Are You Ready to Offer a New Service? - Know What the Customer Wants
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To start with, if you’re stumped about what to offer next, you have a problem. It means that you may have lost touch with your customers. If you touch base with your customers regularly, you will know what they need and want – and many of them will be quite up front about any products or services you don’t offer that they would really like. If your customers have told you that they need something new – like the ability to support certain scripts on their websites, perhaps – listen to them. Your bottom line is depending on it.
By the same token, if you’re coming up with this new service yourself, think about how your customers will benefit. If they can’t see what they will get out of the new service – or you can’t show them – it could be a real waste of time and resources. Will the service cost less than what you have in place now? Will it offer your customers better results?
Consider, too, what effect this new service will have on your ability to serve your customers. Will it allow you to host more sites? Host fewer sites, but with more features? Going back to our example of the e-commerce software package, you might find that you cannot host as many accounts because of hardware, bandwidth, and security needs, but with fewer clients, perhaps you can offer your customers more personalized service – and you might be able to charge a little more as a result. You might find that the new offering makes sense as part of an add-on or premium package.
Remember that it comes down to your customers. Is this really what they want? To quote Holigan again, “I think the main thing is to watch your customer base. Can you diversify with your existing customer base?” It’s important to maintain that focus. By keeping an eye on his customer base, Holigan knows that “there are certain things I can do and other things I should never get into.”
Next: Is the Timing Right? >>
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