How To Lose a Customer *Guaranteed*

** REMEMBER TO WATCH THE VIDEO BLOG AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST**

I should be calling this article How Not To Lose a Customer. But Let’s try a bit of reverse psychology

Position Incorrectly. Over sell your product or service by telling the customer it’ll do it all, or simply give them the wrong expectations of results. No point clearly stating benefits - just go for setting bad expectations you’ll never be able to meet

Lose Sight of the wants / needs or dream. They wanted a benefit - they may not have fully understood it themselves so what the hell – they wanted a toothpaste they got toothpaste. Or was it clean teeth they wanted? Toothbrush? No, just toothpaste. You could have understood the end points they want and focused on them?

Be Stupid. Yeah I know. We all are sometimes. .. Should that logo really be that far over on the jacket – it looks, well stupid?? As the old saying goes common sense is not common.

Don’t prepare and don’t follow up. Well if you actually get the sale – great. Deliver and leave them be – why go back and check everything is ok? Why ask for a referral let alone more business? After all 68% will go elsewhere as they perceive no difference. No point being different is there?

No CNEs. Critical Non Essentials – the key is in the title. They are not essential to the product or service but they are critical to growing and maintaining the relationship. Sound expensive – I guess so. Just do what it says on the tin – yep worked for that fence paint company. Good enough for me. It may be a £2000 but what do they expect? A birthday card? Taken out to lunch? That could cost me £50!

Give them too much to do. Ever tried buying something where you need to jump through hoops to get it – too hard to buy. If you’re a builder – ever agreed that the client is going to order x or y to save spending money with you – then it does not happen on time or they change their mind? End up in an argument or losing the job.

Stop our own circle of learning. “I’ve been doing this for 23 years – what can you teach me about being agricultural merchant.” Well he was right – nothing. Lots of other things about business and money that would have helped him and his customers. Yep 23 years and stopped learning about 18 years ago., business sis struggling customers moving on. 23 years – be there forever – won’t it?

Guarantee something you can’t deliver. Results in 7 days? Instant Riches? Don’t deliver and you are guaranteed to lose the customer.

Only think short term. Life Time Value ?? Well yes I suppose there’s nothing stopping them buying from me every week – in a year that’s £1,000 so I suppose I could look at my marketing as an investment. Naah.

Stay Low. So we made a mistake, got stupid – too late now. No point throwing good money after bad. We should have got the soup stain out, like we said – not ruin the jacket – so I guess we’ll just pay up. Want to make sure he doesn’t rip us off and buy a better suit then the one we ruined. No point offering to clean his new suit for life no matter what – no matter how many times the label inside changes – no point exceeding his expectations – going the extra mile. Who ever heard of a mistake leading to a better relationship and more business and a disappointed customer becoming a fan?

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