We apologize for any inconvenience …

Really.

Feel badly, do you?

This "We apologize for any inconvenience" phrase is rapidly becoming meaningless, seeing as how it’s both overused and usually immediately follows someone telling you the corporate equivalent of “go pound sand”. The truly irksome thing is not the insincerity of the sentiment, it’s that most of the time the inconvenience is, if not intentional, certainly not causing any sleepless nights over at the XYZ Company.

If you want to be truthful, the response should be “Yeah, we know it’s a pain for our customers. What of it?”

I imagine there really are some firms that are sincerely apologetic, it’s just the two I’ve recently been dealing with (Chase & Vonage) clearly aren’t. But it’s not just them, I see this phraseology all the time and virtually always with the same preceding “shove it”.

Listen, don’t fake sincerity. If the customer is wrong, you can point out their error, apologize for the misunderstanding and offer solutions to fix it. If the customer isn’t wrong, you need to make it right for them.

Case in point is the Chase situation. Their interpretation of their fine print (define “may”) and mine vary. Their corporate policy is to define “may” as “will”. Legal issues aside, they should either change their disclosure wording or acknowledge my understanding. Instead their response is “This the way we do it” (go pound sand) and “We apologize for any inconvenience”. It’s not inconvenient – it’s wrong and you should offer to fix it.

How about “We’re sorry you misunderstood what we meant, but you’re gonna have to live with it.” At least it’d be honest.

It's 2007, dammit!!

One of the most egregious things that companies do to hamstring their sales efforts is having numerous computer software systems that do not inter-operate; they don't speak to each other.

Let's assume for a moment that it's true* that there isn't one system that you can use in your company that can:
• automate the sales process (CRM)
• send and receive e-mail,
• calendar, and
• track customer and product information for your particular widget.

Even if that's true, there's no reason on God's green earth why you would consider saddling your sales reps (or internal staff for that matter) with software that can't share data. It's 2007 for god's sake!!

I'm sure there are some companies that have it together, but judging from what I see every day, there's not many. A company I'm working with right now uses a CRM system and Lotus Notes. While these two programs can share contacts and appointments (not automatically mind you; you have to specifically force the link and the procedure is different in each program), neither of them can share data with the separate customer/product database**. In other words, once someone actually buys a product, their data and product specs go into this separate silo never to be linked with the sales CRM system or Notes again, unless someone does it manually.

Cross sell much? What happens if you want to sell them something else, or the contact person changes, or they move? Again, it's 2007 - how can you not deploy a unified customer/client database that is one central depository for prospects, clients and their current or future product information?

And I'm not saying this because it sounds like a nice thing to do. Not doing so wastes time and resources, is costing you sales and is frustrating your sales force.

If you want to maximize sales, you should get with the program. It's 2007.



* and I don't believe this is true in 95% of companies. Software can be customized to handle just about any configuration of any product. This process is further aggravated because firms often don't deploy the latest versions or all the capabilities of software they have.
** not to mention the issues with mobile electronics which sync only with Notes, so you've got to remember to sync everything twice (CRM to Notes, Notes to Blackberry) before and after every outing.