Fast Money and Building Long Term Business Relationships

It sounds like a no-brainer that businesses should always focus their efforts on preservation of clients—much like employees—versus a short-term reward, however this is sometimes difficult for businesses to comprehend. Substantiation is everywhere; think of businesses in and around your area that you no longer patron. Now think why you no longer do business with them? At least a few will be the consequence of unethical behavior, dishonesty, or any combination thereof on the part of the business. I see this all to frequently in the Information Technology (IT) world, specifically within the “break-fix” sector of IT.

Many of these smaller IT shops have a very myopic viewpoint when it comes to business transactions. They look at each customer and think; how much money can we charge to maximize profit? Obviously, this is a very poor outlook. Not only is it unscrupulous, it is a disastrous business model as there are a finite number of customers, and bad press spreads fast. Upset enough customers, you’re out of business. The classic case of such thinking is billing by the hour. How can this possibly benefit the client? This is a direct conflict of interest as it is in the service providers’ best interest to charge the most they think the client is willing to pay.

The best way is to charge the client a flat rate: you set the stage and the customer either agrees or disagrees. There are no surprises, and the customer is assured of the work performed and the service providers’ organization. Having been involved with such organizations in the past, their customer base was always changing and they were always trying to find the next client to replace the last client they lost; they never really progressed. They never looked down the road in establishing a long-term relationship with the client. They elected to have a large amount of cash upfront, but lost the return business. Common sense is that over the long run, having a return client has a much greater return, but these types of service providers simply do not see it that way.

While my organization is a small business, consulting firm, it pains me to see these “break-fix” organizations giving everyone in the IT field a bad name. It took my firm over a year to land a particular client because the previous firm servicing the account had been dishonest and unethical. They would bill for hours they did not work on a project, they would shutdown customer services if they were late on payment, they would purposely crash systems to gain more work, and they hired inexperienced and uneducated staff and pawned them off as experts to their client base. My firm was lucky enough to have the opportunity to enlighten the client that most firms do not operate in this manner.

Long-term relationships always beat short-term thinking. I’m so confident in my firm’s ability and service that we always provide the first visit to the client site for free. Even if it means it takes all day and we solve most problems, thus removing any immediate business; the client appreciates this so much that return for additional service when needed. Furthermore, this is the best form of advertisement, as the client will begin to spread the word to other friends and heads of organizations.

Be Sociable, Share!