Do you have any stupid clients?

[Martinscholes]

I have attempted to get in touch by email with a number of businesses in Wales using a new Welsh business directory.

The reason? I want to feature them for free in the online magazines I publish.

Many of them will not get any free publicity and probably not many orders because most of them have not bothered to tell anyone that they have changed email address.

Either the person in the address has left the firm, so they cancelled the email account instead of running a re-direct to another address.

Or they changed ISP and forgot to tell anyone they have a new email address.

Or their email box is full.

It is almost as if they are running a secret society rather than a business!

In fact they annoyed me so much I wrote a special article about it this morning.
thats Business: Are you throwing business away?

So the next time a client whines about their e-commerce not working very well ask them the following questions:

Do they bother to read their emails?
Do they then bother to respond to their emails?
Is the email address they have on literature and their website up-to-date?

Many of them probably think that if their e-commerce does not earn them the £ or $ that it is somehow your fault!

[jgarner]

To this I reply:

Do You Have Any Stupid Clients? » SEO Factor Clients aren't stupid

[Martinscholes]

Originally Posted by jgarner

To this I reply:

Do You Have Any Stupid Clients? » SEO Factor Clients aren't stupid

So how is it NOT stupid to have an email address that doesn't work?

Or to not bother to read your emails?

Or -in one case- to have one email address that you cancelled and another one (on the company website!) that does not work, either?

Or to not bother to reply to emails?

Or to allow someone to resign or retire from your firm and then you close their email account down without realising that this will mean any customers they were in contact with cannot contact your firm? (Redirect, anyone? Auto reply with new contact details? No?)

To change ISP but forget to tell anyone that your previous email address is no longer valid?

If not stupid how would you describe the above behaviour?

It must defy every sound principle of business management!

[Feydakin]

Of course you are leaving out the other option that the emails are being read, considered spam, and simply ignored.. Just because you are offering something for free does not mean that people will want it..

[Martinscholes]

Originally Posted by Feydakin

Of course you are leaving out the other option that the emails are being read, considered spam, and simply ignored.. Just because you are offering something for free does not mean that people will want it..

No. I am not leaving that out. That's not the case. I am only dealing with those that were bounced back as:

Bad domain, not known, one sent me back a message that told me they had not set the account up properly.

Another two told me that the email box was full.

And recent reports confirm that potentially £1,000,000s of business goes begging because people either do not read their emails or cant be arsed to reply to potential customers.

I based the "not bothering to reply to emails" on a former boss of mine. In the end we encouraged people not to email him. As he was like Dilbert's Pointy-haired boss. An inbox filled with unread mail.

[jgarner]

"Stupid" implies not the lack of understanding or slow to learn. Simply not knowing isn't stupid at all.

This sounds more like a forgetful individual. Hell even I forget to do some of the most basic tasks from time to time. In a larger environment, it's easy to overlook some of the simple things, regardless of their importance.

More importantly though, I want to make sure that I didn't mean to sound as if I were attacking you for your opinion at all. I just think "stupid" was a bit harsh. In my line of work, I deal with a great deal of unknowing people. And that isn't their fault.

[Martinscholes]

Originally Posted by jgarner

"Stupid" implies not the lack of understanding or slow to learn. Simply not knowing isn't stupid at all.

This sounds more like a forgetful individual. Hell even I forget to do some of the most basic tasks from time to time. In a larger environment, it's easy to overlook some of the simple things, regardless of their importance.

More importantly though, I want to make sure that I didn't mean to sound as if I were attacking you for your opinion at all. I just think "stupid" was a bit harsh. In my line of work, I deal with a great deal of unknowing people. And that isn't their fault.

What I actually said after several hours of hard work and 1/4 of emails bounced back was: "you stupid :censored:"

I think I was too harsh. Maybe I should have said: "Are some of your customers making fundamental errors that are going to put them out of business?"

It was very frustrating. Because I knew that if my emails were bouncing back, then so were the emails of potential customers.

Because many of them used the email address sales@ which means they ain't getting any sales!

And one person who replied with the information I wanted has already got a great story in the magazine promoting their farmhouse made chocolates.

And HE used either a Hotmail account or Yahoo, I forget which, now.