed when promised work or solutions are not forthcoming.

High â€œSâ€ small business owners will set their customer service plans up, making sure that everyone is going to be happy with their product or service. A High “S” is probably the best person in your organization to delegate to handle customer service. Their caring attitude and genuinely want to help get things done right or fix problems will shine throughout their work with your customers.

High â€œCâ€ are generally the opposite of High â€œDâ€ business owners; they have ALL the systems and forms in place to document milestones and resolve problems. Watch out though, as their process can tend to be overwhelming for the other personality types to encounter. “C’s” will often have a process by which customer service requests, complaints or queries are implemented and processed. If they are not careful, the system can become so rigid as to not allow for human error or for changes that might benefit their clients in the long run.

Customer Service Received By Personality Types

The High “C” process of customer service can be VERY hard for “D’s” to comprehend. The thought of filling out forms or navigating to the right department through complicated phone systems is onerous to this aggressive bunch. You might want to consider having a “Press 0 to get an operator” or a human who can walk through the process of your forms for them, rather than having them get even more upset on the way to your customer service help. A human voice on the other end of the line will make your “I’s” and “S’s” happier also.

As stated, high â€œIâ€ clients will also want to talk to a person. Sending an email, text or just leaving a message will not make the “I” feel like you have done the best job for them, even if you got everything handled in a timely manner. Additionally, by not speaking to them directly, you leave a door open for this situation to be ongoing and for them to feel left out in the cold. Sending them links to FAQ sections and self-help videos will not make “I” happy with the your company.

High â€œSâ€ clients are not looking for amazing solutions or fanfare. They just want to work with someone who REALLY does handle their account or problem when they say they will. There is very little screaming and yelling with an “S”, BUT you can lose their faith in you if you do not follow through on promises that you make. High “S’s” do not want to change companies or vendors so a little bit of customer service will go a long way!

High â€œCâ€ clients need A LOT of documentation before, during and after the fact. They will be happiest when they get a detailed account of the work that is completed and if there are problems, a list of proposed solutions. You CAN use email, FAQs, knowledge bases and other non-human types of services for a “C”, as many times they can solve the problem themselves. If there are problems, they are going to want to know what went wrong and what steps you are taking so that it will not happen again in the future.

In Conclusion

As a small business owner, knowing your (and your clientâ€™s) personality type can help you to avoid costly Customer Service mistakes. DO NOT assume that your customers want to be treated the way that you want to be treated! Having systems in place for notifying them of your progress or issues that cover ALL the personality types is vital for retaining customers. This is definitely not a one size fits all area of your business. Be sure that if you do not possess the correct skills, you hire someone who does!

Small Business Marketing – GREAT Customer Service

Tara Jacobsen — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:46:00 +0000

Small business marketing and great customer service go hand in hand! While I do believe marketing is vital to growing your business, if you have not addressed your customer service model then you are pouring leads into a funnel where nothing is catching them!

There is nothing more frustrating than running a fabulous campaign that drives a ton of traffic to your website, blog or store and then finding that sales do not increase. Most of my small business owner clients do not do this deliberately, they just have never though of their customer service process as being vital to their success.

Here are a couple of great customer service experiences I have had recently, does your company operate with this level of customer service or have you kind of decided that it is easier to get new customers than to service the old ones?

Chase Bank – whoo whoo, who knew that a HUGE bank could provide great customer service? Well come to find out, it really is the humans at the branch that make all the difference in the world! So I was heading out to Vegas last week and had all my change rolled and ready to turn into my bank (not to be named because they are horrible!). Well the bank lady snidely told me they do not take change rolled and that if I wanted to get money for it I would have to go over in the dark corner and unroll it all myself. ARGGGGG. So I took my change across the street to Chase Bank. There Darby and Adam helped me to cash it in even though I did NOT EVEN HAVE AN ACCOUNT. I am sure they wouldn’t do that every week for me BUT I have to tell you, I am a fan for life!!!! Those Chase commercials never got me to consider or talk about a huge banking conglomerate but those nice humans at the branch sure did!!!
While in Vegas we went to the Harley Davidson diner. Now, Johnny had warned me that service in Vegas could be spotty since he knows bad service makes me wicked mad. The people there (especially Ray our server) were SO NICE. The manager was roaming around helping his servers and everyone was VERY pleasant. That will be sure to stay on my list of places to go in Las Vegas!

What this shows is that great customer service is a top down policy. Chase must have some kind of “treat the customer right” sort of policy or the guys at the branch would have been jerks like the TCF lady (oops did I say the horrible banks’ name or that it is on 120th in Broomfield, CO and you should avoid it like the plague!!!). Seeing the manager and how he treated his staff and the customers at the Harley place was also neat to see. You could tell that it was a fun and busy place to work, that the management liked their customers and that every server was happy to be able to help. DANG.

So what is your small business customer service policy? I KNOW – many of you only have yourself or one or two employees BUT that does not matter! If you have a service mentality then when you grow everyone under you will have a service mentality. Stuff rolls downhill so make sure that you are positioning your brand and marketing to reflect what your values are and how to treat your customers!

Real Small Business Marketing

Tara Jacobsen — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 21:52:29 +0000

Real small business marketing is NOT a lot of things. It is not social networking like facebook or twitter. It is not throwing up a blog and hoping someone will come. It is not signing up for the latest online directory or craigs list or usfreeads.

What real small business marketing is is hard work. It is old fashioned identifying your target market, then figuring out the best way to reach them, then crafting a great offer that you know will make them interested. Then the really hard work starts! It is contacting prospects, following up until they are ready to buy and even some wine and dining from time to time.

Just because there is more opportunity available on the internet does not mean that we can abandon our old business ways. Getting belly to belly with a highly targeted prospect will still result in a sale. Calling your suspect list and making sure that they know you are still in dialogue is huge. Sending personal note instead of emails really does work.

We live in fabulous times that allow us access to millions of new customers instead of the 200 or so that we know personally. Make sure that you transfer some of your old marketing tricks to these new marketing media!

PS – Speaking of old time marketing ideas…have you called your past customers lately to see if they need to buy something else?

Small Business Customer Service – Flashzebra.com

Tara Jacobsen — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 11:56:02 +0000

When I hear about great small business customer service I just have to talk about it! Lon from FlashZebra.com (a manual off-camera flash distributor) sold Johnny two cables. Well when he opened the package only one came. John emailed Lon and within minutes got an answer that his second cable was coming and that the shipping costs were being refunded for John’s trouble. WOW!

Lon has done a great job of choosing a niche! He sells camera cables for flashes to serious photographers. Also he has camera cables that John couldn’t find anywhere else on the internet. He is also doing a great job of generating incoming links.

I will keep an eye on flashzebra.com to see how it is going – love to see a little guy with a great concept!

How To Be A Successful Entrepreneur – Always tell the truth!

Tara Jacobsen — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 13:32:55 +0000

Successful entrepreneurs come in all styles! Donald Trump is RUTHLESS, Martha Stewart is OBSESSED and my all time favorite Seth Godin ALWAYS tells the truth. Even when it is inconvenient! I read a recent post he had that talked about how what you say, what you do and who you are should all be the same thing. I AGREE!

In the new world of the interweb, it is easier than ever to find out if someone is trying to “SELL” you something.

I overheard a funny conversation the other day at networking where two women were talking about the difference between a seasoned insurance salesman who takes the time to find out what you need and the rookie who jumps on you and says you need what he has to sell!

As many of you know, I recently moved from Florida and down there Brighthouse Cable and DSL has ads all over the airwaves with the tagline, “It’s All About You” which segue right into the same old marketing. Someone must have told their advertising agency that this is the new important thing, without telling them to fix their customer service department. Here is Broadband Reports, a stand alone website that allows users to review Brighthouse. Overall the service gets an OK but everyone had trouble with Tech Support. So Marketing gets more and more customers who leave out the back door because of poor service.

As a successful entrepreneur, I will tell you that the most valuable thing I have in my business is my reputation for always telling the truth! I never recommend a service or group that I do not believe will benefit either an individual or my online social networks. I never spam. I never try to make a quick buck just because I have a list of people I can email to.

You shouldn’t either. You shouldn’t sell something to someone that you know is not a good fit. Your prospect can tell in a heartbeat if you are talking with “commission breath” and will run from you and never look back. Instead, what if you tell the truth, say it won’t work for them AND THEN get 3 referrals for people it might work for?!?!

Autoresponders (8X8s) for Realtors – Buyers and Sellers

Tara Jacobsen — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 16:49:48 +0000

Using Auto-responders to Grow Your Real Estate Business

Auto-responders are one of the most innovative tools a Realtor can use to growÂ theirÂ real estate business. However, most Realtors fail to utilize them to their full business potential.Â

The ease of use of auto-responders is astounding once you have them set up! If you have signed up for our email newsletter, you have gotten our auto-responders. They are a series of emails that go out on a periodic basis determined by you. If you are using them in an 8X8 program, that means that you are sending out eight in eight weeks, which I think is a really good frequency!

If you are using a database program, it is very easy to set up an auto-responder (or action plan). Â If you are not able to use your database program for this or if you use outlook or another email program, I HIGHLY recommend that you use an email newsletter service like AWeberÂ or Constant Contact which give you all of that functionality, a great look and both of which cost about $20/month!

We have been getting a bumch of requests for Autoresponders for Realtors – we have answered! Thus far we have developed two versions – one for sellers and one for buyers. In the coming weeks we will be adding Autoresponders for FSBOs, Expireds and Short Sales. We are offering $10 off until Tax Day (April, 15th 2009) so that everyone who want to get going right away can afford to!!!

Â	Â	Autoresponders (8X8s) For Realtors – Sellers Edition Auto-responders are email or 8X8 campaigns that you can set up to auto-generate emails for your prospects and leads. Basically they are a â€œset it and forget itâ€ kind of system that will allow you to contact your prospects and suspects on a consistent basis when you first enter them into your database. Price $19.97 - Use coupon code AUTOS-TAXDAY for $10.00 off until April 15, 2009!Â Â Â Â Â Â Find out more about Autoresponders (8X8s) For Realtors – Sellers Edition	Â
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Â	Â	Autoresponders (8X8s) For Realtors – Buyers Edition Auto-responders are email or 8X8 campaigns that you can set up to auto-generate emails for your prospects and leads. Basically they are a â€œset it and forget itâ€ kind of system that will allow you to contact your prospects and suspects on a consistent basis when you first enter them into your database. Price $19.97 - Use coupon code AUTOS-TAXDAY for $10.00 off until April 15, 2009!Â Â Â Â Â Â Find out more about Autoresponders (8X8s) For Realtors – Buyers Edition	Â
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Airports, Snow Boots and Your Small Business Marketing Message

Tara Jacobsen — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 20:30:14 +0000

I love small business marketing and I love my husband who has moved to Denver for a job transfer. So I have been flying back and forth to the Denver Airport to visit him and try and find a house to buy in the Denver area (we have an offer in – again – so fingers crossed people). What I noticed about the weather here compared to Clearwater Florida, where I am moving from, is that it is C-O-L-D. The people are generally nicer and they have snow boots.

I also noticed that real estate in Colorado is also different from real estate in Florida. They get a different commission than I am used to, they have fewer listings than agents carry in Florida and they have snow boots on when they show houses.

So what does this have to do with marketing you ask? We KNOW real estate is local but so is marketing! If you are in Cleveland, which is a very depressed area right now, you may have to market WAY harder in order to get the same results you got in the past. You may have to do more face-to-face sales pitches to close a client. If you are in Denver, where they say the economy is more solid, you can focus on gaining market share. Do LOTS of marketing to take over the market before the national economy rebounds!!!

While it is not fair that you have to work harder in Cleveland than Denver, make sure you match your efforts to your expected results, not just what worked in the past!

and don’t forget to wear your snow boots!