Category Archives: Increase Sales

Want to Increase Your Sales by 80%? Use Automatic Followup

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Followup is one of the most important practices in a good business and a key to increasing sales.

Take a look at this static released by the National Sales Executive Association:

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2% of sales are made on the 1st contact
3% on the 2nd contact
5% on the 3rd contact
10% on the 4th contact
80% of sales are made on the 5th-12th contact

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Follow Up

Why is following up so important to your success? We are all SUPER busy. We have lives packed to the gills with responsibilities, tasks, interruptions and more — and in the hustle of our everyday life we often lose track of our intentions.

Can you think of a time where you forgot to reply to an email or follow up with a prospect? It happens to all of us! That’s why automatic followup is so incredibly powerful. Using tools like Infusionsoft, we can design an automated system that takes care of the followup for us.

Keep in mind that situations change – a product that isn’t needed today might be the perfect fit in 4 months. Take the time to set up a system that works FOR YOU so that these opportunities aren’t slipping through the cracks.

Remember that in business, like life, following up too quickly can be a sign of neediness and desperation which is an easy way to lose clientele.  Design your followup system so that it feels natural and authentic.

Can you think of at least one way that you haven’t followed up with leads or clients that you can implement now? It’s time to put it into action.

Need help designing a campaign with intelligent follow-up in Infusionsoft? Click here to schedule a discovery call and we’ll get you set up with a system that works for you!

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The Value of Awesome Customer Support

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How to Rock at Customer Service

I just had a really amazing customer service experience that contained a really awesome lesson for us small business owners.  I had recently bought a few T-shirts from CafePress.com. Overall the shirts were okay but I had a few quality issues with two of them — in fact, one had a hole in the armpit!

I submitted a ticket to their support help desk and I was promptly greeted with an automated response.  Fairly typical these days, but it’s still nice to get quick feedback that they are aware of your issue.  I’m doing some work with FuseDesk lately (awesome software by the way!), so customer service is always running through my mind.  Ignored customers are NOT happy customers!

I received a quick reply email from one of their service reps saying:

“In order for me to process a refund for you, please reply to this email with the product numbers or a brief description of the designs on the items you would like refunded.  I will process your request when I receive your reply.  I look forward to your response.”

This of course seems pretty straight forward as well, but with a slight amazing twist: “or a brief description“.  Trying to match up the product item # with the product was a total pain because the numbers were long and the descriptions on the receipt were vague.  However, they made my life easy.  I just described the two shirts that I wanted to return and I was done with it.

Customers Service Key #1 – Make Your Customer’s Job Easy!

The easier it is for the customer to interact with your customer service department, the happier they will be.  After all, we are all just humans and want to be taken care of.  Make our live a bit easier and we will love you for it!

After replying to the first email from my customer service rep, I received one that totally blew me away.

Dear Patrick,

Thank you for your reply! We want you to be 100% satisfied with your CaféPress.com experience.

I have processed a refund for you and you will receive an e-mail from Amazon confirming the refund amount and timeframe for the credit to be received (usually 5-10 days).

I know the items received are not up to your complete satisfaction but as our way of an apology please go ahead and keep them. There is no need for a return!

If there is anything else I can do for you, please let me know.

They don’t even want me to send it back?  This is awesome!  If you’ve been buying products online for the past few years, chances are that you’ve had to return something at least once.  At best, this is usually just a small inconvenience, at worst it can be a nightmare.  I already had the next steps running through my head before this email came… “Well now I’m going to need to find a box to put these in… Crap the printer is still out of ink, need to go to a friend’s house to print the return label… When am I going to have time to get to UPS or the post office?”

Customers Service Key #2 – “WOW” Your Customer!

That one single email changed my opinion of CafePress.com from a midly disgruntled customer with a lackluster purchasing experience, to that of a RAVING fan who will almost certainly be a repeat purchaser and spread the word to my network.

This is the kind of amazing customer service experience that has propelled companies like Zappos to incredible success.

What action steps can you take in your business to WOW your customers?  Trust me, it will be worth it!

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