In the world of sales, there are often no right answers. What would you do in this tough sales situation? Make the call below, and see instantly how your judgment compares. Final results will appear in LBM Journal. Be sure to check back next month for a fresh Tough Call.

Tough Call - I Want It Now!

In this age of instant-everything, customers can have unreasonable expectations about how quickly you should meet their needs.

Despite the prolonged tough economy, you and your team at RealTime Lumber have mostly managed to maintain pre-recession service and inventory levels. Naturally, since sales have taken a significant hit, your company has had to make some tough choices. Staffing levels aren’t where they once were, and hours have been reduced somewhat. The big golf tournament that you and your builder customers had come to count on didn’t happen this year; hopefully you can bring it back next summer. Still, for the most part, your company is holding its own.

When you saw that business from pros was declining, your company decided to make a concerted effort to appeal to homeowners and DIYers. You promoted your service, your knowledgeable team, and the fact that this is where the pro’s shop. Plus, while you lack the ad budget of the big box store across town, you’ve worked hard to communicate that your prices are competitive.  The strategy worked, and you managed to pick up a significant amount of walkin, consumer business.

As tends to happen, the new customers came complete with some fresh challenges.  The biggest one has to do with immediacy. It started with homeowners, but now it’s spread to your remodeler and builder customers as well. Your website is available 24/7—why aren’t you? Here are two recent examples.

A homeowner finally found time to take on an overdue “Honey-do” project: replacing a eight handlesets throughout the house. His challenge was finding a style that would complement the existing sets. One Saturday afternoon, he found just what he was looking for on your website.  He drove to your store, and got there just before you closed for the day. As it happened, you had two of that style in stock—the rest would have to be ordered.  “How can you show something as available on your website, then not have what I need when I come in?” he shouted.

An experienced remodeler customer — someone who really should know better—called you one morning, furious that he was unable to reach his salesperson the night before. As it happened, he was meeting with a potential client the previous evening, and needed a takeoff immediately. With that take-off, he says he could have closed the sale right then. Now, who knows? “If you want my
business,” he said, “you need to be available when your customers need you. My sales calls happen at night. What am I supposed to do when I need answers?”

Your company, while solid and profitable, is a small, independent business.  The explosion of information available on the Internet, via smartphones and tablet computers, doesn’t change the fact that you have limited resources—and can’t possibly be available 24/7. But each and every sale is important, and you don’t want to lose sales or disappoint customers. What would you do?

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