They say you only get one chance to make a good first impression. It’s an axiom I believe that applies not only to our personal lives but our businesses too.
In my previous post, I wrote about the importance of following up with your leads in a timely manner and how that can lead to a good first impression of a company and their product or service.
So what impression is left if companies don’t follow up quickly with leads or are unable to keep sales promises they make on their website?
Last week one of my assignments was to explore options for hosting an upcoming webinar. I did a Google search and clicked on some of the paid links as well as the natural search engine links looking for a solution. After a couple hours of research, I narrowed the list to four possible alternatives and filled out the contact forms on their websites.
One of the forms I filled out stated that the company would follow-up on every lead within 30 minutes during business hours. Since there were still three hours left in their business day, I filled out the form, noted the time, and waited for a call.
Twenty minutes later the phone rang. It was a sales representative following up with my contact form. However, it wasn’t the organization that promised to follow up in 30-minutes. I talked with the sales representative for about 15 minutes before hanging up. Thirty-five minutes after filling out the form, there was no call from the company with the promised response time.
By the end of the business day, I had received calls from three of the four companies I had requested information from. The one I didn’t receive a call from? That’s right, the company that said they would contact me in 30 minutes.
Personally, I would have been fine with a call back within 24 hours. But the fact that they promised a call in 30 minutes and fell through on their promise made me wonder if their product would do all the wonderful things that were touted on the company website.
A sales representative from the company finally called the next morning. I half-heartedly listened to the sales pitch about their product, but I just couldn’t get excited about it. After I hung up, I crossed the company and their product off the list of solutions we were considering.
In business, as well as our personal lives, commitments and follow through on those promises are important. If you’re going to make a big, bold promise on your website, you should be able to keep it. If not, prospects will flee to a competitor.