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As most of my business is found through referrals,
I received a call from a company that was referred to me by someone at
the college where I teach marketing management. They were looking
specifically for help in the area of ecommerce (i.e., SQL database
programming, shopping cart software, and notably merchant account
set-up, which is in my estimation a more daunting task here in Canada
when compared to the American banking system).
They were told that I would be the "expert" to contact. While I was
flattered somewhat, I had to decline since my expertise is mostly in
business development and marketing. Granted, the extra business would
have been a great addition to my portfolio. But I felt that I would
offer a disservice if I were to serve them in a way that would not
have been to their best advantage.
And so came two interesting observations.
First, while others would jump at the opportunity, the potential
damage that it can cause my company in the long run would be rather
serious. Of course, I could have provided the service and would have
found the resources to do so. But I felt that it would be better for
me to simply refer the prospect to one of my other clients who is more
qualified in that particular area.
As mentioned in
http://SuccessDoctor.com/articles/article26.htm, the long term
effects are usually the opposite of the short term ones -- crime, sex,
and drugs are typical examples. In marketing, however, since
credibility as well as third party, word-of-mouth advertising are key
(especially on the Web), providing a service that I was not qualified
to render could have cost me down the road. Many clients in my
practice have encountered that very problem and are now faced with the
possibility of closing their doors because of it.
Poor service and the lack of integrity
online may not seem as important. But in actuality the underlying and
oftentimes inconspicuous negativity it may cause can (as one of my
mentors once said) "come back and bite you." On the Internet, bites
(or negative bytes, in this case) can indeed be worse than its barks
-- words online carry more weight. Why? For two reasons:
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Roger Dawson, in his book "Secrets
of Power Negotiating," wrote, "If it is said, it could be
true, but if it is written, then it must be true."
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And words online stay around for a lot longer
than any other medium -- including the fact that their flow is
almost impossible to stop.
My mentor also said, "Implication is more powerful
than specification." While I usually use this phrase to demonstrate
that implying superiority is more powerful than stating it (in
instances where one's expertise is implied instead of outright
declared -- e.g., through ezine articles, ebooks, forums, and good
service), the negative aspect applies just as well.
In other words, if you offer poor service, or a product of lesser
value than what you claim (even if it's not apparent in the
short-term), the mere implied notion that you are offering poor
service can kill you in the long run. Statistics have shown that, when
a person is satisfied with a product or service, he or she will tell 3
other people about it. But when that person is dissatisfied, 10 others
will get an earful. Online, those numbers are easily multiplied.
Nevertheless, my second observation came from something I've learned
from Jay Abraham (see
http://www.abraham.com) who I believe to be one of the most
savvy and successful marketers in the world. Jay often teaches
Deming's marketing concept of "optimization." In short, it says that,
if you do not make the best use of whatever business process in which
you're engaged, you'll never grow your business to the extent to which
it can really become.
In the same way, making your
customers realize -- and then providing them -- the optimal value of
what you offer is key to expanding your company's profits if not
future profitability. Internet marketers are faced with a plethora of
competitors and service-related issues. Therefore, losing a customer
online is much easier than it is in the offline business world.
If prospects don't recognize the value of what you offer and, more
important, don't receive it, they may not only choose to never buy
from you but also never return if they do buy. In the very least, they
may talk negatively about you. While that might seem trivial, on the
web a customer's dissatisfaction can propagate faster than a virus.
Rants or "negative bytes" can appear on websites, newsgroups, message
boards, emails and of course conversations -- people would far more
tell others what to avoid than where to go.
While legal teams can work incessantly to stop the spread of negative
publicity, recent cases have proved that, online, it can be a more
arduous task than what most would tend to believe. (A few interesting
cases in point are
http://www.aolsucks.com and
http://microsoftsucks.com.) In the very least, if people don't
know you exist, you don't. But if you offer poor service or fail to
deliver the level of service you promised, you will be avoided…
Like a virus.
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