Edition 448 – Front End Vs. Back End

In my ongoing quest for learning, I started following the work of a respected, US based organisation around two years ago, on the recommendation of a good friend and colleague.

This organisation engages in lots of email marketing. Daily updates, weekly summaries and the usual peppering of marketing emails in amongst those that are informative and learning based.

Throughout 2023 and 2024, I signed up to a couple of their online courses. Part of that was driven by the desire to learn more, about an emanating aspect of the work that I’m undertaking with my clients. Part of it related to my desire to engage more in their community. A third element was driven by an interest in attending one of their overseas based residential courses, at a future date.

Earlier this year, as they rolled out their in-person events calendar for 2024, one of the courses for September piqued my interest. It was right in my wheelhouse, in terms of the work that I’m doing, and where I’m heading professionally. So, I started to undertake a bit more reading, not only about the content of that week’s learning, but of the outside speakers that were being engaged to present.

In May of this year, I reached out to this organisation, as I had a few questions that I needed answers on. For me, those questions were important, as there was a similarity between myself and my career trajectory, and that of the lead person in this New Mexico based residential course. I’ve long held a strong ethical focus in how I go about my work, and I wanted to make sure there was no perception that I was attending merely to pilfer the intellectual property of the lead presenter.

After a few days of no responses to my email query, I followed up a second and, ultimately, a third time, before I finally received a response. It was tepid in the least, and gave me the sense that my question was merely being answered, not considered. I’d asked for the lead presenter to be contacted about my concerns, but it appears that element of my request was overlooked. I had a strong position about this for one reason – I didn’t want to commit the time and cost of travelling to the south western United States, only to be told on Day 1, Session 1, that given my background, I shouldn’t be in the room.

When I sent a follow up email in response to their reply, it took a further four days before I received anything back. That pretty much sealed the deal in ensuring I didn’t sign up for what would have been a significant investment.

What’s the point of promising everything in the front end, and investing huge amounts in your marketing muscle, if there’s no support in the back end?

Don’t you risk “overpromising” and “underdelivering” if you don’t invest as much in the resources needed to deal with the small percentage of those that reach out with genuine enquiries? Surely, if 1000 people are reading your material, no more than 10 are responding, in some form or other?

Whether it’s buying a new car, engaging a new advisor, recruiting a new employee, or selecting a travel destination, a lot of considered thought goes into the decision making process. Sometimes it’s days. Often it’s weeks. Occasionally it’s months. Yet, it seems there is little appreciation for the time investment that goes into arriving at such a decision.

So, what are you investing in the back-end, as much as in the front-end, in the quest to build and grow your business?

This Week’s Tip

“Interestingly, their communications ramped up recently and I decided it now bordered on
email bombardment.
An unsubscribe request was made and, somewhat surprisingly, no feedback was sought as to why I unsubscribed.
I sent off some unsolicited feedback to help them, which to this day, continues to remain unacknowledged.”