I’ve known plenty of people that called themselves ‘Sony men’. That is to say, they bought in to the brand in a big way, particularly years ago. They’d only buy Sony hi-fi gear or their TV had to be a Sony. Personally, I’ve never considered myself a Sony man, but you’ve really got to respect the strength of the brand that makes someone want to only buy Sony products.

I discovered one of the methods they use to maintain that brand strength.

A slight contradiction here, but I’ve always owned Playstations. I had two of the first version (one got stolen), and two of the PS2s (one scratched discs until they were unusable) and Father Christmas kindly brought my son and I a PS3 this year.

So here’s the lesson; the PS3 was bought from Amazon and yesterday, it just stopped reading discs altogether. After searching a few forums, I established that it’s probably a problem with the laser. I called Amazon, who took a whole bunch of details and then said I needed a reference number from Sony and gave me their telephone number.

The number turns out to be a generic one, and there’s another, dedicated number to speak with the Playstation team. A tiny bit irritated, I redial the Playstation team.

Another guy takes a few details about the fault, I’ve already tried all the options he suggests, so he registers the unit and then simply says:

“That’s fine. We’ll have our courier deliver a replacement to you tomorrow and collect the faulty one at the same time”. No repackaging the box with the accessories and cables – just the unit on its own.

What a pleasant surprise. No grief whatsoever! I really don’t mind stuff breaking down if that’s the service I’m going to get.

The alternative version of this story, full of grief and endless form-filling, tests, paying for shipping it back, being without the unit for days or weeks, would almost certainly have affected my decision to buy the next generation of Playstation. As it happened, the outcome of it breaking has actually made me even more likely to buy Sony again.

It’s a sad state of affairs when this level of service is extraordinary – surely this should be the standard level of service anyway?

So the lesson is this: your customer service doesn’t have to be extraordinary, it just needs to fulfil (or exceed) expectations – and you’ll have a customer for life.

Sure, it made the house look great. It completed the appeal of the property amongst it’s neighbours. The finish of the property was awesome inside and out.

The problem though, is that this makes a promise to a potential buyer and then fails to deliver. It’s a big damned lie, one that might just convey the wrong message and kill your potential sale. The buyer may not have even wanted a garage, but the seeds of doubt and mistrust are already planted.

There are many examples of simple untruths out there on the web too. Buy now, in stock! Click the ad, and land on a page all about the product you want to buy and guess what: awaiting stock! If you promise next day delivery, deliver it next day. Again, the customer may not even demand next day delivery – but you promised.

Don’t make promises you can’t fulfil – it WILL cost you sales and customers.

Work with your customers in the knowledge of the end result. If your end result is a quick sale and no repeat orders, where is the motivation to do a good job, or make sure that they are happy? If the profit in acquiring new customers is in the long term relationship, you’re much more likely to be considerate, helpful, supportive and understanding. You’ll consistently work hard to do a good job.

Seth compares the follow-through to the action required in Tennis or Golf – the ball is long gone, so why keep swinging? The same is true for football, boxing and my personal favourite, snooker – if your cue continues in a straight line after the shot, you know the stroke itself will also be true.

Seth’s Blog: Follow through
If you know that the last two inches of your follow through don’t matter, then you’ll start slowing down at three inches, or even four, and suddenly it does matter. If you draw the line on money back guarantees you’ll keep sliding backwards, bit by bit, until it does matter. If you’re quick to fire the employee who needs a lot of help, you’ll be quicker with those that need just a little, and then, pretty soon, it’s a very different place to work, isn’t it?

1. Be nice
2. Be fully attentive
3. Exceed their expectations
4. Listen to what they’re really telling you
5. Help them understand how
6. Always follow up
7. Stay in touch

It’s a great seven-point plan that will work well, but needs to be implemented in appropriate ways for different products and services.

CRM was supposed to help businesses better understand their customers and increase efficiency. Yet most companies are not getting the return they expected. Why the purchase of software or hardware (which can sometimes cost millions to the company) that enable a company to capture informations and details about individual customers that can be used for target marketing, called by some people “an expensive way to learn what otherwise might be learned by chatting with customers for five minutes”?

from Why CRM doesn’t work « David vs. Goliath

Excellent. Someone else that gets the point!

Coincidentally, I’m currently working with a business that is about to implement a ‘CRM’ system. It turns out, like too many businesses and people, and in all fairness the whole industry, they don’t really understand what CRM is.

In many cases, CRM is implemented on a promise, on the promise and expectation of what it did for another business. In truth, the thing that actually made the difference was the businesses approach to it’s customer, as is pointed out in the post.

All too often, unfortunately this point is missed completely. Who’s going to point out that it’s the strategy that makes this work? The software company pitching for the contract? Conflict of interest. The Sales Manager? Too close to the problem.

CRM can work extremely well and deliver fantastic results. But unless it fits your strategy, rather than your your strategy fitting around it, it’s just going to add more work with little return.

I can help

He reported a concerning trend: agents appear to be over-valuing properties to get the instruction. Once the vendor is tied in to the contract, they can’t do a lot about it. But here’s what happens:

The agent gets viewings and some interest in the property.

My colleague, being a smart guy, knows that the vendor is already paying rent elsewhere so figures there’s a good chance of a reasonable offer being accepted. Also, being a smart guy, he does his research and discovers that an identical property just next door has sold for £240k just six months earlier – £30k less than the asking price for this property.

In the vendor’s head, they were prepared to drop their price by £20k for a quick sale. They are offended by the offer and turn it down.

The agent tells the buyer that the vendor won’t accept anything less than £246k. The buyer walks away, appalled by the tactics of the agent.

• The agent wasted their time.
• The vendor is disappointed and offended, doesn’t make the sale and is still paying rent and a mortgage. This is probably going to happen a few more times before they understand what happened.
• The buyer goes elsewhere, hoping to find an agent with some scruples.

Now, the real problem is that there’s no relationship to build here. It’s not like the vendor is going to sell a house every year and keep using the same agent, is it? Next time they want to sell, they might be a little wiser and get three valuations, and chose the one in the middle that is likely to be more realistic.

The agent oversold and under-delivered. Does it matter to him that the client won’t come back for more? Probably not, because the client wasn’t likely to come back any time soon anyway.

The painful reality is, these guys get paid a fat commission cheque for selling a property. Just how much is a recommendation from a satisfied vendor worth? Surely they really could, and should, do better?

See: Seth’s Blog: Expectations and this blog: Expectations.

most of the time, you’re challenged with this: high expectations that must be beat.

Over the years, I’ve worked with people that habitually over-promised and under-delivered. It’s a tough place to be and usually only ends in disappointment, mistrust and a short business relationship. I’ve often associated it with the dreadful reputation that sales people get, one I’ve always challenged whenever I hear it.

Be honest. There’s no way back from dishonesty, and certainly no way forward for a client to recommend you to others.