Hug Your Customers: STILL The Proven Way to Personalize Sales and Achieve Astounding Results by Jack Mitchell

Author:Jack Mitchell
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Hachette Books
Published: 2003-06-10T14:00:00+00:00

Chapter 32

We Like to Drop a Line

Marketing means keeping in touch with the customer, not just waiting to see them in the store. We’re big on writing notes, lots of them, and technology helps us make sure they’re always personal.

When I wake up in the morning, I often print out on my home computer every sale of at least $2,000 from the previous day. It usually starts my day with huge smiles. It’s one of the reports I love the most, so it comes out first. It shows the entire profile information on the customer and spouse, plus what sales associate sold what to them. I like to know those sales, because they’re significant and I want to thank those involved in them. Usually I pull up a screen which allows me the ability to communicate to Amy Vrzal, my fabulous assistant, to draft a note to the customer. I’ll also make sure to congratulate the sales associate for a super-important sale.

Meanwhile, associates often send out personalized notes or e-mails of their own. It could be a birthday card or an anniversary card or simply a note to say hi. When we send out a personal letter, it’s really personal, because it has details we could only know by checking the computer. Even a computer-generated letter has a real, positive impact, especially if it is signed in ink with a handwritten personal note. That’s what we aim for. Everything should be personalized. So we sift through the computer to give us the facts on a customer’s recent visit to the store and use that as a springboard for a note that reads as if it were handcrafted. One of the other benefits of technology is our tracking system that lets us monitor the letters that went out so we don’t duplicate any or flood someone with letters.

We address as many as possible of the envelopes by hand or by a sophisticated envelope printer and put real stamps on them, no bulk postage. That way it is more intimate and won’t get thrown out. The chances are, if it’s addressed by hand and has a real stamp, the person will open it and say, “Wow, they remembered my birthday.” Our sales associates handwrite the birthday cards.

The conventional wisdom is that people don’t want any more mail—they already get too much—but we’ve found that if it’s personalized and specific to the customer, they love it. Out of the hundreds of thousands of letters we’ve sent out, maybe two or three people have said, “Enough already.”

Here is an example of a letter my brother Bill sent out (and similar ones are done by all members of the Mitchell family in their respective stores):

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