[pianotech] repeat business

[David Love]

That's fine.  Most of my customers prefer that I send a reminder since it's
just a something that's not high in their consciousness and they lose track
of time.  So I do it and it probably keeps a some percentage of people on a
more regular schedule.  I always ask at the first appointment if they want a
reminder.  If they say no then I don't send it.  That's fairly rare though.

David Love
www.davidlovepianos.com

-----Original Message-----
From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf
Of Joe DeFazio
Sent: Wednesday, August 18, 2010 11:55 PM
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [pianotech] repeat business

Okay, I am going to come clean here, and probably get blasted for it:

Last year I made zero calls asking repeat customers to schedule another
tuning, sent out zero postcards, and sent out one reminder email (to a
client who practically begged for a reminder email).  That's it.

I have many, many of repeat customers;  they just call me - I don't call
them.  I hate to be bugged by people, and I don't like to bug them either.
If I can see that the client is the type of person who really likes to be on
a strict schedule, sometimes I will even give them the name of another tuner
who likes to schedule in advance like clockwork.  Now, if a client wants to
pre-schedule their next tuning while I'm finishing up their current tuning,
that's great, and I'm happy to do it.  Also, if I have completed a rebuild
or major repair, I will call to schedule a followup appointment as necessary
(the price of that followup is typically included in the recently-completed
job, for which I will have already collected payment).

I usually have plenty of work, or too much work.  Once in a while I will
have a slow week, but there's always shopwork to be done.  Surely I can't be
the only one who has decided to run a business this way.  I am certainly not
recommending that any particular tuner should run his/her business as I run
mine.  Nor do I mean to imply any criticism of other tuners who choose to
make phone calls, or to send postcards, emails, singing bunny-grams, or do
skywriting (I do, however, have to draw the line at singing bunnies who
skywrite;  you can hardly hear them over the roar of the engine, plus I'm
told that the bunny suit gets really uncomfortable after a while in the
cockpit).

One of the great things about this profession is that we can each find a
business model and a clientele that works for us and is comfortable for us.
If we do excellent work, have excellent communication skills, and are
reliable, we will, in time, find customers who appreciate our approach and
choose to be a part of our clientele.  Other potential customers will select
a different tuner who runs his/her business in a way that is a comfortable
fit for that customer.

Joe DeFazio
Pittsburgh