Why Should You Continue to Communicate with Clients?

Let’s do a bit of an experiment right here and now.

I want you to feel your feet.  I want you to feel your feet against the floor, or in your shoes, or in your socks.

Have you done that?  Good.  Now, let me ask you this.  Until I brought this to your attention, you were NOT feeling your feet.  Yes, you were feeling them, but you were not consciously aware of your feet.

Why is this??

It is because the brain is processing so much information that it can only focus on a few things at a time.

The brain then blocks out all the other information that is incoming.

Does this make sense?

Okay, if you disagree, now I want you to listen to all of the background noise around you.  Is there a fan on?  How about music?  Is someone having a conversation close by?  Is there a coffee bean grinder grinding?  Again, you didn’t notice any of these items until now because your  brain had blocked them out as inconsequential to what you are currently doing.

Once again I want you to feel your feet.  Got it?

I bet you had already forgotten about feeling your feet in just the few seconds it took you to read those last few sentences.  Once again, the brain has to filter out information or it would be going crazy.  So you might be saying something like, “Matt, what the heck does this have to do with my business?”  It has everything to do with your business.  Let me explain.

Most business owners never follow-up with their current customers.  And we know it costs 5-7 times as much money to get a new customer as it does to keep a customer.  Furthermore, most businesses do a horrible job of selling more products or services to their current customers.

Your customers are rarely thinking about you.  They are thinking about their own lives.  They are thinking about the thousands of things THEY have to do.  The laundry, the dishes, getting the oil changed, mowing the yard, balancing the checkbook, and on and on and on it goes.

So if you are not communicating with them on a regular basis you ARE losing money.  They are not just sitting around all the time and thinking about you.  You need to go back to them again and again in order to provide more value and education and eventually sell them more products and services.

This also is why you do not get the referral you deserve.  It is because you are not talking with your customers all the time, so therefore you are not “top of mind” when they are talking to someone who needs your product or services.  So, to summarize monthly communication is essential because if your prospects and customers don’t hear from you, they won’t think of you.

Furthermore, you don’t get the referrals you want and deserve, you don’t get the repeat sales and business, and finally customers leave you and don’t buy again.

To overcome this problem I recommend, at the VERY least, communicating with your customers at least once a month.  I believe it is also essential to do this in multiple media formats.  Email, direct mail, phone calls, faxes.  The more the better.  Why?  Because some people respond and like different types of media better than other people.  Also, it goes back to what your brain will pick up on.  If you see the same type of mail day in and day out you begin to filter it out.

So, there you have it.  Follow-up all the time.  Oh, and one last thing.  Have you already forgotten the feeling and sensation of your feet?

If you have, just remember that as quickly as you forget about the feeling of your feet your customers have also forgotten about you!