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What distributors REALLY want! (Part II)
By Terrel Transtrum
In Part I, we assert that distributors desire a connection with the people and organizations with whom they do business so the outcome is a compelling experience that transcends mere transactions. Here, we continue with a discussion about the five steps to distributor loyalty.
Before They Enroll
What do distributors want to see from your business before they decide to enroll in the first place? As a result of a six-year research project that started with Herbalife and included 12 participating clients, we have concluded that there are five steps to distributor loyalty. They are:
- Reliability
- Responsiveness
- Assurance
- Empathy
- Tangibles
Let's briefly examine each of these:
Reliability
Perhaps at the top of the list of the worst things you can do is to fail to keep a promise to your distributors. Becoming a reliable keeper of your promises (product promise, commission promise, and service promise) is a difficult achievement for some organizations because it involves three distinct aspects. These are:
- The reliability of your people
- The reliability of your product
- The reliability of your service and distributor experience
All three must be acting in concert to establish your organization as a reliable provider of goods and services to your distributors and their customers. Yet, many times organizations have great products but their people just cannot deliver. Or they have superior people and products, yet they fail to do the basic "blocking and tackling" -such as getting commissions correct or other specifics-that prevent them from creating reliable service experiences.
Product reliability and efficacy is vitally important. That aspect-plus the four others that follow-create the impressions regarding the reliability of your people, your service, and how dynamically you create distributor experiences.
Responsiveness
Responsiveness involves all the "touches" a distributor has with your company from the point at which he or she is only a prospect to well after the enrollment and into the development of the distributor's roots in the company. It can be defined as "consistently providing the right solution in a timely fashion in a manner that holds value for your distributor and their customers."
Assurance
If you want distributors to stay, then you have to assure them:
- They have made the right decision in choosing to do business with you;
- You are going to be there to assist them if they have any difficulty; and
- You are going to hold your organization and its people accountable to ensure that the job gets done.
Assurance provides your distributors with the confidence that everything is going to work out fine-and reinforces their decision. And, while reliability and responsiveness are the first steps in building the relationship, assurance is where you begin to enhance the relationship. Reliability and responsiveness can be products of your systems-assurance is a function of emotion. Distributors have to feel assured, and emotions are the foundation of engagement and connection.
Empathy
"I feel your pain."
Whether he really did or not isn't the issue. A vast number of voters believed that Bill Clinton had a great deal of empathy for their challenges. They responded with their votes.
Does your distributor believe that you truly empathize with him?
Very few products or services are sold because everything is perfect for the consumer! Your consumers (distributors and their customers) seek to solve a problem, heal a hurt, enhance a business, have more fun, make more money, and get more out of life-any of a myriad reasons. However, every one of those reasons requires that you understand and empathize with their situations.
Tangibles
After you have performed your service, have you left "tangibles?" In other words, after you have performed your service, is there something tangible, concrete, or solid that is left?
Too often, we merely "do our jobs" or perform what we're supposed to do-and assume the distributor will remember that we executed our tasks with professionalism and caring. Ask yourself the important question, "Do WE leave behind a trail of tangibles, creating a compelling experience?"
What Next?
Organizations must develop an ardor for distributors that transcends mere product or service. When managers and executives and field leaders truly display leadership, their vision of an obsession for distributor loyalty will naturally encourage strategies that enhance the role of the employee. The organization's team of employees is then empowered to develop and execute approaches that build their distributors' levels of trust, connection, and loyalty.
Your challenge is to build a corporate culture that is so distributor obsessed that you and your employees create innovative approaches that bridge the gap and resolve the disconnections that impair field relationships and ultimately loyalty.
If you accomplish that task, your company will receive one of the greatest accolades in business-to be known as an organization that provides distributors with what they REALLY want.
(The content of this article is extracted from ServiceQuest® RetentionSmarts™ Modules. Click here for more information on RetentionSmarts™ training and mentoring systems.)
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