Being of service always wins

Your business exists to serve customers.

I don’t care whether you have products or services, whether you deal in low price commodities or super expensive transactions.  The fact is that you don’t exist unless your customers decide to give you their valuable time and money in exchange for what you provide.

It may seem trivial, but the logical conclusion is that if you don’t serve your customers in the way they want and need, you’ll lose them.  And you’ll lose your business.

Big duh.

Why is this even worth talking about?  Because I constantly see people who recognize that their product or service needs to give value, but don’t exercise this during the sales process.  They often act entirely different, giving a strong impression that “we’ll only start serving you once you actually become a customer.  Until then, we’ll treat you like dirt.”

When you do this, you’re not likely to become a customer because of the way you’ve been treated.

Once you change your mindset, the fix is fairly straightforward.  Treat everyone as valuable even before they’ve decided to give you their money.

OK, so you’re selling airplanes worth hundreds of millions of dollars.  Does this mean you give someone an airplane for free just in hopes of getting their business?  In some industries you don’t mind giving freebies, but this might be just a bit over the top.

No, don’t give them a free plane.  But give them valuable information, a bit of TLC, and especially the honesty and respect they deserve.

In my line of business, I do “give away” a lot of free coaching in my sales process.  It’s OK with me, because it’s really the best way someone has to decide to work with me.  There’s really nothing I could say in a brochure or on my website which would really explain how powerful this is, but sitting down with someone for an hour can be amazing.

If I deliver real business coaching and don’t hold back.

Sure, there’s a lot of other things in our coaching program which will entice people to make the purchase.  And I would rarely meet with someone over and over to deliver free coaching unless I consider them a personal friend.  But few people ever over-use this generosity.

So start treating people like valued customers from the first time you meet them.  Heck, even before that.

It’s helps make you a real and trustable person.