The 7 Deadly Sins stopping you winning new business

Our customer service team often get asked how Sellers can ensure they secure the business when responding to a Bark. As with anything, there are no guarantees, but there are some things we see Sellers doing that harm their chances.

In association with Nick Hewer from The Apprentice we’re bringing these together in a video and Blog post covering the “7 Deadly Sins stopping you winning new business” and providing guidance on how to quote.

Sin 1: Not addressing the Buyer by Name or getting the Buyer’s name wrong

• If you know the Buyer’s name – use it. It shows you’ve read their details, shows a little care and makes a great first impression. “Dear Mr Jones” looks so much better than “Dear Sir”, or worse “Dear Sir or Madam”.
• One watch-out though – make sure you type it correctly. If you address a Buyer called “Beverley” as “Baverly” (yes that has genuinely happened) it’s unlikely you’re going to hear from them again.

 

Sin 2: Copy Pasting Stock responses to save time

• We know it’s quicker to have a ready-made “Dear <insert name here>, I would love to do your job for you please call me on <insert number here> or email <insert email here>”, unfortunately it just doesn’t work very well.
• When a Buyer is reading the responses – and they could get 3 or 4 they’re choosing which Seller to work with – it’s far more likely that they’ll go with the Seller who’s taken the time to tailor their response to the Buyer’s needs as the Buyer will be thinking: “yes, that’s exactly what I need”.
• You may think that Buyer’s can’t spot a copy pasted message, but trust us – they can.
• The average response is around 500 characters long – about a paragraph – and there’s a balance to strike: Write too much and the buyer will get bored, write too little and they may not be interested.

Sin 3: Not giving details on what your quote covers

• There’s nothing worse than getting to the end of a job and sending an invoice including materials only to be told by the Buyer “I thought the quote included materials”.
• The best Sellers are clear from the start what’s included in the quote and, more importantly, what’s not.
• Including this helps reassure the Buyer that they won’t get stung and makes it more likely that they’ll choose your business.

Sin 4: Not including a price

• Pricing can be a touchy subject: Price too high and the Buyer may rule you out before reading the details; too low and you risk making less money than you could do.
• Where price is relatively standard e.g. a pricing a job per hour it’s relatively easy to share a price with the Buyer with confidence that you won’t be overcommitting.
• Where you don’t have all the information needed to price accurately or the Buyer’s specification is vague this can be much more difficult, however most Buyers still expect at least a guideline price.
• Our advice is to always give a price, giving comments to support and marking as an “estimate” if needed. This allows scope to discuss with the Buyer later as more information becomes available.
• For example, if you don’t know how much a garden Landscaping job would cost you could estimate based on the average cost of other jobs you’ve done and include comments along the lines of “price subject to survey” or similar. Alternatively, you could give your usual minimum price and mark the price as “minimum price given, final price subject to discussion”.
• Around 60% of our responses have a price attached and Buyers tell us this is useful to know so you may be missing out on business if you don’t give a price up front – particularly if your competitors do.

Sin 5: Not including usable contact details

• At Bark, we want you to secure the business so we always make it easy for the Buyer to see your contact details.
• When the Buyer sees your response they can click to view your website, profile, contact details or ask you to call them so it’s vital to ensure these are up to date on your Bark Profile Page.
• One complaint we hear from Buyers is that Sellers aren’t available to answer the phone when they call – we know that it’s likely you’re on another job of course but the Buyer may not.
• If possible give a phone number that can always be answered – Buyers may not call back a second time if you don’t answer right away.
  It’s also a good idea to include your contact details in your response to the Buyer too. We’d recommend doing this in a signature that is the same each time, something like:

Kind Regards
Bob Jones
Company Name Limited
bob.jones@companynamelimited.com
01234-567890
www.companynamelimited.com

Sin 6: Poor spelling and grammar

• When your response includes poor spelling and/or grammar Buyers will get the impression that your work will be of a similar standard.
• Some of the most common things we see are:
  • Using i instead of I.
  • Missing apostrophes, for example: “youre” instead of “you’re” (we also get the occasional “ur”!!!)
  • Using capitals in the MIDDLE of a sentence for no real reason.

• You can get plug-ins for your browser that check automatically as you type, so you don’t need to check in a word processor (e.g. Microsoft Word) before responding.
  • One we’ve found useful is Grammarly, which is available free. It doesn’t check everything but does a pretty good job
  • If that’s not for you then there are loads of free tools available online that can check what you’re writing
  • If all else fails, read your response twice before clicking reply just to make sure it sells you in the right way.
• Be doubly careful that your profile has no spelling errors, as every Buyer sees this. You can review and update your profile by logging in here and then clicking Profile.

Sin 7: Not selling your business

• It’s very easy to answer the specific customer requirement, without actually saying why the Buyer should choose you.
• Remember yours may not be the only response and you want it to stand out.
• Do you have a portfolio of your previous work? If so, include some pictures, or a link to the page on your website that shows what you’ve done with similar jobs before.
• Do you have professional qualifications? Explain what they are, and why they mean you’re a great Seller to choose.
• Do you have positive reviews on Bark or other sites? If so reference them – we automatically show your Bark review ratings to potential Buyers.
  • Did you know you can get your customers (Bark or otherwise) to leave a review for you on Bark? All you need to do is send them the link from your Profile Page
  • Why not send the link out to your previous customers now to build up your reviews right away? 
  • Also include the link on your website so you keep getting new reviews from your customers – Bark or otherwise.

No Seller wins every time, but hopefully our tips can make sure it’s you more often. If, for whatever reason, you aren’t successful we recommend you follow up with the Buyer to ask why. Some will tell you and you can use this to adapt your future pitches and improve your chances the next time a Bark comes along – which won’t be long.

What are your tips for quoting? Feel free to share in the comments section.