This morning I had a business breakthrough. I am so excited to share this with you that I interrupted my Sunday morning routine and came right to my computer. Are you ready? All emails that most of us are currently sending to our customers and prospects should start with the title above – I WANT YOUR MONEY. Wait – don’t click off the page, let me explain!
I believe that in business, making money matters. It allows us to run and grow the company, support our employees, give back and yes – to pay ourselves! We can get all philosophical about this if you want but at the end of the day I believe we all find some satisfaction when we earn more money for ourselves and our families. It allows us to provide for them, plan for our future, to help others, and even to indulge once in a while for ourselves. Now I am not a “stuff” guy. You wont see me in $300 jeans or wearing fancy watches. I don’t always need the latest gadget or gizmo. There is nothing wrong with those things – they just aren’t for me. My thing is CARS! I love cars. Always have. For some people they are just transportation – for me they are an experience and they bring me joy!
Sometimes I lease them, sometimes I buy them. Either way, when I get one I don’t skimp and I try to get what I want. Fortunately my wife supports my “habit” and gives me free reign in this area of the relationship. I guess it’s kind of like her shoe collection. More on that another time. Anyhow, one of our cars, is coming to the end of its lease and we will be preparing to return it in a few months. Any of you that have been in this position know what’s happening now. Dealers from all over the place are coming out of the woodwork to entice me to get my next ride from them.
This morning I received such an email from the sales person that actually sold us this last car. This is a luxury brand car so I figured they’d have their sh*… stuff together! The email read like this:
Hi Shawn (note the mis-spelling of my name! Great start.),
I see your lease is coming to an end. Let me know what car I can get you into next.
Suzie Saleswoman
Are you kidding me? First of all I have not heard from this person since literally the day we drove off the lot. Second, no questions about how my experience has been, how I liked the car, the dealership etc etc. In essence she has provided ZERO VALUE to me since the day I signed the papers. So – as I said before she should have just written me an email that said “I WANT YOUR MONEY”. Now let me ask you this – what are the chances I will do anything more than drive over there, hand her the keys to the current car and walk right back out the door? There are a million places I can get my next car and in this day and age they don’t even need to be near my home!
It got me thinking – how many of us do essentially the same thing. We contact our customers and prospects when we want something! When we want to make a SALE. We don’t offer value along the way and simply enter into a one-sided TAKE relationship. Who wants to be in one of those?
On the other hand, what if “Suzie” had been emailing me regularly during the 3 years I had the car. Giving me tips on up-keep, new advances, day trips that I could take the car on. What if her latest email asked me what I was interested in getting next – even if it wasn’t her brand – and she offered to do some research and comparisons for me. How’s that for VALUE?? Do you think I might be more inclined to want to do business with her again? Of course. She is simply thinking about the TRANSACTION, not the LIFE-TIME RELATIONSHIP we could form. BIG MISTAKE.
Now I am not suggesting that her actions are representative of the brand and possibly even the dealership. They are, however, representative of the way none of us should be doing business. Let’s all up our games. Let’s be a resource to our customers. Let’s think of them as more than just a transaction on a piece of paper. Let’s value the relationship. I suspect some amazing things will start to happen.
