Many service professionals will tell you that the words ‘ethical’ and ‘marketing’ don’t belong in the same sentence. While you’d be opening another can of worms by asking for a precise definition of ‘ethics’, let’s just say for the moment that often marketing leaves us feeling a little dirty, or sleazy if you prefer. One marketing guru summed it up by saying that marketing and sales are the world’s second-oldest profession – and often are indistinguishable from the first! Is that how you feel? If so, you have a problem (and you didn’t need me to tell you that!) That’s because without marketing you’re on the fast-track to retiring from a dull middle-management job at a faceless, heartless corporation. Not much in the way of choice, I hear you say!
Well, perhaps there is a third way. Let me say that a little more positively: I KNOW there is a way to be as successful as you choose to be at marketing without feeling like you need a hot shower and a scrub. Let’s take a few moments to explore the marketing dilemma and see if we can unravel it.
First, let’s acknowledge that not all of us would do anything for a quick buck. Most of us (certainly the professionals I work with) went into professional services because we really believed that we could do things better if we weren’t hamstrung by corporate red-tape, and that by doing things better we could better serve the customers whose dollar we were on. Has that changed? Not for me – and I doubt it has for you either. So at its heart our business exists because we believe it helps those we do business with as much as – if not more so than – it does ourselves. Many professionals remember this simple fact by carrying a Vision or Mission Statement which says so. (Without intending to get off track, I cannot recommend highly enough that you regularly reconnect with the reasons you went into business in the first place. Our Marketing Mindset process helps our clients to do just that.)
Second, let’s agree that sometimes we really need to close a deal in order to survive. We’ve all had months when the taxman was calling, the bank manager was refusing to extend the overdraft and the kids were expecting to be equipped for university like Shackleton was for the Antarctic! Some of us have had more of those months than we care to remember! At times like that it doesn’t help to hear some smart aleck say that if you really need the money, you shouldn’t do the deal. They may be right – and if so we’ll have our nose rubbed in it later when we’re trying to untangle from a customer whose expectations were way too high but whose commitment was close to non-existent. But in the heat of the moment it’s human nature to do what we have to do in order to survive, so we do and say whatever it takes to get the signature on the proposal.
Clearly then, there are times when our commitment to a customer doesn’t closely mirror our overall vision for our business. And if we have too many of those, we start to question our vocation. You may not realise this, but you should: Getting to feeling like that is a GOOD THING! It means that your profession still means something to you; that you still want to be better. You want to be better for your own sake, and you want to be better for your customers’ sake. If you ever lose that desire, you’re in deep trouble and I’m not sure who can help you!
However, that scenario should not be the norm for service professionals. All too often, though, it is. Why? Because we neglect the necessary chore of regularly prospecting for customers until the urgency is great enough to force us out of our comfort-zone. Or, to put it another way, we don’t do any marketing until we’re having ‘one of those months’ – the type that make us unethical marketers! Are you sensing the pattern here?
Finally, then, lets discuss how to break the cycle that leads to ethical misdemeanours. It seems too obvious to say, but plainly it’s not: Do more marketing more regularly, and you won’t have many of ‘those months’. Of course it’s one thing to say it and quite another to do it. How do we market regularly? What does that involve? How do we get the most bang for the buck? We are busy people, so only the most effective marketing activities should be in our portfolio or else we’re wasting time and money, right?
Many years of testing and sifting have demonstrated to me that there is nothing that even comes close to Relationship Marketing in terms of effectiveness for service professionals. As I define it, Relationship Marketing is about building trust with and demonstrating credibility to prospective clients before initiating the crucial sales conversation – letting them get acclimitised to you and plying them with information about your services so that when you ask for their business they have little hesitation because they already know they’re going to get value-for-money. And for it to work successfully on a consistent basis, you have to have a game-plan for it.
Put in a nutshell then, a good Relationship Marketing game plan well-executed is the cure for the ethical marketing nightmare. So what are you waiting for? Make sure NOW that your marketing strategy is focused on building relationships – not just when you’re desperate for new business but every week and every month. Your conscience will thank you later!
©David Deakin and Zee2A Limited
Would you like to reprint this article? You may do so as long as you include the copyright notice and the following paragraph: David Deakin, CEO of Zee2A, is a marketing guru who works with Professional services Executives yearning to take their business to the next level of profitability and success. Through one-on-one and group mentoring programmes he helps them to create sustainable marketing strategies that attract more clients at profitable rates. To learn more, sign up for his e-zine, or make an enquiry please visit http://www.zee2a.com
Excuses rather than Solutions
Tags: comment, customer service, Ethics, excuses, opinion, reputation
In a recent issue of our e-zine The Marketing Edge we asked readers to share their experiences illustrating how service providers offer excuses rather than solutions. We ran the same question in the Q&A section of LinkedIn. Here are some of the best answers we received:
“Back in November I alerted my web host company about a problem with one of my accounts. I supplied the requisite paperwork to resolve the issue on my end with the promise by them that the issue would be resolved.No less than five phone calls later, a lost account, and excuses galore, I ended up recovering the account two months later, but it cost me time and money. I’m still not satisfied with the way that they handled this problem and I am closing this account after a five year business relationship. Worse, were the excuses and lack of customer support. There were times I felt insulted by their answers, never mind the canned answers I received for many of my problems.The bad thing about this company is that I am telling everyone how dissatisfied I am with their product. I am sure they’ll lose more business because of their customer nonsupport.” – Matt Keegan
“I was unable to find my question addressed in the FAQs on the Web site. Past experience has taught me that sending a service request e-mail would only net me further frustration, so I called the service hotline instead. I was routed through a long menu of options, none of which seemed to fit my question. Then I was put on hold. No exaggeration, my phone timed it–I remained on hold for seven minutes.The rep who finally picked up told me I could not proceed any further without a credit card number. My name, PIN, account number, password, etc.–things that work from the Web site (assuming the Web site is functioning, which is another frequent problem) would not do–it had to be the credit card. I ran off and dug up my credit card…OK. I asked my question. The rep told me that wasn’t his department. He transferred me, at which point I went back on hold for another five minutes.The second rep took me through the credit card routine again, and I asked my question. The rep wanted to know why I called her because the other department should have answered. I told her the other department had transferred me, so what do I do? She put me on hold again (3 minutes) and came back with an answer this time…but unfortunately the answer was, we don’t offer that service. Before ending the call, the rep tried to pitch me an account upgrade. It’s easy, she said…I already have your credit card number and only need your authorization!Now that’s nerve. And it’s NOT “customer service.” ” - AnnaLisa Michalski
“Excuses vs Solutions. However best an excuse is, it will still remain an excuse and not satisfy the customers right to get a solution. The irony of today’s cost cutting competetion is that no one is allowed to build an infrastructure to support the customers, every penny goes into marketting and sales efforts. Upon this, there are chances of over committment to sell more. So, finally comes the role of Support staff to handle the customers problems. Really, the present situation is of firefighting and companies should understand the need to build the infrastructure to be proactive to serve the timely solutions to the customers everytime. They should understand that however best the firefighting operation is, it still leaves many damage marks which are difficult to erase/compensate for. Also, the classic case of using Service Providers, the principles should understand that they still are accountable/responsible for the after sales services to drive the repeat sales and so they should be really in the driver seat of all the activities of the service providers instead of allowing them the liberty of carrying out the service operation from A to Z. Its their brand name which sells and its their image which gets hurt when the customer does not get the desired/ committed solution.” - Bhupinder Sehgal
“Part of the answer to that question, I think, goes to the basic business model of the service provider. It is easy to illustrate in the case of a very small (micro) start-up, compared with a larger broad-market provider of the same basic service. The start-up model may rely upon word of mouth and customer referrals to grow the business, and this may work well up to a point. At some point, the company must leverage its reputation, that is, the company has to capitalize an expansion of its work force and delivery zone to keep growing, and this “lumpy” investment (bigger facilities, internal training, new layers of supervision/management, etc.) means borrowing based on past business performance, which was reputation-driven. It starts to get hard at this point. The larger competitor may operate on a different business model, one that invests much more heavily in advertising and sales. To the extent that the big company relies upon advertising and a well managed sales process, they will have less incentive to invest in customer service–because their new customers do not come from referrals, they come from advertising/sales! Now, at some point in their target market, the big company may find that negative feedback, transmitted by word of mouth, is harming new sales. But in many situations, this intuitively plausible outcome does not occur. How, after all, does an unhappy customer communicate their bad experience to prospective new customers? In some business environments (hospitals, say, where there are only a few thousand in the entire country), that’s a risk, but in others (snow removal services to residents in Chicago), it’s tough for an dissatisfied customer to “get the word out” about Ace Snow Removal on a broad scale; ASR can continue to advertise on TV and the Trib.”- Rod Bell
“My worst experience: I took an expensive gas trimmer (had it for 2 months and it busted) into a local shop for repair, the one required by the manufacturer – I had purchased this at a big box home improvement place, but was not allowed to take it back there for an exchange. (flag 1) The shop tagged it, said it would be ready in 2 weeks. I let 3 weeks go by, no phone call. I then call and they say (flag 3)”oh, it’s next in line, it’s not ready, but call in tomorrow, so you can come get it.” I call the next day and it’s still not ready. (flag 2 – me having to call, flag 3, it’s not even ready) Next week, “we don’t have the parts.” (flag 4) Okay, so you get the idea.After 2 months, I still don’t have my trimmer. I call the manufacturer and proceed to throw the shop directly under the bus. The final straw? They said “we have other stuff to work on here, your machine is not a priority.”
I ask for the manager of the shop and he is more rude than the other people that work there –this treatment is part of their company culture! This small business amazed with their ignorance of the situation and had multiple opportunities to care for me, but chose instead to make me feel like I was a nuisance and a bother for wanting my machine repaired.That said, I don’t believe the clock starts ticking at the time of a complaint: it starts ticking the minute you begin a relationship with them. Like any relationship, they have an opportunity to knock your socks off with attentiveness and care or they have the opportunity to completely blow it and treat you like you’re not special at all. Making excuses does nothing but this – they don’t care. “ – Deb Kolaras