“I said…Did you hear what I said?”. Communication is like that sometimes. We sometimes assume we’re on the same page as the person we’re talking to only to experience frustration later. Especially when working with customers, we may think we’re moving forward until we hit a snag. The customer thought we said one thing, when we meant another.

We sell vehicle wraps. Sounds simple since it’s just one thing, right. But just like any marketing communication, there is so much more to consider than just verbal interaction, as if that wasn’t enough to consider. After all, we communicate with our customers in a variety of ways. We see them in person, talk on the phone, text, email and message them in social media.

What is your percentage of responsibility in communication?

When you listen to someone would you say you are 100% responsible for receiving the transmission? You try to be an active listener, take notes, and ask questions if you need to clarify something.

When you speak to someone, how responsible are you as the transmitter of the message?

I love to ask this question when I teach communication at my company. Most people will say they are 100% responsible when listening, but aren’t sure how to answer the question of transmitting.

If you want to be an effective communicator, the answer to both questions is 100%. If actions get off track due to communication we’ll get used to accepting responsibility and this gives us an opportunity to sharpen our communication skills. It’s just as important that we make sure they understand us, and we should take responsibility for them as well.

But right from the start, we realized that we had to address this topic as a potential NIGHTMARE. One of my first jobs was refused because the Forest Green lettering wasn’t the right shade of green. It was perfect on my color chart right next to the words “Forest Green”. But the customer had a different idea of what that meant when he ordered it on the phone. He pointed at a different green and I got to do the whole job again. I’m lucky to have learned this valuable lesson early in the game of business.

I decided to view every form of communication as potential for trouble. Even in areas I hadn’t anticipated. So I started testing everything I could. Nothing is worse than doing a job twice or potentially losing a customer altogether.

Some areas were obvious. Customers need to see what they are getting. We all interact visually to some extent. I need to see a picture of just about any information I’m taking in, otherwise I could be visualizing a different scenario than you are. So, for everything we do, the customer receives a proof, which is a computer rendering of the job we’re doing.

We’ve learned to proof everything. Even if it’s just a few letters on a rectangular object. You may get 10 people that will keep saying, “make it bigger” and the next person will say “I just need the identification numbers”.

So we have learned that we are communicating so much more than a design to produce.

We communicate vinyl color. Try doing that on the phone. “How dark is your green?”, “I just want a medium blue, not dark or light”, “What color would you use for my business?”. The fact is, on the phone, our customers don’t have a color chart. They may have never heard of a PMS chart because up until now, they never needed one.

We communicate marketing priority. Priority is always important. Many times a customer will approach us and give us their logo, phone number, pictures they would like to use. Then… they give us 15 bullet points to add. So we work with them to establish a priority of information, and they often realize it’s best to discard some information. They always pause to think about what one message is more important than another, which is valuable to them in other forms of marketing as well. This is an area where we are qualified to offer suggestions, but ultimately those decisions are made by the customer, or they authorize us to make them for them.

We help our customers communicate with their customer demographic. While designing a wrap, we ask lots of questions that help us to bridge the gap between them and the people they want to sell to. For instance:

Who do you want to talk to with your vehicle graphics?

What do you want the vehicle graphics to say to them?

What do you want them to remember from your graphics?

Where will the vehicle be when they see the message? At a client’s house? On the road? In a parking lot while they are eating out or buying supplies?

What do your other forms of marketing look like? We reference magazine ads, printed materials, web site, etc. Since we are supplying one form of marketing for our clients, we definitely want to see if that harmonizes with whatever else they are doing.

We communicate design. This is difficult at first, because there isn’t anything to refer to yet. We ask if they have already seen something they like or don’t like. We make sure they want a unique design that does NOT conflict with another company in their industry. And we especially will always guide them away from a design that already represents the look of another one of our customers.

We communicate emotion. We get to know our customers and what emotion they wish to invoke when their design is viewed by their prospects and clients.

We communicate ordering details such as quoting, scheduling, fleet pricing, life of the materials, care of the wrap, and lots of other ‘normal’ things.

As you can see from the list above, it isn’t easy for someone to buy a vehicle wrap, especially their first one. As a relatively new product, we find that first time buyers sometimes feel that they don’t know enough about wraps to ask the right questions that would keep them from being taken advantage of. They want to know what to expect since this is a large transaction initially, even though it may be the least expensive marketing tool in their arsenal.

One of the greatest compliments we receive is ” I really enjoyed the buying process. Your people walked me through it with ease, and made it easy for me”.

Of course the best thing to hear is “I love my wrap, and I get new customers all the time because of my investment. Wish I would have done it sooner”.

By anticipating the next nightmare you might be able to avoid it now. When it comes down to it communication will make or break your company, use it well.

John Wiley, President