Give them their expectations. That’s my message for today. People get the wrong impression of what to expect. Now you get complaints. People say, didn’t arrive quickly enough. It wasn’t in stock.
The price was too high. There were extras that were needed. However that is simply a case of miscommunication. And it’s unfortunately, remember I say, with everything else, it’s your fault.
You must give people their expectations. Otherwise they’ll decide for themselves.
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So if you tell them you offer next day delivery and they order on a Friday, and Saturday, it does not arrive, you can’t say, well surely you know that Saturday delivery is extra or you can’t get on the truck.
No you have to explain when it will arrive, so if you order before 2’o clock or 3’o clock, whatever the cutoff time is, it will arrive the next working day. Not the next day.
You can put on a note on to say that, by the way the next working day, if it’s a weekend, but don’t expect them to look for that. Put it somewhere, where they are informed. The best place to put it is actually in their receipt. In their, your order is processed email. Simple as that.
But people will complain if they didn’t get what they expected. But if they got what they expected, they won’t complain.
If extras are needed, for instance if you supply something that doesn’t come with batteries, I mean why would you do that, but if that’s the case, when they get there, you know how annoyed we all are at Christmas, when we get all the kids toys out and there’s no batteries.
Make Your Customers Aware in Advance
Why not put a big sign on the front, ‘Batteries not included’. Or just give them the batteries. But make sure they are aware in advance.
On their receipt say, ‘Did you want to buy batteries? They are not included.’ Then they are aware. When they arrive, they can come back and buy some more, and add it to the order. No problem. You can sort all that out.
If certain items cost a fortune, say you sell, I don’t know, say you sell telescopes, there are probably $20 telescopes, $50 telescopes, a $,1000 telescopes, and then there’s probably a $20,000 one.
And you probably sell one every two years. It’s unlikely you have a few in stock. But all the other ones might be in stock.
Why not say special order item will be to you within 4 days or comes direct from the supplier in 4 days, 7 days, whatever. Then they know. Then there’s no complaints.
You see what I’m saying, you want to cut out complaints because quite often the place people complain is not to you, it’s to their friends.
To other people they may have recommended you to. They are then complaining.
Or they could be complaining on social media and they may have reach. For example, I’m not showing off, I’m just using myself as an example. I have 22 or 23000 followers on twitter.
If I complain, they can share that to their followers. That is a huge reach. Because all full 22,000 actually read that, and a few of them shared, and some of them have even bigger followings, imagine. You are the first you’d know about it when people say all. Or said about you on twitter. Too late then.
Prevent Complaints
So prevent. Preventative medicine, preemptive strikes, and also its great customer service. Why wouldn’t you give people what they expect? And tell them everything they need to know. Never assume anything. Please. Honestly I’ve been in the customer service and direct dealing with customers for over 32 years. Yes it was my birthday recently. And, customers are wonderful, as long as you tell them what they are going to get. And make sure they’re happy with that. That’s all it takes.
Tuesday Toolbox Tip
It is a Tuesday. Fabulous Tuesday. By the way, it is baking hot here, it is 82 degrees. This is something I use every single day. This is one of these ones, remember as I said, I was going to re recommend the ones that you might not have heard the first time around. But you really should be using. For my to doers, I use an app called TeuxDeux. I’ve used it for years. It syncs on my mobile, it does actually cost. Click here to instantly download our FREE Book “The 71 Ultimate Marketing Tools”
It used to be free but it’s hardly anything. It’s an annual fee, to the point I can’t even tell you what it is. Its a few dollars. Not like a 100 or 50 or anything like that. Just a few. It’s worth it.
The way it syncs, the way it allows you to hide extras, to drag them onto your to do, the way it pushes stuff you didn’t do, onto tomorrow.
The way it gives you options to do other things, recurring tasks. Ah brilliant. If you’re not using it, if you are using just the phones built in app, or an excel, or notes or something for your to dos, don’t. Use a dedicated app that is designed just to do that job.
That’s it. Anyway tomorrow you got a fantastic expert interview series. Every Wednesday, the expert interviews. You will love it. I will be back with another tip for Thursday.