Module 4: Marketing, Selling, and Customer Service

This lesson is on marketing, selling, and customer service.

“Sir Thomas Fuller, Buxton once wrote: The longer I live, the more certain I am that the great difference between the great and the insignificant person is energy invincible determination, a purpose once fixed and then death or victory.”

Once upon a time, at a company seminar with a room full of senior accountants, A business coach asked how many people here are in sales? They say that accountants choose accounting because they lack the charisma of engineers. The very idea of selling is uncomfortable for them. They see themselves as high-level professionals, not as salespeople. So, no one raised their hand. He smiled at the group and then asked again a bit more slowly and distinctly. How many people here are really in sales?

> Rule. Everyone in an organization or business is a Sales Agent for the company! Sales start at every engagement within or outside of the business.

This time, one of the senior partners got it. He raised his hand; the others looked at him with some amazement. Then one by one, they all got it. One by one, they all raised their hands. It had gone on, and that realization hit them all; even though they were accountants, they were all in sales. Their personal success and the success of their company were totally determined by their ability to develop and maintain good business relationships with their clients. Every customer interaction was important. It either helped or hurt.

Every time they met with a client, they were either building higher quality longer-term relationships, or they were tearing them down. They were all in sales in some way. Then he asked how many people here are in customer service? This time there was a certain degree of hesitation, but not as long as before. One by one, they began smiling at each other and tentatively raising their hands. Soon, the entire room of senior accountants had their hands up.

It was clear to all of them that each person was in the sales and customer service business from the time they started in the morning until they finished in the evening. The way to wealth is paved by sales and customer service. You should be spending 50 percent or more of your time in these two areas. If someone asks you what you do with your company, you can say I am in charge of new business development and customer service. Your job is to find and keep customers buying from your company from morning to night.

Customers are everything at the beginning of each strategy session. He asked the question, what is the purpose of a business? Almost invariably, people answer to make a profit. Then I\’ll point out gently that that is not quite correct.

“As Peter Drucker said, the purpose of a business is to create and keep a customer.”

All of the activities of a successful business are focused and concentrated on creating and keeping customers. When you successfully create and keep customers in a cost-effective manner, the result will be a profit. But the profit always comes after the creation of the customer. What is the key measure of business success? It is only one thing customer satisfaction.

> NOTE: How do you measure customer satisfaction? Answer. Repeat business.

What is the most important sale? Answer the second sale. You can get the first sale by advertising and discounting or free offers, but it\’s only when the customer buys the second time that he or she is telling you that you have satisfied the promises you made to get him or her to buy from you the first time. Only the second sale is the true measure of how well you are doing in business on the way to wealth.

• You have three goals in your business.
• Your first goal is to get the customer to buy from you rather than anyone else. For the first time.
• Your second goal by delivering excellent products and services and giving excellent customer service is to get the customer to buy from you again and again
• and your third goal.

The key to long-term business success is to get your customer to bring their friends and to encourage them to buy from you as well. This happens with the very best companies in every business and industry; repeat sales via customer referrals. The most important person in your business is the customer. Your predominant consideration must always be the customer. You must think day and night about who your customers are. How to find them and how to get them to buy. The customer is everything. Tom Peters, whose book in Search of Excellence became one of the bestselling business books of all time, was asked some years later what he considered the most important of the eight business principles discussed in his book. He replied immediately with an obsession with customer service. To build a successful business, your main job is to create customers, organize your business, and produce products and services so that people buy from you, buy again, and tell their friends. It\’s the one true measure of how well you\’re doing. Marketing and Selling are two separate activities. Marketing is the process of lead generation. Marketing embraces everything you do up to the point of sale. The design, development, and determination are the exact products or services that you\’re going to sell. Are the first part of marketing. The second part is to think through every element of the marketing mix before beginning.