Introduction
You are a 20-year veteran in the manufacturing industry. You have always counted on good tools and reliable technology as contributors to your success. And you have saved a lot of money and time ignoring fancy tools, silver bullets and bright, shiny objects. But have you noticed things are starting to slip.
Your concern is valid, but the problem isn’t your fault. Your success came from your focus on providing value to clients and your discipline in ignoring useless technology people have tried to sell you. But consider life without a copy machine or phone; some new technologies are here to stay and provide real value. Today there are a few simple systems that manufacturers benefit from and it’s worth your time to embrace.
Embrace the DIY’ers!
Your manufacturing business faces the big challenge of meeting customers’ escalating expectations for instant accessibility and efficiency. Your clients crave seamless access to data, quicker interactions, and more control over their engagement with your company. They want to do it themselves! The stats are in:
- Over 67% of customers prefer using a form of self-service rather than talking to a customer service representative
- As many as 73% prefer using the company’s website exclusively instead of social media, SMS, or live chat apps for support.
You can make that happen with a game-changing self-service system that grants customers:
- Lightning-fast, Instant information at a glance
- Anytime, anywhere accessibility
The system is secure and managed by you, guaranteeing data integrity and client confidentiality.
Here’s an example:
Roy called me, “I need help. Things are falling through the cracks; customers are wanting answers and I’m losing money on some contracts.” Roy had built a successful business, doing things the same way for 15 years, but it wasn’t working as well anymore.
Roy explained, “Where a contract is located is a stressful guessing game – is it on someone’s laptop, or maybe it’s the fileserver or is it still attached to an email?” Roy’s partner Mark mentioned, “When customers call with questions it could be hours of waiting before the answers are found. Clients aren’t happy about response times.”
I told Roy, “You need a self-service system that will seamlessly connect you with your 5 major clients.” Roy wanted to improve and said “Yes”; the results were amazing. Roy and Mark watched customers access information themselves. Mark stated, “Because contracts are better organized, and clients can access what they need, our email and phone calls related to contracts were reduced by 80%!” They also mentioned, “It is reducing the administrative workload for our clients as well.”
Roy and Mark are back to winning and reaped a remarkable $24,960 in savings that year by introducing Self-Service.
Setting up this revolutionary system eliminated a headache. It takes a mere 16 hours of planning and prep, a small investment for a huge payoff in time, money and customer satisfaction.
How To Ignore Your Phone and Email
Don’t you hate it when your customers ask you these questions?
- “What’s the status of my order?”
- “How do I return this?”
These questions drive you crazy because they take up your precious time and interrupt your workflow. Taking you away from the important stuff, leaving you swamped with mundane tasks. Because they can hinder your customers’ overall experience, they can also make your customers unhappy and less loyal.
But what if you could get rid of these questions forever? That’s what our solution does for you! It sends automatic notifications and uses online forms to keep your customers in the loop about their order, repair or return. These features:
- Make your customers feel valued and informed
- Eliminate annoying customer phone calls and emails for good
- Skyrocket client satisfaction
- Free up your time for more important tasks
You might be worried that reducing the call volume will make you lose connection with your customers. But the truth is, your customers don’t want to bother you with trivial matters. They’d rather enjoy the value you provide and engage with you in meaningful ways. Research shows, more than 85% of customers want to experience proactive communication and contact from a business. Which means automatically sending them updates and information. Some even prefer no personal interaction, like people who happily pay more to complete mortgage transactions online.
Don’t just take our word for it. Listen to success stories from our client:
Andy, the Customer Service manager of an existing client met with me, “Joe, we handle 200 repairs a week and my team is overwhelmed with phone calls and emails from customers. We like to have regular contact with our customers, but my team is overwhelmed by all the updating, instructing and conversing. We keep going because we don’t want to lose contact with our clients; we know silence is deadly.” “Some of the customers are angry or frustrated having to waste time to call and ask about the status of their repair. They are used to Amazon updating them effortlessly.”, he said.
“Have you considered providing information and status updates automatically? We can also provide a simple online form that auto-requests any needed info.”, I suggested. “I was thinking about that same thing, but don’t want to lose touch with clients.”, he responded. “Andy, these days people expect information without having to talk with someone, in many cases they prefer it.”, I said.
I followed up after the system was built and implemented and asked, “How are the phone calls going?” “What phone calls, we hardly get them anymore. We saw a staggering 40% drop in emails and phone calls related to repairs. This allows us to trim their Customer Service team from 4 to 3 people, saving a whopping $60,000 annually. Plus, the customers are happier and more loyal; they are sticking around for the long run because it’s easier to get repairs.”
Andy and his team saved precious time, money and stress.
Getting started with our solution is a breeze with our help. We collaborate for just 8 hours to tailor notifications and communication strategies to your unique needs. After that, we take the reins, leaving you to relish the rewards.
So, if you’re ready to reclaim your time, elevate customer satisfaction, and level up your operations, consider taking our solution for a spin. It’s not about dodging customer inquiries—it’s about responding more efficiently and crafting a seamless, customer-centered experience. In this era of business, success lies in the art of maintaining equilibrium between customer engagement and operational prowess.
$75,000 Spreadsheet Error!
The most expensive and stressful issue I see for manufacturing businesses is often the Band-Aid they use to keep their business currently moving forward; the daisy chain of spreadsheets, Access databases and emails. While in the past these tools were much better than paper systems, today they are a liability.
Spreadsheets! They seem like a simple solution until they damage your bottom line and reputation. I’ve seen errors in spreadsheets cost companies anywhere from $5,000 to JP Morgan’s $6 billion in lost profits. Hours upon hours are wasted weekly on redundant manual entry in this spreadsheet and that spreadsheet. And let’s not forget copy/paste of sales data, to production data, to scheduling data, to executive reports.
Look five years from now—how much will these errors and wasted time cost your business?
These are silent company killers working in the shadows.
The moment you realize… in today’s tech enabled world, a lot of what you do can be automated. With a few simple inputs… All your numbers… All your data… No admin… No mistakes…
The solution is simple AND productivity and profit will skyrocket.
Take, for instance, Mike’s story:
Mike came to me with an issue, he purchased a business, and he was overwhelmed by the 100,000 rows of data in spreadsheets. He said, “I purchased a business where if 1 person is away or something is entered wrong then customers are let down and reputation and profit are hit.” He thought he purchased a business, but with this issue, what he purchased required him to watch the office 24×7… He purchased a job.
On our first call he realized an overwhelming transformation wasn’t required and he could use technology he already owned. He could move to a system that allowed for simple data entry, job details and cost information with a mouse click, a view of jobs that were due and a report showing whether he made or lost money on each job. All built in a step-by-step manner, where each step drove efficiency, profit and delivery.
The step-by-step approach would also allow him to get buy-in with his team along the way. And let the ROI from each improvement pay for the next step. The first implementation focused on on-time delivery, which targeted reports and notifications about jobs that were at risk of being late. This step produced an improvement in delivery by 30% which made Mike, and his team thrilled with the newfound efficiency. These results allowed them to focus on core business activities, meet customer deadlines, and make informed decisions based on accurate data.
Recently Mike mentioned, He now owns a business.
Imagine yourself achieving similar results. You can move away from the crushing burden of spreadsheet errors and redundant manual entries to a streamlined, scalable system. The investment is minimal compared to the massive benefits you will reap.
3 Customer Service Levers Lifting Your Business to New Heights
Doing the above 3 changes will take you to a new place. These are effective and reliable systems smart companies use, and systems we implement successfully. The 3 changes allow you to still stick with your proven formula of less is more, continue ignoring silver bullets and bright shiny toys, but it also allows you to start winning again.
Ready for more? Read these 3 questions and send me an email with the answers. We can have a 15-minute call to point you in a new direction.
- If you are sending files to clients or they are sending files to you:
- What is the nature of those files?
- What kind of interaction do either of you have with these files?
- What repetitive phone calls or emails are your team regularly doing; same content, just the job #, customer name, status, etc. changes?
- What are the 1 to 3 spreadsheets you use to run your business?
Finally, as you were reading this you may have thought of a friend or someone in your network that would find it useful, please share it with them – I’d really appreciate it!