It could be argued that there are dozens of reasons why companies lose sales. However, I believe that nearly every reason out there could be categorized in one of the following larger reasons.
- Poor Exposure
- Poor Experience
- Poor Expectation
In this blog post, we’ll break down what each of these 3 reasons mean, and how you, as an entrepreneur or business leader can minimize the negative effect that each of these can have on your business or organization.
Poor Exposure
This one is fairly self-explanatory. If no one knows that your small business exists, it’s much harder to close a sale. Lack of exposure is an issue that has been facing business professionals, small business owners, non profits, and even churches, since the beginning of time. Put simply, you need people to know about you in order to make sales. And unfortunately, customers won’t just naturally come to you. You’ll have to be intentional to market to them.
What are some strategies or tactics that you could implement to help your business or organization gain exposure?
- Making sure your website design is optimised for SEO so you’ll be found when people search for businesses in your area of service
- Sending promotional materials such as postcards, brochures, etc in the mail to potential customers
- Outbound marketing such as cold calling, cold emailing, etc
- Inbound marketing such as lead generation on your website (freebies, PDF resources, or other ways to exchange value with an email address)
- Networking at social functions or any place where your potential customers are all gathered together
- Pay for ads. One of the fastest and most effective ways to get your messaging out there is by paying for ads on Google, Facebook, or Instagram.
Poor Experience
The next reason that your customers may not be buying could be poor experience. Poor experience essentially means that your customers are either turned off or confused by what they see, hear, or read about your business when they do finally get exposed to you. If your marketing message is confusing and not clear, or if you simply have a design or look and feel that isn’t appealing to them, you’re going to lose the sale due to poor experience. Another category that fits under poor experience is friction. If customers are trying to navigate your website and are encountering glitches, or technical difficulties this will also diminish the experience they are having with your brand.
What are some strategies or tactics that you could implement to help your business or organization create better experiences for your potential customers?
- Talk to a messaging expert to make sure that your marketing copy is both clear and targeted
- Work with your graphic designer or web developer to make sure your look and feel and overall design is aesthetically pleasing and not unprofessional
- Ask customers for feedback. Hearing what your customers think about your brand is vital. You may learn what is throwing potential leads off so that you can pivot and implement some effective changes.
Poor Expectation
Poor expectation is one of the most common reasons that a potential customer may choose to pivot away from your company. This simply means that what you’re selling isn’t what your customers are wanting to buy. This could be caused by your customer not needing your product or service, being turned off by the price that you’re offering, not liking the systems or process that you’ve chosen to implement, or how you choose to communicate with them during the sales process. If your customer has one expectation for how the transaction could go, and you have a totally different expectation for your customer, you will likely lose the sale.
What are some strategies or tactics that you could implement to help your business or organization avoid poor expectation?
- Be up front about expectations. Be transparent with pricing, products, and processes from the beginning so that your customer could decide more quickly whether or not they want to use your services or purchase your products.
- Be sure that you’re offering something that people actually want to buy. If you are, make sure you’re targeting your marketing to the right audience. This will help you and your team avoid wasting time marketing to people who won’t end up buying in the long run.
We hope this article was helpful. At the end of the day, there are so many reasons why companies lose sales to leads and potential customers. However, they typically fall into one of these three buckets: Poor Exposure, Poor Experience, or Poor Expectation. Hopefully you and your team will be able to think critically for ways that you can address each of these items, so that you can start seeing an increase in sales and customer engagement.
