How do you get a prospective customer that would never buy from you to do so?

An insurance agent walked into my office one day and offered to sell me a life policy. I politely explained to him that I didn’t need the policy, not because I already had one, I didn’t just want to. From the look on his face, this salesman was finding it difficult to understand why a young educated chap like me wouldn’t want a life policy. What he didn’t know was that I had been badly hurt in the past by an insurance company that corned me out of my hard earned money by holding unto the supposed interest promised me as well as about half the principal amount i invested in the policy. They claimed I was being charged administrative charges. How an insurance company could claim half a customer’s principal as administrative charge never seems to baffle me.

After several failed visits and because I had fallen in love with the charisma of the salesman, I carefully explained to him why I would never buy his policy or any other life policy for that matter.

Reflecting on this realization, it occurred to me that there must be others like me out there. Customers who had been badly hurt by companies in the past and have made up their minds never to patronize a product or a service provider again.

Here comes my question: 

*Is there anything that can be done to get such customers to buy again?

*Is it a fact that some companies operating within an industry unknowingly De-market potential customers to themselves and to other players within the same industry?

*How would you get a potential customer that has sworn never to buy from you again to do so? Or is it safe to assume that such customers can never be won back?

My humble take on the matter is this:

Customers who have been badly burnt are a pretty hard nut to crack, or at least, it may take a pretty long, persistent effort to win them back. A salesman would have to place a premium on how much he is willing to sacrifice to win a potential customer. He will have to consider the perceived potential earnings from such customer, the cost of winning the customer, the time and effort as well as resources needed, and the time effort that may be lost from long persistent visits that could have been used to gain other potential customers that may be easier to acquire. One thing I know for sure is that such customers when won will most possibly be your most loyal customer. They also have the potential to win customers for the company.

 

Valentine Okolo