Introduction

Related YouTube video: https://youtu.be/0_dbccxjp2g

In a recent neighborhood online discussion, someone asked if it was common for contractors to leave a job unfinished and then be difficult to track down. Within an hour over 100 people responded with their negative experience.

The strange thing about this issue is how rampant it is and how obvious finishing a job leads to more sales.

The main reasons vendors don’t finish are:

  • The next project provides new money and therefore looks more appealing than the existing unfinished one.
  • At face value, the existing job one will not generate more money.
  • The vendor simply cannot remember what remains to be done, and does not track anything, so the workers move on to the next project assuming the customer is happy.
  • The vendor does not think there are any negative consequences of the decision to move on, even though there are.

The missing connection: future sales depend on keeping existing customers happy, either by repeat business or referrals. This concept is totally lost on most companies. Actually, more than totally lost. Really totally lost.

Reputation and future sales

Small business success relies on word-of-mouth advertising, and this requires you to maintain or improve your reputation. Here are some example statistics*:

  • 13% of customers tell 15 or more people if they have a negative experience.
  • 68% of consumers say they are willing to pay more for products and services from a brand known to offer good customer service experiences.
  • 93% of customers are likely to make repeat purchases with companies who offer excellent customer service.
  • If the company’s customer service is excellent, 78% of consumers will do business with them again after a mistake.

*Source: https://www.helpscout.com/75-customer-service-facts-quotes-statistics/

Your customers can be your free sales team if you finished the job

You want your existing customers to be your free, part-time sales staff. They have access to people you will never meet. If you don’t impress them with your service (which includes finishing a job) then they will tell people not to use you. If you finish in a timely fashion and they are happy, they will sell for you.

It is simple: finish the project and have the client tell others for free so you make more sales.

Making more from the current client

If you finish a project, you can point out new items to fix, things that might not have been obvious before. For example:

  • The customer’s lawn is thinning, and you can add seed for $X
  • The old broken device you have been tripping over in the customer’s yard could be fixed or replaced for $Y
  • The wood in the customer’s patio is rotting and you can fix it for $Z

If you have not finished the original project, and you also point out more things you can do, you will look a little foolish when you clearly haven’t finish the first thing.

Ask for a testimonial and potential new leads

If you are in good standing with the customer, you can ask for testimonials and leads. If you are not, they either will not write a testimonial, or they will, and you won’t like it.

There are recent examples of where I have not referred a vendor to a friend because the vendor simply would not finish my project. These projects were between $10-30K, so my vendors are missing out on a huge amount of potential sales from new clients by not finishing my project.

If I have to make this point any clearer, I promise I will vomit! 🤮. Too late.

Defining Done

If you lose track of which projects are unfinished, then it is time to use something to record project status. For more details on tracking items, see https://www.improvingyoursmallbusiness.com/tracking-all-requests-not-losing-income/

A progress bar showing 0 to 100% of a project being worked on

Start with a checklist that defines “done” that can be used with all projects, and then add any project outstanding tasks to it. For example:

An image showing a checklist of items to finish for a job

Neil, I have many customer projects I have not finished, and months have gone by, what should I do?

If you have a chronic finishing problem, then I would select all the clients in the last year that you have not finished and reach out to them. Offer to finish their job for free (assuming they paid you initially). Use this as an opportunity to rebuild some bridges and enable these customers to become free salespeople. Try these steps:

  1. Contact them and mention that you believe that there are some unfinished parts of the project and apologize.
  2. Ask if they would be interested in you finishing the project at no extra cost. If they have not paid you for the unfinished part, offer a large discount for the work (as a reward to them for putting up with you).
  3. When the work is done, run the through your checklist and see what goodwill you can generate.

Summary

Finish – or seek therapy about why you can’t!

Feel free to email me with questions at neilpotter@icloud.com.