MARKETING

Many ways of losing customers

Nishan Wimalachandra Corporate Consultant, Trainer and Lecturer

In a survey that was conducted finding the answer to the most popular question, “which company gives the best customer service?” still seems to be an elusive dream. Almost all Sri Lankans believe that there is no such firm, that strives to give superior customer satisfaction. Firms that lost their customer base, or had experienced a decline in sales, admit, that their main problem was no customer service, whether internal or external.

However, our discussion here is not about gaining new customers, but about how we could lose them. Given below are simple, but powerful ways any firm could adopt to lose its customers and go bankrupt within a few days.

The word CareLess truly gives its true definition.

Recently I had to visit a private hospital regularly due to an ailment of a family member who was hospitalized. The large number of LCD displays, and beautiful infrastructure were, very welcoming. The medical care given is so pathetic, the poor service given by its people. The staff had no idea about any procedure, and most of all the physicians do not come at regular intervals to visit the patients condition. The hospital publicly displays posters, which states that the hospital values their staff as well as the patients.

If patients abuse their staff, they will be strictly dealt with.

A hospital must be more caring towards their customers who are patients, as well as the visitors, for instance this is a sure fast way to lose patients due to the poor service rendered and thereby the firm loses its credibility.

If any hospital is looking for loss, this sure is the right place to succeed in losing customers.

Coarse mouthed customer

Another way of losing customers, that is when employing personnel at the front office or at a customer interface point, it’s better to have people employed who got real shanty toned voices who keep on talking with the employees while customers are being ignored. This is a built in mechanism which cannot be changed and therefore a firm who recruits such people can definitely be on the fast track to losing customers.

LiNDA charms the housewife

In the highly competitive home appliances and consumer electronics market as many brands joust for position and the attention of the consumer, a brand is making strong inroads by paying attention to key areas and mainly focusing on the consumer. LiNDA brand of home appliances and consumer electronics, has steadily earned the trust and respect of an increasing number of consumers through their product quality and consistency.

Brand Manager for LiNDA, M Hanzaff Mohamed described how the brand has continued to grow over the years with its emphasis on quality and affordability. “LiNDA has been in the market for around six to seven years and has steadily grown and we have improved in terms of sales. Our product has improved and we are at a stage where we can compete with the more popular or well-known brands in terms of quality and price.”

LiNDA is marketed by The Tradesmann SL., which primarily focused on manufacturing, but has successfully expanded in to many different areas has been in operation for the past fifty years. With expansion and growth the company has diversified into trading which today accounts for a large share of the company’s turnover. The company is one of the largest providers of domestic hardware products in Sri Lanka. The largest manufacturers in the country for hinges, nuts and bolts.

Tradesmann SL which pioneered in coloured steel roofing with its GANGA brand, and its brand of corrugated GI roofing sheets ‘SEVILI’ leads the market.

GANGA is a Sri Lankan brand that leads in the Indian market too. “We have a huge sales and distribution network that covers every state in India. We have four manufacturing facilities in India currently in operation and two under construction to be commissioned soon, to provide the same quality and standard as we do in Sri Lanka,” says Hanzaff.

The company has a internationally recognised certifications including ISO 9001:2000, ISO 14001:2004 and OHSAS 18001:1999. Apart from manufacturing and trading, the company is a leader in the distribution sector.

With this impressive background Tradesmann SL imports the products from original equipment manufacturers(OEM) in several countries like India, Japan and Malyasia, where the products are manufactured according to its requirements for the LiNDA brand.

“To ensure that these quality standards are met, we have liaison officers in all the countries we work with. There, these officer do factory visits during production, packing, and even when it is finally being loaded into the containers.

“We maintain a quality check at the place of production, all our products are SLSI certified. We again give random checks to ensure conformity with our quality standards. At any point if the quality fails we reject the entire shipment.”

Hanzaff further states that, “one of the things LiNDA believes in is that the benefits of luxury modern conveniences and home appliances should not be exclusive to a particular segment of the population. Everybody has the right to enjoy it considering that everybody’s life is fighting for time and becoming more complicated.”

“While maintaining the quality, we also maintain the price at an affordable level where everyone feels very comfortable and not cheated or overcharged.”

We have had customer testimonials LiNDA products had served them unfailingly for many years, and they would buy another LiNDA product without a second thought.”

During the coming festive season LiNDA wishes to introduce a Cookware range, a DVD Player and a Portable Sound System along with other home appliances such as cloth dryer racks, steel flasks, and many more. Maharaj Water Pumps are domestic as well as agricultural water pumps. With the expansion of the consumer electronics range we will be expanding one after-sales network which will be led and guided by our QC team.”