Relevant Solutions

It’s not a solution unless it’s relevant. If it doesn’t impact a current, real, and realized need, you can’t sell it. Do you wonder why your prospects won’t see you? Do you wonder why your clients don’t seem to call you as much? Maybe because they view you as “last year’s answer.” They are dealing with this year’s problems—strike that, today’s problems and they need today’s solutions. Retool. Get out of the box. Change the way they perceive you. Or fade away into irrelevancy!

High Tech Touches

Once upon a time, it was all about High Tech and High Touch (Alvin Toffler). Today, it’s about High Tech Touches. Once you capture someone’s email or cell number, you have the means to stay in touch with them and add value on a massive scale. Blogs, SMS, FasCas, email (sounds old fashioned), Twitter…you name it; there are dozens of ways to remind your prospects and clients that they are on your mind.

Holding Value

When you buy a new car and drive it off the lot, its value (i.e. what it’s worth) drops almost 20%. And it continues to diminish over time until its worth nothing. Client relations are similar. The moment we start a new client relationship, our value to the client is the highest it will ever be because we are the solution to their immediate pain. As their pain diminishes (we solve the problem) so does our value. There are only two ways to address this. One is to constantly search for new pain that we can address (starting the value clock over again). The second is to lower our price (thus increasing our value relative to cost). There is no third option.

Why Good Clients Leave

We don’t lose clients! That’s totally true. We know where they are…somewhere else! So why does that happen? Why do good clients leave? Feel free to add to the list.

1. They no longer need what we’ve been giving. Last year’s solution is this year’s expense reduction. Client needs have changed radically in the past 6 months. Have our conversations changed? Have our solutions changed? No matter how well you speak of a solution no one wants, you are going to keep that client.
2. Someone else offered more value. This often comes in the form of a lower price and we dismiss it as that. But look deeper. Price is a part of the value equation. No one buys for a lower price unless they feel they are getting value (benefit). Somewhere along the line, our benefit failed to justify the cost. Be realistic. If our benefit has dropped (i.e. we solved their problem) then our cost should also. If ours doesn’t someone else’s will.
3. We got boring. We stopped pursuing our client, dating them, coming up with creative solutions and new ways to make a difference. We went from uncommon to common. It was so gradual we didn’t even notice it. Maybe they didn’t at first either. But over time, our “same ol’, same ol’” opened the door to a new suitor.
4. Management changes. The person our relationship was with is gone and we either haven’t built other relationships in the organization or we haven’t gotten in front of the new decision maker quickly enough. If have gotten there, we’ve probably told them more about what we did than explored what they may need. See #1.
5. We Blew It and Didn’t Know How to Recover. Most companies blow it from time to time and, while not acceptable, it is expected. The real trick is whether or not we can recover—own the problem, solve it, etc. Defensiveness, denial, ignoring it, not apologizing, explaining it…these are the ways to lose a second chance.

Zappos—A Company to Benchmark Against

If you’ve never seen an interview in a bathtub watch this. If you’ve wondered who out there gives incredible service check out Zappos and watch this.

Being Customer Driven

Check out this article from Harvard Business Review on being a customer driven business. http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/merholz/2009/02/becoming-a-customer-experience.html

New Solutions

What’s the point of offering last year’s solutions to this year’s problems? More effort at pushing what doesn’t work or matter any more is a great way to fill out sales activity reports but an even greater way to end up losing your job! Listen to your clients. Throw out preconceived notions of what they need based on what you have. Ask real, piercing business questions. Solve today’s problems!