Robert Craven says ‘Stay close to your customers’.

Are your customers behaving themselves these days?
 
Have you noticed any new behaviour from some clients acting bizarrely? If so, it could be the ‘downturn factor’ affecting people in ways we all seem to ignore.
 
Robert Craven, a business expert (’guru’ sounds better), has a good has made some useful suggestions for braving the recession, such as his recent webinar, entitled “The seven reasons why we get stuck in a recession and what to do about it”.
However has the recession blues made us forget what Robert Craven suggests “we always seem to forget about”?.
He says that customers leave us i.e. the ‘customer attrition rate’ but it is the statistics that are shocking.
If
5% of customers leave us because they die,
A further 5% of customers leave us because they ‘die gracefully’ (they move on, the business closes down, they go into partnerships, etc).
Another 5% of customers leave us because of our bad service.
65% of customers leave us because they feel that we don’t care, and move on to someone who does.
 
Craven shakes us to our senses. Have we done a customer survey recently? No, why? Don’t want to upset them, or frightened you might irritate them? Well, how do you know what your customers think?
Some may be thinking of moving on.
Craven’s warning to business is as vital IN the recession as at any other point in the business / macro economy cycle. MAKE SURE YOU STAY CLOSE TO YOUR CUSTOMERS.
One way we have done this at CarSpareFinder where our clients are established vehicle dismantlers is by introducing innovative new added-value features. Having something else to offer them does keep those communication channels open. Managing customer relationships (business to business) needs investment, but the investment almost always pays off, and handsomely.
Staying on top of your business is easier with a Management business coach. It helps you as a business manager differentiate between working in the business, and working on the business. It brings ‘power to your elbow’ to help manage and improve business performance.
Is it a question of starting with your customers? No, but you could start with it as your first question.

Julian Rowe. Business Correspondent, 13th Man in Business.

The financial decisions we make.

Julian Rowe, Business Correspondent, Business Service Finder, reflects upon analysis by economist, Dan Ariely, in his interview with the BBC World Service concerning Predictable irrationality (regarding money).
Regarding money, Ariely suggests we make repeatable, predictable mistakes - the recording of his interview is still available on the BBC World Service website.
Ariely is a behavioural analyst, concerning himself with ‘Behavioural economics’ i.e. Human irrationality and money. Ariely quotes Greenspan, in front of Congress, who is alleged to have said, “Oops I made a mistake”. Ariely points out that this shows ‘irrationality’ is not just confined to the lower eschelons of society i.e. we at the bottom of the heap.

The main reason for the mistakes we all make with money, Ariely argues, is because it is actually a very hard subject to master. Everytime one spends something, e.g. a cup of coffee, one should really ask oneself “what I am giving up in the future” in order to enjoy this cup of coffee now? What will I not be able to do in the future? In reality, as Ariely points out, it is this concept, or thought, that is actually very complex. For example, if I buy this now I may not be able to go to a movie in ten years or buy this book in fifteen years time is a very challenging decision. Because of this challenge, we often resort to “simplified juristics” (i.e. reasoning) or simple ‘rules of thumb’.
One of these (rules of thumb) is ‘relative comparison’ – i.e. how much does this cost compared to something else. The fact that something is on discount today as opposed to yesterday, why is it such a big deal, Ariely asks?  It is because we don’t know how much something is worth, so we compare it to what it used to cost. In the same way we compare our salary to other peoples’ because we have very little way to evaluate it.
What can we do or how should we learn to stop getting ourselves into this kind of (financial) mess?
In the current downturn, many people are trying to cut back on expenses, realising that the financial future may not be quite so bright as it was. The big question is “How does one cut down”?
People always look at ‘discrepancy spending’ i.e. not buying a coffee or a sandwich – the expenses they can physically see coming out of their wallet or purses. However Ariely argues that most people do not pay attention to the expenditure - things directly deducted from our bank accounts or credit card i.e. whatever is on one’s automatic payment schedule. So we sometimes cut the wrong things, i.e. the things that have a direct impact on our pleasure, and not much on expenditure and ignoring things hidden which might greatly reduce expenditure yet hardly impact on our pleasure.

Ariely states that regardless of most people’s financial astuteness the odds are that people will make the wrong cuts. One reason for this is that often we are very bad at predicting what our life might look like in the future - The change in circumstances. When we look to the future we think it will be terrible. It turns out to be so in the short term but then it is quite manageable.

For business owners financial decisions are better made with a business finance consultant specialist, and a good online resource in the UK is Business Support Finder.

All specialists are accredited, offering current liability cover which in this case would be Professional Indemnity Insurance for financial specilaists.