I’m out of town tonight in a town I have never been to before. While I was checking into the hotel I asked about a good place to eat. As usually happens this question starts a debate between everyone within ear shot. The desk clerk asked what I was in the mood for, I told him that I usually like something that is unique to the area. He told me that there was a great seafood restaurant. I knew it was going to be good because everyone that was involved agreed to the choice.
Not having ever been in the area before I asked for directions. One of the locals gave me these exact directions. “Go out of the hotel and make a left. At the first light make another light and go over the bridge. Make the first right over the bridge and it will be down overlooking the water.”
OK so here I go, left out of the hotel, right at the first light, over the bridge, first right, NO WATER! I knew I went over water when I was on the bridge so I went a little further down the road to see if it was there. Finally I found the water, no restaurant. I drive a little further, no more water. I went against my gender and asked someone, I was told to back to where I first made the right after the bridge and it was right there, but NOT on the water. After a few more turns and backtracking I found the restaurant.
So now I was there, but I started thinking, if the directions I got were so flawed how is the food going to be? Maybe that information is as flawed. I sat in the car and thought for a few minutes. There were not a lot of cars in the parking lot, the cars that were there were nice cars, the building looked like a typical seaside seafood restaurant (made to look like a shack). I decided to give it a try. I went in and got seated (not a water view table) and the menu looked great. To make a long story short, the food was wonderful!
So like so many everyday things that happen to me I started thinking about how this would relate to sales. It was really quite easy.
I started thinking about the information we give to our customers. How accurate is it? How accurate are the directions we give our customers and how easy are they to follow? If the customer follows our directions will they get lost like I did? How many customers do we cause to sit and think about our products and services because of hard to understand or inaccurate information? How many sales do we lose because we gave bad directions or inaccurate information?
I made a decision to try the restaurant even with the bad directions, but I was only investing the price of a meal. If it was truly bad I could always grab a burger and go back to the hotel. A customer may be investing hundreds or thousands or hundreds of thousands with you and your product or service. Will the customer decide to go ahead anyway?
The directions and information you give can’t be as inaccurate as the directions and information I got. A customer looks at you as the expert like I did the person giving me directions. The difference is I will never see that person again, your customer will hopefully see you over and over again, or at the least know how to contact you. Bad information or directions will cause YOU as many headaches as your customer maybe more!
I am sure that if the person who gave me the directions had thought about it for another second, they would have corrected the mistakes and I would have found the place the first time past. You MUST think about what you say and make sure what you say is dead on, no mistakes, no errors. Close isn’t close enough, you need to hit the bulls eye every time.
Here is the sad part, just like my food, your service or product is most likely excellent and exactly what the customer needs and wants. Wouldn’t it be a shame if the customer had to accept second choice because of your inaccuracy? Wouldn’t it be a shame if you lose your commissions because you didn’t take the extra second to think about what you are saying and making sure it was correct?
If you are ever in Natchez, Mississippi go over the bridge that crosses the Mississippi River, make the first right and immediately on your left is a restaurant called The Sandbar. It is NOT on the water, there is NO sandbar, but the food is excellent!
Lorin
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