To listen to the recorded conversation or download the .mp3 file click here

Independent Commercial Category: The Print Shop– Wisconsin Rapids, WI– Warren Miller

Allegra Network Category: Allegra P&I– Glendale Heights, IL– Gary Blaski

Franchise Services:– Sir Speedy– Haverton, PA– Michael Brown

AlphaGraphics:– AlphaGraphics– Franklin, TN– Lisa & Mark Welsh

CPrint:– BayPrint– St. Petersburg, FL– Al Karnavicius

Each quarter thousands of print buyer opinions are gathered to measure their satisfaction with recent performance of printers who serve them. The benchmark is a compilation of all feedback gathered for printers participating in CustomerPulse™. The feedback is published to help participating printers benchmark performance and react quickly to customer feedback. Results are segmented by brand, size, and other classifications. The PBSI™ is the most comprehensive measure of print buyer loyalty and printer performance available in the printing industry.

The process is designed to help any size printer with prices starting at $49/month. The vision of the PBSI™ is to improve industry performance through reliable real-time buyer satisfaction benchmarking. Visit www.surveyadvantage.com/printers for case studies and program details.

Survey Advantage recently expanded its property management offerings with the release of its latest product, TenantPulse™. A tenant feedback and benchmark service, TenantPulse™ is a fully-automated, continuous process designed to gauge tenant satisfaction and provide property owners and managers with detailed reporting on opportunities for improvement.

“We’re thrilled to partner with Chapter 88 and offer property owners and managers in today’s economy an easy, cost-effective way to improve their occupancy and retention rates,” said Mike Casey, President of Survey Advantage. “It costs an average of $4,000 to get a property ready for another tenant. We can help owners and managers avoid that expense by understanding tenant needs and how the property can best address them. Often, there are simple issues the owner is unaware of because busy tenants don’t bring the problems to their attention. Our TenantPulse™ solution is a convenient and anonymous way for tenants to share their input so management can make needed improvements.”

Greater Rhode Island Chapter 88 has over 170 members who take part in regular networking and educational opportunities. Many participants have attempted to solicit tenant feedback previously utilizing do-it-yourself solutions or paper surveys. Survey Advantage’s automated process leverages property management software like Yardi and Tenant Pro to eliminate the administrative burden, enable benchmarking of performance and identify goals for improvement.

“We’ve been offering feedback process solutions since 2001 for a variety of industries. But after recognizing the need among property managers to drive their occupancy and retention rates, we knew our proven process could add value to this market. It’s a win-win for both Chapter 88 members and Survey Advantage.”

“We’re happy to have Survey Advantage as part of the IREM family,” said Richard Hitt, President of IREM Chapter 88 . “They bring a unique perspective and approach to solving occupancy issues in today’s economy. We’re always looking for creative solutions to help our membership and TenantPulse™ is something we’re all eager to learn more about.”

Forty-two percent of tenants and owners responded to the first survey, who helped MPM identify its top strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities. MPM shared the results with property owners and then met with certain tenants where applicable to review their suggestions.

“Over the past decade, we’ve experienced increasing competition from large firms with national, multi-property operations, and knew we had to be proactive in meeting tenant expectations to ensure their continued occupancy” said CEO John Macliver. “We chose to partner with Survey Advantage to help us develop a feedback process with a high response rate to capture constructive input on where and how we could improve. The results have been instrumental in helping us maintain more than 90 percent occupancy at our properties.”

“We’re proud to help MPM maintain their position in the market,” said Mike Casey, President of Survey Advantage. “With double-digit commercial vacancy rates today, tenant retention is critical. MPM wanted to ensure its services and facilities were in line with tenant expectations, and the only way to find out is to ask. With our ongoing feedback process, owners know where and how to invest to make sure leases get renewed every year.”

Visit www.surveyadvantage.com/iremri for details.

The CPrint Summit will be on November 3, 4, and 5th. Please contact CPrint International for Details.

Best practice techniques will be discussed for strategic annual surveys of both active and inactive customers. Topics to be discussed include “How to set goals for the project, How to manage a quick turnaround project, and How to turn feedback into action.

Contact NAPL to register for the conference to be held just prior to Graph Expo. Dates are September 8, 9, and 10.

1) Phone systems and plain ‘ol etiquette

Think of your customer’s experience when calling you. Today I called a customer and got “Hello”. That was it! I asked if I had the right place because it didn’t sound like the $5 million business I’ve learned to know and love. I made the mistake of googling their company in a rush and found their phone number on the top of search listing. It was their manufacturing plant phone number. Darn iPhone app! I got the supervisor who was nice, but not a good first impression, and not the number that should be on top of your SEO goals! You may want to ask yourself the following questions and check the following.

• How does my phone tree navigation work when prompting callers?
• Do I have my people trained on how to answer the phone properly?
• Is it easy to get to someone when they call us?
• How many incoming phone lines do I have and are they all operating properly?

Call and check out your competitor’s first impression. The best example of phone etiquette for a y large business is Cox (www.cox.com ). This Fortune 500 company is amazing. Whenever I call for service they make it easy for me to business with them and show they care. I am sure others have had horrible experiences with them and posted to www.yelp.com, but for 20 years now they have treated me right. I think it is amazing how well they make me feel unique and special with such a large customer base and diverse product line. Just last week I had a problem with my home phone going dead and they stuck with, sent someone out, fix it, followed up, and went above and beyond. Pretty cool and they “wowed” me again.

2) Website presence

After receiving a call from a company this week I mentioned that they looked like a nice size operation of 25 to 30 people. The president came back almost offended saying they had 150 employees. I should never have assumed, but I explained that in their company picture on the website had 25 to 30 people standing in front of his front door. It looked like a company portrait. Also, the website did not look like one for a 150 employee operation. Earlier in the week I was looking at a company’s home page and it had a picture of the front of their building. It looked like condemned property in the low rent district in the city. “Not good” as Chevy Chase said in Caddy Shack. Highlight the positives on your website. Things to consider.

• Portray your image, culture, personality.
• Be informative and show you are on the move. Keep web content fresh.
• Pick a platform for quick and easy content management.

Check out your competitors. Good examples for let’s say the printing industry are www.thinkpatented.com or www.sorrentomesa.com. They approach it differently, but you see a progressive, thoughtful approach that is inviting for a prospective buyer or customer.

3) E-mail footers

This may sound basic, but you have an opportunity beyond the basic email message. Thoughtful footers keep customers up to date, invite them to your social media groups, and share news. Don’t go crazy adding another email to the email with a lengthy footer, but a thoughtful email footer can help e-mail recipients. Think like the customer. Things to consider.

• Twitter, facebook, linked in, YouTube icons nicely lined up
• Include your website URL or your logo with a hyperlink to your website. Fancy!
• Your title, phone, email address
• Maybe a picture of yourself. This is a tough one and the jury is still out if this tacky

4) Building appearance
Recently I was reviewing survey comments for a property management firm who surveyed tenants. One comment was “dog poop on front steps for two weeks now.” We both laughed at first wondering why the tenant didn’t just scoop it up, but we both understood they were making a point. It is the property management company’s job. Another comment was “weeds were taller than the shrubs until last week when they were cut”. How does your building look? Don’t let your hair down too much.

• How is your landscaping company doing?
• Are you putting your best foot forward when people come into your lobby?
• What areas may customers see? Any dirty laundry hanging around?
• How do the floors and bathrooms look? Clean high traffic areas often.
• Does your place look like it is run by someone organized, disciplined, predictable, and reliable? That is the kind of printer everyone wants.

5) Packages and delivery

How well trained are your delivery people? Do you know how well they are treating customers? Do you know how your packages look when delivered? Is the appearance of every package predictable? A small, but best in class, business puts most products for delivery in branded boxes, have a tag line “We care”, and has a survey URL very visible on the box to show they are open to hearing feedback. Delivery people can make or break you. Delivery people are customer service people no matter how you slice it. They need to greet, be respectful, and represent your business. Last year an owner shared with me that they almost lost a major customer because their driver kept delivering to the wrong address even after the customer asked numerous times to bring it to the right address. Grumpy delivery people or chronic complainers don’t help much either. Pick happy, enjoyable to be around, people who can roll with the punches and are “customer centered”. Make sure their appearance is sharp for a positive first impression. You may want to invest in embroidered shirts for two reasons; to show you can embroider for them and, to build your brand.

So here is the homework for the week! Do a few tests and investigate how well your first impressions are. I’m sure I got weak links and skeletons in my closet. Time for all of us to get cracking. Inspect what you expect.

I get the feeling these vendors care more about campaign success than me. They don’t get in the ball park of my needs. I feel someone is behind their e-blast software, saying, “More is better. Grab more e-mails, send more messages. Send more and something will stick. Throw any e-mail we find on a business card in the rubbish or parking lot, or scraped from the Internet! Throw it into that massive pool of ever-growing e-mails mixing customers with prospects.”

This “blast, blast, blast” mentality is sending a message to me that campaigns are more important than customer relationships, cost saving is king, covering everything the company does in one e-mail is efficient, and it is not important to know who the customer is. They don’t know who the customer is and don’t care, because they just want to sell more stuff.

Seriously, we have all made mistakes with e-blasts like the best of them, so I should not throw stones while living in my glass house. But we all need to learn and adjust. It’s challenging, but I believe it is critical to categorize customers when conducting e-blasts and direct mail. Begin with a defined process, a discipline, and the right customer relationship management (CRM) software. Then get to know your customers and segment appropriately. Don’t forget to train sales reps on the importance of this information and how information will be used. Don’t go nuts categorizing customers into three or four categories or you will lose your mind managing who got what e-blast and when.

Simplify based on customer information that will help you send messages that build relationships rather than destroy them. Send information to them that they will probably be interested in. You might want to break your list by region, industry vertical, networking group, relationship or self-selected interests. Segmenting your customer list is just as important as segmenting prospect lists. Be careful not to over communicate with e-blasts. They might not opt out because they know you and like you, but instead they will hit “delete” because they are numb and disinterested. Get feedback from customers on what they like. Customer opt outs can be misleading because customers want to be nice to you.

Top 5 “Good” practices

1. Take time to map your customer base and how you should segment.

2. Do not segment your list too much, so you can manage frequency of e-blasts at the individual level.

3. Create a process for segmenting as new customers come online.

4. Invest in a good CRM to support your current and future needs.

5. Train your staff, explain the benefits and monitor the process.

Top 5 “Bad” practices

1. Hacking something together that is not sustainable and falls out of tune quickly.

2. Not knowing who you blasted to and when, so you have no controls and you over-blast.

3. Poor staff training, so no one knows what is going on and the segmentation is not working.

4. No measurements. Getting some results from e-blasting can lead you to think, incorrectly, that you are doing a good job.

5. Not investing in a good CRM with a mapped out process, resulting in a poor foundation.

Top 5 “Ugly” practices

1. Not e-blasting because you are afraid of over e-blasting.

2. Thinking e-blasting is a fad.

3. Saying you will get a handle on your customer e-mails next year.

4. Sending out dead links or ugly content.

5. Having your customer e-mail list decentralized in multiple computers, laptops and personal accounts.

It’s not easy, but planning, setting up and managing your customer e-blast process will help cultivate better relationships. It all starts with knowing your customer at the individual level, respecting his or her appetite for your information, and sending content of specific interest. Good luck and I hope this helps us as we move forward into this continuously evolving e-blast world.

“The CPrint® Sales Summit is the one time per year where CPrint® Affiliates meet to learn the advanced selling techniques that will propel their business for the next twelve months. Due to CPrint®’s unique relationship with its vendors, technology and training are often released here first, before the rest of the industry ever knows it exists. And, with the velocity of change today, even six months is a tremendous head start.” said Todd Nuckols, President of CPrint® International.

The presentation “Easy ways to generate leads and preserves recurring revenues.” will offer advice on how to leverage Printer’s Plan™, EFI Printsmith™, printLEADER™, and Printer’s Plus™ software to enhance and automate revenue preservation and lead generation strategies.

Michael Casey, President of Survey Advantage adds “Many family run printers benefit from CPrint’s hands on approach during these challenging times. We are happy to be able to educate their affiliates on how to leverage their existing technology to keep the pulse of every customer, know when loyalty is slipping, and generate leads.”

About CPrint® International
CPrint® International offers onsite consulting, mentored board meetings and professional training conferences and courses in print shop production and sales have been successful in helping family-based businesses become profitable and prosper. CPrint® helps our affiliates reach a higher level of competitiveness in their individual markets. Visit www.cprint.org for details.

About Survey Advantage
Survey Advantage is the leading provider of customer research, customer retention, and lead generation programs for the graphic communications industry. CustomerPulse™ and MarketPulse™ were designed in partnership with the industry to improve productivity by helping operations manage their customer relations and overall operational effectiveness. Additional information may be obtained by visiting www.surveyadvantage.com/printers.