How do you provide 24/7 service and still have a life?
Dealing with the microwave mindset.
As a consumer culture we have been trained to expect immediate gratification any time day or night weather that means ordering a pizza, finding information, shopping, or booking an appointment. That can be a huge disadvantage for small businesses that can’t employ staff 24/7 to meet the immediate expectations of potential customers. It can also be a fantastic opportunity for any business that solves the problem of how to provide 24/7 service at a minimal cost!
I first entered the workforce in 1976 (yes, that is before Apple Computer company was formed, I am that old!). I can remember having a 45 minute lunch break and having to plan ahead if I wanted a hamburger for lunch. I would have to bolt to the burger shop two doors down from the office immediately my lunch break started to get my order in and would wait nervously hoping that my order would arrive in time for me to eat and return to the office in the alloted 45 minutes. How things have changed. Today if Maccas takes more than 3 minutes to prepare our meal we are ready to walk out! I call it the microwave mindset and like it or loath it, if you are in business you have to deal with it now.
Analytics show that when you take more than 30 minutes to respond to any online query, your chances of making a sale fall by 50% and every additional 30 minutes that pass it reduces by another 50%.
So as a small or micro business how do you provide 24/7 service to satisfy your potential and existing customer expectations and still have a life? Are you still taking phone calls at 9pm or worse? Or have you resigned yourself to responding to emails every morning knowing that many of those opportunities have already been lost to a competitor?
A few years ago I went back through my clients' feedback and realised that the businesses that were most effusive in their praise of my work were the ones who we had provided with online booking systems. We have provided many booking websites for different types of business but the business owners have been universal in their agreement that being able to accept bookings online 24/7 has had a transformative effect on their business.
One of the first online booking systems we created was for a small telemarketing / appointment setting business. The telemarketers would previously cold call prospects to make appointments, a supervisor would confirm the appointments and then the business owner would spend most of his Sunday afternoon creating schedules for the coming week for the salesforce to ensure they would be in the right area each day and rescheduling appointments that couldn't be met. We created an appointment booking portal that automatically confirmed and scheduled appointments as they were made by the telemarketers. Being online, tt also allowed the telemarketers to work from home greatly reducing the business overheads. Shortly after going live I received a text message from the business owner one Sunday evening, thanking me because it was the first Sunday he had been able to spend with his young family in the three years since he established his business. That is what we call a transformative solution.
- We have also created websites for:
Boat Hire Bookings - Car Rental Bookings
- Medical Centre appointment bookings
- Alternative Healthcare provider appointment bookings
- Airport Transfer Bookings
- Car Parking Bookings
- Training Course Registrations
- Large Event (including sub events) Booking
Why are Online Booking Sytems So Transformative?
One of our clients who had prevoiusly accepted bookings by phone or email was shocked to relise how much business he had been losing by not being available 24/7. After we created on online booking website for his boat hire business he could see bookings regularly being made paid for online at 9pm, 11pm and even 3am! I can just see the boys sitting in front of the TV with a beer in hand at 3am when one say “guys, I have a great idea, lets go fishing this weekend. We could hire a boat”. Not only did the number of bookings jump dramatically but because they were prepaid, cancellations, which had previously been a major problem, dropped to almost zero.
Even in a salon, imagine how much better your customers' experience would be if the hairdresser/beautician wasn't running off every few minutes to answer the phone to make an appointment? Many of our clients find that 60% or more of their bookings are now made online freeing up staff to provide a better face to face customer experience.
Having a 24/7 online booking system means your customers are better served, they are happier and you have more free time to spend that extra income.
Could your business do with a transformative solution that allows you to provide 24/7 customer service without having to hire more staff? Connect with me at Websites With Purpose to discuss your business needs.
