I found this story about Bank of America on Chris Brogan’s blog…
Yesterday, I went into a Bank of America branch. I had a check from a customer of theirs and wanted to cash it. I was told that I would have to pay $6 because I’m not a customer, too. Further, you made me stick my fingerprint on the check, because my signature is somehow not good enough.
These two actions made me think several things:
- You don’t want my business.
- You don’t trust me. (Signatures are legal proof of consent everywhere else on the globe.)
- You don’t want me doing business with that customer any more.
Do any of those seem like good ideas in this economy? Do you want this kind of a blog post railing against your policies?
Chris goes on to talk about his favorite bank and the great customer service they have. He also goes on to end his open letter to Bank of America like this…
Sincerely,
Go to Hell.
With the tough economy, great customer service is going to become more important than ever. Would you really want customer of yours to have this kind of open letter about you? Sometimes some of our sales policies and procedures can make you difficult to work with. This could include:
- Too few payment options. If you’re only taking cash or checks, you’re cutting out on all the customers with plastic. If you’re on the Internet and you’re doing this because you don’t want to apply for a merchant account, you’re committing online suicide.
- Too few ways to contact you. Email is great, but sometimes a phone number is better. At times, people want to talk to an actual human being. Providing just email can be frustrating for those who don’t want to use.
- Too stingy with information. Some artists are so terrified that some is going to copy their work that they provide teeny, tiny pictures with no alternate angles or detail shots. Other artists are so terrified of marketing that they provide very little marketing copy or even descriptions of their work. If you’re going to make it that hard for people to connect with your work, then don’t expect them to work very hard to buy it.
- Restrictive returns policies. Does anyone other than me find the practice of getting an in-store gift card instead of money back for a return incredibly annoying? Restrictive return policies, restocking fees, and excessive shipping and handling fees is one way to drive your customers away.
In most cases, artists create overly restrictive policies to protect themselves from unscrupulous customers. The problem with this is that truly “bad” customers are usually in the minority. So that means that you’re treating your honest customers as though you were expecting them to cheat you. If you do seem to have more than your fair share of “bad” customers, than I agree with what Bruce Baker often says…perhaps you’re marketing to the wrong type of customer.
Now I’m not suggesting that you don’t have common sense policies that can protect you from the rare “bad” customer. What I am suggesting is that whenever possible, make things easy for your customers instead if giving them more hoops to jump. In a tough economy, customer service is usually one of the first things to go. Make yourself stand out by making yours stellar!
