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Are You Sending Your Customers Across the Street to Complete their Purchase?

[ Posted On: 2008-03-31 ]

Every day thousands of businesses unwittingly send their customers across the street to their competitors to complete their sale. The simple, under-appreciated fact is that the cost of selling a second thing to an existing customer is a lot easier and less expensive than going out to find a new customer. So why are so many business leaders content to make the initial sale and then watch their customers go across the street to get the rest of what they need?

You've gone through a lot of work to attract people to your business, and to provide them with a top notch product or service. One of the biggest management mistakes people make at this point is to congratulate themselves on the sale, and then start the cycle all over again.

Not that you shouldn't congratulate yourselves, you should. But now that you've put in all that work to create a satisfied customer don't just go back to the beginning and do it all over again. Instead, make sure you've actually done all you can to help your customer get everything they need.

The idea of offering a related product or service at the time of sale is called cross-selling and it's a management tip all businesses leaders should listen to. Related products and services, and product bundling are two cross-selling opportunities every business should have a strategy for.

In every business, whether you're in products, services, consumer sales, or business to business dealings, there are always additional ways to help your customers. So once you've gone to all the trouble of attracting a customer and making the sale make sure you ask the simple question "Is there anything else I can help you with today?"

I don't mean that you need to literally ask this question to every customer, although that is not a bad idea. What I mean is that you need to take the time to find out if your customers really do need anything else. Find out what people are doing with the things they purchase from you, and add related products and services to your offering. After all, the hard part (and the expensive part) of making the sale has already been done. Now is the time to make sure you give your customers everything you can. Remember, at this point it's a lot easier for a customer to purchase related things from you than it is for them to start the search over again for the rest of what they need.

Suppose you just spent weeks researching the best high definition television system and finally came to a decision on where to buy it. What's the next thing you're going to want to do? You're going to want to watch it. You're not going to want to watch a regular TV show. You're going to want to watch something in high definition to see just how impressive your new system is.

The message is this. After buying a new high definition TV, the next stop is the high definition DVD store. So if you're the TV vendor, make it easy for your customers and offer them a selection of high-definition DVDs while you're packing up their TV.
This applies to all products and services. There is always a related product or service you can offer, the additional cost of sale is very low, and your customers will appreciate the convenience of getting related things they would be looking for anyway from you as part of the deal.

If you're not offering related products and services to your customers you're doing your customers a disservice and leaving money on the table.

Another great cross-sell opportunity to increase the value of a transaction is to bundle products and services together at a discount. Done right this represents a win-win situation for both you and your customers.

The communication companies are masters at this. My local cable company offers phone and internet services, and the local phone company offers cable and internet services. Each basic service goes for around $40 per month. So cable is $40 and internet is $40. That's $80 right? Well guess what, if you buy the cable/internet bundle it's only $65. Plus I only get one bill per month instead of two. It's cheaper and more convenient for me, and it's better for the company I decide to go with because they get more money from me each month. This is a classic example of product bundling to increase the average value of each sale.

One of the reasons this works so well from a business perspective is that when you offer a bundle of things together you don't pay the cost of advertising each item separately. You save on advertising / lead generation costs, and are able to pass a portion of those savings along to your customers in the form of better pricing.

The cost of getting new customers is often the most expensive thing sales and marketing teams do. Once you've spent that money and got a customer, do yourself and your customer a favor and look for the cross-sell.

Don't miss the opportunity to offer related products and services, and product bundles as part of your cross-selling business strategy. Stop sending your customers across the street to compete their purchase.

Article Source: http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard

About The Author: Daryl Cowie has shared management tips with 1000s of people in over 30 countries around the world. His mission is to help you and your company turn business opportunities into business realities. Sign up for his free business management home study course at FreeManagementTips.com

| View Profile & All Articles By: Daryl S Cowie |

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