Loosing business.
I have recently replaced my car, it has been a few years and the process is always the same. I decide what I want, keeping myself to a reasonable budget and focusing on nearly new cars. I then spend an evening on the Internet and pick out some suitable contenders.
So I identified four cars that suited me and sent off an email to all four dealers. One dealer responded within a few hours and by the end of the week I had my car.
The other three dealers never responded, on chasing one I was was told that he had no idea where emails went. I never bothered to chase the other two. The dealer who did respond tells me that 60% of their business comes via email.
This is just one of several occasions that my purchase enquiries for diverse products have been ignored.
I am constantly amazed by the number of businesses who ignore email communication and see it as a problem rather than a serious business tool.
In a business to business survey published this week (September 2010) asking for the preferred means of communication other than face to face, email scored over 60%.