I am sick of salesmen who only bother about the sale.
The insurance guy who sells his policy and disappears. The bank agent who stalked you for a deposit and went missing after getting your signature. The telephone service provider who charges you for a “Hello tune” that you never opted for and wont refund you. The door-to-door salesman who doesn’t understand his own product, but is desperate to sell it to every house out there.
I hate them all.
To them, a sale is the end of a transaction.
To me, it is the beginning.
It is the beginning of many important things in a customer life-cycle.
It’s the beginning of a chance to show that you care about your customer.
That you will help them make better use of your product / service.
That you will understand their needs and align your product and interest on those lines.
That you will be there when things break.
That you will dedicate time to collect feedback.
That you will take the effort to respond to the feedback.
That you will ‘be there’.
That you are ‘committed’ towards your customers.
I so agree… I have seen this happen so many times and most recently happened with a prominent hotel . We called them back within a couple of hours to check on whether we had left a camera behind, and told them we would turn around and return if it was there. Call backs promised didnt happen and 4 calls and 2 hours later we insisted on holding on the line while they called their housekeeping. It was a 2 minute job, given the camera wasnt even there! I was told each time i called that there were guests waiting to check in. And i thought to myself, if i was a guest waiting to check in, i would surely understand if he would but explain that there was a panicked customer who needed some info!!! Net net, i will never return to that hotel, and most likely never return to that chain either!