It’s the little things…

Overlooking the little things in your marketing gets you overlooked!

Marketing can be a fickle thing.
One minute it’s about your ‘wow factor’, your big vision and the bigger picture, the next they say you should be focusing all on the detail.

So which is it Jamie?
If the truth be told both are correct – ‘Mastering your Marketing’ encompasses everything about how your business communicates to the market and your customer – both the big and the small aspects.

Last month the ‘Marketing Man’ blog focused on developing your ‘wow factor’ and explained why it’s important to identify and communicate this to your customers. (Click here if you missed out.)

This month I want to stress the importance of getting the little things right – that’s right – the nitty gritty, often overlooked or undervalued aspects in your business (and in your marketing in particular) that business owners and businesses are often ‘too busy’ to fix or address.

Why?
Because although focusing on delighting your customers and creating the ‘wow factor’ are important for your marketing, equally important is ironing out the quirks, the faults, the little ‘out of order’ signs in your business and your sales funnel that may (temporarily) be annoying or frustrating your customers right now.

So how could you be annoying your customers?
It could be a lack of response time with day-to-day communication. Do you do what you say you’ll do or do you run out of time and defer to the next day?,
Do you actively follow up on requests or suggest real solutions, maybe it’s an inferior online payment system or a poor online experience. Maybe the problem is you’re just doing enough, but you’re going through the motions. It happens to us all.
Because, like it or not, collectively those little imperfections all have the potential to grow, fester and ultimately drive regular customers away. How many customers have you lost who have simply walked away without you even knowing why? That’s right, you don’t know, but you CAN work to reduce this factor.

The truth is, you can have the greatest ‘wow factor’ in business/marketing but if the regular stuff – the usual systems and ‘touchpoints’ are overlooked, that nice new paint job is going to lose its shine at the first sign of rain.

Customer feedback surveys all suggest that if you work on fixing the basics – i.e. deliver a responsive and personal service that answers customer queries in a timely manner, bring a human element to your processes, and essentially care about your customer so they feel like they’re not just a number, you’ll be well on your way to creating your own mini ‘wow’ factor. Not too much to ask is it?

Having said that, as business owners of Synkd, we also understand that when life gets busy, delivering ‘the basics’ is sometimes easier said than done! Note: Don’t be too hard on yourself.

Some other examples of overlooking the nitty gritty include:
– fixing that ‘buggy’ website with the missing links, missing pics, those dreaded 404 errors and keeping online information relevant and up to date.
– that basic straight to voicemail answering message you’ve been meaning to update? Get onto it!
– that basic template customer feedback form (if you even have one?) that you just ‘Googled’ in a rush that really needs updating for more specific and tailored feedback?
– that broken online payment button on your website that you’re unaware of but which your customers are only too aware of. Please, take my money!
– saying you’ll call back in 10 minutes and 2 hours pass because you got distracted or busy?

Essentially its all of those little things that you know you need to get on top of, but simply don’t have the time to get round to actually do.

By fixing the little things in your sales funnel you actively make your customers lives so much easier that they’ll notice and thank you for it (its the perfect retention strategy – although that should be ‘magnetic’ strategy).

 

Additionally your purchasing process will be far more streamlined, which ultimately saves you $1000s of marketing dollars over the long-term.

How?
We all know the famous stat that a new customer costs x 5 times as much as retaining an existing customer?

So get busy ‘fixing your service’ and focus on the little things to ensure your current customers remain your future customers for the course of their lifetime, no matter how many or few times they buy from you.

The devil is in the detail after all!

Your Marketing Man,
Jamie,
Signing out