Buzz Builder

Why Last Impressions Are Essential to Generating Referrals

A few years ago, I wrote about how critical first impressions are to business success. But, a company’s last impression with a customer carries even more weight when it comes to generating repeat and referred business.

Recently, my wife Ellen and I spent three nights at the Trumpeter Inn, a bed & breakfast on San Juan Island in Washington State. During our stay, Geoff and Shaun, the attentive husband-and-wife owners, provided top-notch service which included answering all my inquiries about the best things to do and places to see (no easy feat when you consider that Ellen calls me “The Question Man” for my propensity to grill people for information).

On our last night, we told Shaun that we needed to catch the 6:00AM ferry to the Mainland. It pained us to leave early since breakfasts had been so delicious. Shaun promised to have brown bag breakfasts waiting for us when we left. While other hungry ferry passengers had to make do with stale vending machine food and coffee, we enjoyed a breakfast bonanza which included homemade muffins, yoghurt parfaits with fresh fruit and granola, boiled eggs and juice. We sipped gourmet coffee out of takeout cups that she had thoughtfully left for us next to the coffee machines, which were programmed to kick into action when our morning alarm sounded. The Trumpeter swans that Shaun drew on our breakfast bags made us smile as we unpacked them on the ferry with San Juan Island receding in the background.

Over the years, I’ve left stayed at enough bed & breakfast inns to know that I would have to fend for myself if I checked out before the standard breakfast hour. By doing something completely unexpected in such a classy way, the Trumpeter Inn stands above it competitors and it’s no wonder that it’s the top-rated B&B on San Juan Island according to TripAdvisor, America’s leading customer review website for travel recommendations.

It’s not just B&Bs that benefit from leaving customers with a strong positive impression. With the weather heating up in the Pacific Northwest, I hired a company to power wash and seal our back deck. After I was given the price for the job and the work had started, I asked the owner of the company whether he could spray off our outdoor table while he was at it. Not only did he do this, but the job took longer than expected because he took extra time to thoroughly wash the table and all the outdoor chairs so they look almost new again—at no extra charge.

Professional service providers can also find ways to leave their customers impressed. Whenever we complete an engagement for a client in which we’ve carried out a successful media relations campaign, there is always the possibility that journalists will contact us about a future story. Whether we are billing a client or not, we promptly follow up on media opportunities and respond to queries on the client’s behalf without charging anything. We’ve learned that the hours we work for a client without being paid after an engagement officially ends is a wise time investment because it dramatically increases the chances that the client will reengage our services and recommend us to others.

In these tough economic times, those companies that find ways to leave a great last impression will not only survive but thrive.

When No Price Is the Right Price

Below is an an article from the May edition of my free Buzz Bulletin monthly online newsletter. To subscribe, please sign up on my website.

I can never get enough ice cream so I was chagrined last year when Dreyer’s, which makes some of my favorite flavors, shrunk their most popular container from two to 1.75 quarts. Last week, Dreyer’s cut their standard ice cream packaging even further, from 1.75 to 1.5 quarts, with only a small reduction in price. Pretty soon, we’ll be taking magnifying glasses to the grocery store.

As people reduce their purchases in these tough economic times, Dreyer’s is just one of many companies that believes that shrinking packaging is a smart way to keep prices down while enticing people to buy more. However, other businesses have discovered an entirely different lesson: reduced pricing or even free products and services can be a much better way to engender customer loyalty and create buzz.

As soon as the weather gets nice in Portland, I feel like riding my bike. Invariably my tires are flat or I’m facing other mechanical nuisances. Two weeks ago, I started calling local bike shops to ask how much it would cost to repair a flat and tune up my bike as well as my wife’s. Three places quoted me prices in the $75 to $85 range. However, the Community Cycling Center in Portland, Oregon told me to bring my bike into the shop and they would see what it needed.

Because I was in hurry, I dropped the bike off and told the mechanic to do whatever he thought was necessary to get it working as smoothly as possible. When I returned, the mechanic told me that he only fixed a flat and put cloth tape on the inside of a wheel which is always getting flats as a preventative measure. The mechanic said that he looked over both of our bikes carefully and that there was no reason to do a tune-up on either bike since they were operating without any problems and the brakes were safe. I left the shop after paying a $14 bill, instead of the $150 I had expected to pay.

I had a similar experience recently with our Subaru Outback. After noticing some minor rattling coming from the left front tire area, I took the car to Superior Import Repair in Portland and left it there to see whether they could figure things out. The mechanic said that they drove the car a couple of miles, listened to sounds coming from the car with a stethoscope, and couldn’t find anything wrong with the car. While he was looking at the car, he checked fluid levels, brake pads, lights, and other items. He made me feel great when he said that our car was running so well that he would feel confident driving it across the country. The bill: $0. When I asked why I wasn’t being charged, the mechanic said, “it’s the least we can do for a good customer.”

In their commitment to providing great service first and worrying about pricing second, my bike and car mechanics solidified my loyalty. Why would I shop around for other providers when I have people looking out for my best interests? Furthermore, these stellar customer service experiences have inspired me to buzz about both businesses to friends since they’ve occurred. Surely, some of this positive word of mouth will lead to new sales.

Clearly, in this difficult economy, it’s critical to watch your expenses closely. However, sometimes giving things away is the best way to grow your buzz and your business.

Tree Maintenance Service Builds Relationships and Business with Savvy Customer Outreach Campaign

This spring, the old horse chestnut tree in front of our house looks better than  ever. A couple of years ago, we were depressed to think that the tree was nearing the end of its life since the leaves were sparse and sickly looking.

A couple of years ago, I met Matt Allen of Pacific Tree Works, which serves the greater Portland, Oregon area, at a networking event. Matt told me that pruning our tree would help it look better and allow it to live longer since the elimination of dead branches would encourage the roots to feed the parts of the tree that were still alive. Based on his excellent knowledge and professional demeanor, I hired Matt to trim the horse chestnut as well as a 110-foot Douglas fir in our backyard. Sure enough, ever since Matt trimmed both trees, they look better than ever. In fact, the horse chestnut has improved so much that our neighbors have asked us what we've done to make the tree look so healthy.

In the first year after he pruned our trees, I referred Matt to  friends who could use his services. However, as time went by, I stopped referring business to Matt because he simply stopped being top of mind. Last month, I received a letter from Matt and his wife Anna thanking me for my business and requesting that I refer business to their company since times are tough for small, family-owned businesses. To attract more clients during the recession, they said that the company is cutting  prices by 20% throughout the rest of 2009. Along with the letter, they included an attractive color brochure which emphasizes the company's local roots and commitment to the community. This savvy marketing effort has put Pacific Tree Works back on my radar screen, and I'm sure that I'll be referring more business to the company.

If you're looking to get more referrals for your business, when is the last time you've told that to your customers in a compelling way? In these tough times, your best source of new business is your existing customer base. If you let people know what you're doing both in your business and community and ask for referrals, the results should surprise and delight you.

It doesn't take a complicated message to impress your customers as you can see by clicking on the letter that I received from Pacific Tree Works.

 

Rather than Being Bitter, Innovative Entrepreneurs Twitter

The April edition of my free monthly Buzz Bulletin eNewsletter is going out this afternoon. Read it below and sign up for future editions on my company's website.
 

“Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.”
Steve Jobs, Founder & CEO, Apple Computer

With the economy mired in a severe recession, many entrepreneurs have stopped marketing because they believe that they must conserve scarce financial resources. Yet, others are increasing their exposure to existing clients and prospects as they embrace online social networking in efforts that require moxie not money.

Today’s newsletter focuses on how you can grow your business with Twitter, a free social networking and micro-blogging service that enables its users to send and read other users' updates known as tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length which are displayed on the user's profile page and delivered to other users who have subscribed to them (known as followers). Twitter has grown from 475,000 unique visitors in February 2008 to 14 million in April 2009.

Last October, Andrea Waltz, a friend and successful professional speaker, told me that she had just created a Twitter profile and was curious to see whether it could help grow her business. Having heard few business successes stories on Twitter, I was skeptical. Six months, later Andrea has 2,700+ Twitter followers and considers the service a core part of her marketing strategy.

Andrea told me, “Twitter has allowed me to get connected to the ‘end users’ who are interested in our Go for No!® program. I don't push our books but I have had people buy them because they saw me tweeting about them.  More importantly, Twitter has allowed me to connect with people that are doing similar things. For example, I make a point of following other speakers, authors and experts in direct selling, which is one of our big target markets. One of these people, a direct sales coach/trainer, just had me and my partner as experts on a call for her 10 day teleseminar series ‘Direct Sales Super Summit.’ We gained excellent exposure from being affiliated with her and she offered to share the email list she generated for the event. This is just one small example of how Twitter can be a valuable tool to get to know like-minded people and partner with them on successful projects.”

An interesting 4/13/09 article in The New York Times describes how many other businesses are benefiting from Twitter including large companies like Dell, Amazon, and Starbucks, as well as a small day spa in San Francisco.

It’s impossible to know exactly what Twitter can do for your business. But why not give it a try? Before doing so, I suggest that you check out “The Top Seven Mistakes that Twitter Users Make” on the 10,000 Words Blog.

I would love to follow what you’re doing on Twitter and learn how it’s working for you so please connect to me on Twitter.

Travel Portland's Twisitor Center Lands Some Well Deserved Media Attention

Kudos to the folks at  Travel Portland, the city's official tourism agency, for scoring attention for their innovative "Twisitor Center" in an Associated Press article that is being picked up in newspapers around the country!

The Twisitor Center allows Twitter users to "tweet" or send short questions about things to see and do in Portland, and get short answers back fast.

The Twisitor Center is a cool way to tap into the friendliness of wired Portlanders so they can easily share their knowledge of unique ways to enjoy the city that only natives possess. It's a tool that many companies will find particulalry useful. For instance, real estate and relocation companies can tell their clients the Twisitor Center since it will give them instant access to information that will make adjusting to their new city much easier. I'm sure that Twisitor Centers for other places will soon start popping up like mushrooms in an Oregon forest.

Matt Weinstein in "What Bernie Madoff Couldn't Steal From Me" Video

Last December, my wife and I were extremely lucky to travel in Antarctica for nearly two weeks with a group that our client OCSC, a sailing and adventure travel company in Berkeley, had organized. The trip was even more spectacular that we had hoped. The scale and grandeur of Antarctica never ceased to amaze. But, we never expected to learn so much from a fellow traveller.

On our boat, we met Matt Weinstein, a successful professional speaker and all-around great guy. Midway through the journey, Matt was called up to the ship's bridge to take a satellite phone call from his wife Geneen Roth, an accomplished author and healthy eating expert. Geneen told Matt that they had lost nearly everything that they had saved for retirement since they had invested with the infamous Bernie Madoff.

Unable to rush home since there are no flights out of Antarctica, Matt still had about a week left on the journey. During this time, when we talked with him, we were amazed that he didn't demonstrate much anger or grief. Surely, we thought, he must be in a state of shock which would morph into rage as time passed. But, over the past few months, we've seen that Matt possesses an amazing ability to reflect on what's really important in life. While he and Geneen will likely only recoup a small percentage of the money that Madoff stole, he has earned something of greater value.

Below is a video of Matt presenting an insightful and entertaining speech on "What Bernie Madoff Couldn't Steal from Me." It's the best eight-minute presentation I've ever seen. If you like it, please forward it to a friend. Here's wishing that Matt gets a lot of groups to hire him to speak about what's really important in life!

Customer Service Is the Future of Marketing

A couple of days ago, I heard a great interview on NPR's Talk of the Nation with Emily Yellin, author of Your Call Is (Not That) Important to Us. Emily spoke about the history and future of customer service and discussed some fascinating research that she did at customer service centers around the world. One comment that I found particularly striking and true: "Customer service is the future of marketing."

Too many companies are preoccupied with trying to stir up interest in their products and services with word of mouth marketing. Yet, once they get a prospect to call them, visit their websitie, or come into their showroom, poor service prevents them from making the sale. Or, even worse, the customer makes a purchase and then has a problem that the company fails to resolve in a quick and satsifactory manner.

Positive word of mouth will grow when a company delivers upon its promises with stellar customer service. Many businesses would be much better served getting their customer service practices in order so that purchases create happy customers willing to come back and refer their friends.

Buzz Marketing Lessons from Attendees at The ASPPA 401(k) Summit 2009

On 3/23/09, I gave a general session presentation at The ASPPA 401(k) Summit on how 401(k) plan advisors and providers can galvanize their business with buzz. I was pleased to see that attendees were excited about finding innovative ways to grow their businesses outside the realm of traditional marketing. Seemingly, many of them have experienced lackluster results with conventional advertising approaches similar to those that led me to start my word of mouth marketing company in 2002.

Afterwards, Sheri Fitts from The Standard and I led a workshop which featured three plan advisors discussing how they have worked with us in building their businesses with buzz over the past five months. The panelists were David Hinderstein (Strategic Retirement Group-website coming soon), Michael McCabe (Trinity Advisors Group), and Andrew Sweeny Jr. (Horan Securities).

At the workshop, we asked the advisors and providers in attendance to join a LinkedIn group called Advisors’ Buzzstorm which is open to any 401(k) professional interested in sharing creative ways to create buzz for their businesses without traditional advertising. In a workshop exercise, plan advisors and providers shared some of the most successful “buzzstorming” practices that they’ve used to grow their sales. Their comments included:

• Establishing myself as a resource for attorneys and accountants
• Using newsletters and seminars
• Sending out oversized postcards, blast emails and videos (like YouTube)
• Distributing email newsletters with Constant Contact
• Leveraging LinkedIn to build a larger professional network
• Working on visual brand
• Tracking clients and competitors via Google Alerts
• Calling clients four times a year to check in and ask for referrals at the end of every call
• Sending out a client survey
• Teaching CPE to CPA's 3 times a year along with an estate attorney
• Creating a marketing plan for referrals from 100+ brokers and CPAs at my broker/dealer
• Blogging on our website (each of our advisors contributes)
• Issuing targeted press releases about new initiatives or ideas that might be provocative, innovative or insightful regarding current events in the news
• Obtaining a certificate in retirement planning from Wharton School of Business and subsequently promoting this accomplishment via e-mail, snail mail and website
• Sending out financial newsletters by e-mail to corporate & individual clients
• Speaking at industry events where I share some of my findings
• Sending targeted e-mail campaigns to qualified prospects
• Meeting with prospects in person (road trips)
• Positioning myself as a subject matter expert available to reporters looking for commentary on industry events
• Growing through word of mouth referrals from the investment advisors we work with on various projects

The Best Marketing in a Down Economy

Below is an article from the March 2009 edition of my free monthly eNewsletter The Buzz Bulletin. To sign up for future issues, please visit the Galvin Communications website.

“Do what you do so well that your customers will want to see it again and bring their friends.”
Walt Disney

In today’s difficult economic climate, it’s easy to feel as if there’s little you can do to improve sales since the media keeps churning out stories about how consumers and companies aren’t spending money. The good news is that many of your competitors will believe this and stop trying to attract customers. This presents tremendous opportunities to grow your business.

Last week, Bob Stonhaus, a friend, client and founder of modular wine storage manufacturer STORViNO, sent me a statistic about the recession of the early-1980s. McGraw Hill Research found that companies which maintained aggressive sales and marketing efforts enjoyed more growth – some 275 percent in the five years after the recession – compared with only 19 percent growth amongst companies that cut or reduced their marketing budgets during the economic downturn.

Now, you might be thinking to yourself, “Hey, that makes sense but I don’t have extra cash for marketing since my sales are terrible.” Well, the best marketing doesn’t cost anything. Rather, it takes a commitment to love and delight your customers with stellar service.

Yesterday, my wife Ellen and a friend went to Vinideus, a neighborhood wine shop and bar in Portland, Oregon that we’ve walked by for months but never visited. Ellen was curious to check it out since we’ve seen signs in the window announcing a diverse array of activities including a networking evening, French movie night, salsa lessons and a variety of musical performances. One of the owners greeted her and everybody who came through the doors with a smile and warm hello as if they were arriving in his living room (in fact, the shop has the cozy atmosphere of a family-run bistro in France).

When he overheard Ellen and her friend discussing the nuances of authentic French crepes, he apologized for interrupting but enthusiastically told them about his plans for introducing crepes in a few weeks as well many of the other exciting things that Vinideus would be offering.  When Ellen and her friend left, they had signed up for the shop’s weekly newsletter and were already making plans for their return.

They wandered a few blocks up the street to try another wine bar, where the atmosphere was quite different. While the service wasn’t bad, it lacked the warmth, energy and knowledge of the previous establishment. Likewise, the space itself felt cold—literally and figuratively. There was no music, no laughter and, not surprisingly, very few customers on what should have been a popular place on a Friday night. Ellen’s comment was, “There was no enthusiasm, no love.”

Think about the businesses that you love. What makes you loyal to these companies over others that offer similar products and services? Is it possible to adopt some of their customer service tactics? By doing so, you will take your business to new heights as satisfied customers keep coming back and referring their friends.

The Wall Street Journal Highlights How the Salem, Oregon Chamber of Commerce Is Leveraging Online Social Networking

Today's Wall Street Journal has an excellent special section with tips, ideas, and strategies for small business owners looking to grow their businesses.

When I first started my company in 2002, I joined the Emeryville Chamber of Commerce in California and got a lot of value out of its networking and educational events. Unfortunately, my experience in other chambers of commerce was not nearly as positive. Too many chambers offer the same sort of programs year after year. As people grow tired of the same old stuff, enthusiasm and attendance dwindle.

I was excited to read details in The Wall Street Journal about how some progressive chambers of commerce are offering interesting educational programs and new media platforms to help their members leverage technology to grow their businesses. I wanted to offer kudos to my friends Kyle Sexton, membership director at the Salem Chamber of Commerce, and Tim Fahndrich, president of Third River Inc., a consulting firm that specializes in helping local businesses with Internet marketing, who are interviewed about the chamber's cool online social networking Face2Face website. I hope that other chambers emulate what Salem is doing since it provides a great way for time-pressed members to get much more value from chamber membership.