I just like to get you to clarify, nobody is getting a bunch of customers and throwing them against the polls. It’s all about customer retention. Ok so what you are doing is in the morning a customer wakes up and their mind is immediately invaded by newspapers, TV, kids have to be dropped to school, have to get ready to be at the office on time for the 9:30 meeting. Oh my God, I forgot my mask at home. Oh my God, this thing is happening on Facebook this thing is happening on YouTube. Oh, driving let me utilize my time listening to some podcast. 20 different things are in their mind at all times. You are just less than half percent of their customer attention.
Customer Retention
What do you need to do, in order to get customer retention? Hold customer retention, harness customer retention, and maximize customer retention. You need different steps of the process. You can’t just sit in front of somebody and try all the tricks in the book to convince them and become like the salesperson. You will run out of fuel and you will run out of motivation. Another question somebody asks me is a man you know I put all my passion into my product, why do you say that I should get rid of my product?
I am not saying you get rid of your product. Do not become so tied down to your product that even if the product becomes obsolete. You know you’re still wasting your time promoting. A product can change, customer basis can change, everything may change, the vision does not change. If you have a vision if you have a passion by all means stick to it. All it means is I stick to I water it, nurture it, put sunlight on it so that it grows from a little seed into a big tree.
How to Get Customer Attention?
How do you get this customer attention, hardness attention, and all of that? Nobody is thinking about what you are, how to sell or promote in the market. Nobody wants it, nobody likes it, nobody has money to buy it. What you do, you do something that scholar-stage-wise approach which in our community in the Startup Frat community we call the express highway approach.
How does that work? How does an Express Highway approach work? You have an entry point into the express highway to go down this road. It is said to express highway from Mumbai to Bangalore express highway, from Delhi to Chandigarh express highway. From where I am right from Chennai to Mahabalipuram. This is where the express highway starts.
Step – 1
Now at different points during the express highway, what do you have? You have toll plazas. 1 toll plaza, 2-Toll Plaza, 3 Toll Plaza. Let’s say after every 20, 30 km after every 50 km is a toll plaza. Now what happens is, you bring people into your communication. You don’t start telling them, hey this is my product you know, start buying it because they don’t have enough information, they don’t have mind space, they don’t know you, but you know who you are. They are like, Ok I will think about it, ask my wife. What should do is, take the journey and you talk to them about the idea you say I’m thinking that wouldn’t be great. Won’t it be great if XYZ could happen?
Which is a result that we spoke about yesterday. This thing you know results that potentially cause their pain now everybody doesn’t have the same pain that your product solves. What you’re doing is, you’re trying to Swift and sought to how many people are in pain, that your product can solve to say something about an idea. What if this would happen would be interesting and if the other person said yes or no if they say yes that’s great if they say no they are out. What is out? I say ok ya ya and then they will tell me more about it, it will say no no we were just thinking but, you know you obviously came to the same conclusion that you are not interesting at all.
You just think about an idea about which is thinking about an idea. I came to the same conclusion. So that way you don’t give information to people who don’t want it. You are not giving free information to people who don’t want it. Long story short, you give them an idea and their ideas sound interesting. No traffic is gone over here, this is the no traffic will put the. Now the Yes traffic says yes I am interested in the hit what you call it Toll Plaza they gone pay toll to move ahead. What is the toll?
They have to take some action to prove that they are the right person for you to invest your time. They have to do something to prove, you’re reversing the situation over here, you’re not proving anything to anyone. That’s what happens when you run after a customer you are trying to prove and you’ll run out of fuel, run out of your steam, you will run out of money, and run out of motivation. We don’t do that.
They have to do something to prove that they are the right customer for us. So we call it a small toll plaza, a small commitment, a micro-commitment. They say give me more information I am interested in, you said that’s great we don’t have a lot of information, we just started exploring but hey why don’t you do one thing, one should do one thing. Once you send me, this is my phone number, you give them a business card, just add it to your phone book, and send me Hi by WhatsApp.
But I am gonna do is, I am gonna save it and then you know whenever the information becomes available I am gonna send it immediately to you on this call you or something. You tell them, hey this is my WhatsApp number added send me a Hi. What are you doing? WhatsApp has an app called WhatsApp business which is free. It allows you to send mass mailers up to your 2000, 5000 people mass messages in all. But there’s a catch, you can’t send to unknown people.
You can only send it to people who know you and how does WhatsApp know that these people know you well. They have added your number to the phone books WhatsApp can see it, and they have sent you a message so WhatsApp can see that as well. So what you do is yeah that’s why you see a mutual fund salesman or somebody coming to your house and says hey just send me Hi from your WhatsApp number and I will send you a plan. WhatsApp needs to understand that you know them, they know you.
Whenever the information becomes available with a click of the button, you send it out 2000 people at a time all for free. The first toll plaza has been crossed. Let’s say, they say hey I will give you my WhatsApp number First toll plaza has been crossed.
Step – 2
Now there is the second zone, zone number 2. You could have 5 zones, 10 zones from Bombay to Bangalore. They like to help or something at the toll plaza. Every 20-30Km you have to pay a toll. Now you come over here, This traffic is coming over here when the information becomes available, you make it available to them and what do you do? You say, Hey man we set up a small meeting on Saturday. You know for all of you to get the information, will have some pretty cool offers for your, etc. This is gonna happen at this date, this time at this place.
Make it easy for them, but make sure that there is some effort involved for them too because they need to qualify for the second toll plaza. Hey man, you know you got to make yourself available, make it a Saturday evening. Most people are actually free. If they are very motivated then what you’re gonna do is, you know then you can send them something that makes it compelling for them to come on Saturday.
Let us say that they don’t come or don’t respond to this when I am not interested, now I’m going to make an effort to come to you. You need to send me all the information, call me, give me the best quotation, then they will know they are not the right customer for you. Any customer that says I know all the information gives me the best price. You don’t take them down the highway, you put them out. I have all the information and all that gives me the price. Nothing they go out, you don’t message them again.
Then maybe if they call you later and say I was waiting for your message, I didn’t get your message, Then you put them back into the machine. Otherwise broadly what they are saying is, they don’t have time for this and you interruption and you know you are not welcome. If they say I know all then just give me the price, Then you are not welcome, your information not welcome. No need to deal with those people. Don’t be cheap.
Step – 3
Now, what happens to the people who actually pass this toll plaza. They show up to your meeting, they show up somewhere to a coffee meeting. Over here, you’re gonna showcase your final product. You’re gonna make it compelling for them to go in and to chase. That is how the thing works. You can have one another toll plaza and it may be another qualifier. Rule of thumb: remember the higher the price of your product is the more toll plazas people need to cross. In order to get it.
If you ever go to a Mercedes Showroom, just remember that first go gonna call them and make an appointment. They don’t send the car to you, call them, and make an appointment to know who they are dealing with. Unless you’re already some eminent person of society that they already know, they’ll send a car for a test drive, but you have to call intake and appointment and you show up on time. Then they’re gonna ask you qualifying questions. What other car do you have right now? If you say I have a Maruti 800, They will probably say Mercedes is not the right fit for you.
Nobody wants to get into the hassle of how much it is, give him a test drive after that and what will the financing be like. I don’t have down payment money, your prices are too high, can you reduce interest rates, can have a lower down payment, nobody wants to get into that. So what they say, what car do you drive today sir/man, and if Mam says or sir says that I drive a Maruti 800 or maybe like a lower segment car. You know I had a Maruti 800, so if I ever went to the Mercedes showroom, they ask what car you drive. Let’s say a Maruti 800, I didn’t do that but as people told me that’s what happens.
I would suggest that you drive some other cars first and then you come back. Maybe you go there, They will say Ok, we will fix your test drive at your preferred time you gotta show up again. Then they will say put down a down payment, you know we talk about financing afterward. There are a bunch of hoops, a bunch of toll plazas, there you gotta go through in order for them to figure out that this is the right person. If you go there and say I want a yellow-colored CLK Roadster you don’t have that is stock, can you get me tomorrow? The answer is No. Everything can be done but only for the right person.
The answer will be no why don’t you take any one of these options that we have in mind they are thinking and describing driving a Maruti why does he want a yellow color CLK Roadster. He should be lucky to get Mercedes over it alright. So they are gonna have this qualification level to showcase smart salespeople. Good salespeople know how to sell better. Smart salespeople then know to sort better. Remember that a good salesperson sells better, smart salespeople sort better. Now that’s what we call an Express Highway.
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