Connecting Sales, Marketing and the Front Line
Video Transcription
Connecting Sales, Marketing and the Front Line – Move from Transactions to Relationships
Ryan Housefield, SVP, Sales Executive, Marquis
I’m a nice customer. You all know me. I’m the one who never complains, no matter what kind of service I get. I’ll go into a restaurant and sit quietly while the waiters and waitresses gossip and never bother to ask if anyone has taken my order. But I don’t complain. I just wait.
And when I go to a store to buy something, I don’t throw my weight around. I try to be thoughtful of the other person. If a snooty salesperson gets upset because I want to look at several things before making up my mind, I’m just as polite as can be. I don’t believe rudeness in return is the answer. I think that’s uncalled for.
No, I’m the nice customer. And I’ll tell you who else I am.
I’m the customer who never comes back.
Why they leave.
So, what are the stats on customers that never come back? Granted, 3% do move from the area, 5% do have relationships and partnerships somewhere else, only 9% find your competitor more appealing, and 15% have an issue with some facet of your product or service. But here’s the thing: the balance, the lion’s share – 68% – leave simply due to an attitude of indifference towards their business with you. Accenture said the same thing. It’s not about price. It’s about customer service, or lack thereof. And again, this is not necessarily about bad customer service. It’s much more subtle than that. So, let’s explore why and the opportunity some of that presents.
According to Bain, reducing attrition by just 5% can increase your profits up to 95%. That impact is all realized when you’re not spending your resources and spinning your wheels trying to replace the customers you’ve lost. Now you have a great foundation to build on and grow from.
Let’s look at another telling fact. According to Future Branches, 73% of your customers don’t know everything you offer, and would likely buy more if they did. But if your staff doesn’t know what your customers have and don’t have, both groups are in the dark. And at that point, all you can do is process a transaction.
What they expect.
Let’s recap the state of consumer expectations. First off, your customers assume you can see everything they have with you, don’t they? Based on that, they expect to be treated as a unique individual, not just another transaction. And if you know what they have, you should be able to make relevant recommendations that can help them.
Guys, your best customers expect you to know who they are. Everyone likes to be recognized. And as it was once said, “All customers are created equal. But some are simply more equal than others.” They expect you to be a trusted advisor and know what’s happening in their financial life. After all, that’s our fiduciary responsibility as a financial institution. But if we don’t record previous conversations and customer requests, it’s going to be pretty difficult to meet that expectation.
And then finally, regardless of where they engage you, they expect the left hand to know what the right hand is doing, and everyone to be on the same page. And if I was really going to boil that down, it all comes down to us honoring the relationship, taking note of what they shared with us and making it easy for the customer to do business with us.