This shouldn’t even need to be said- but the purpose of any business is to exchange your goods/services for your customer’s money. You have NO OTHER REASON to have your doors open.

However, we constantly see instances where companies make it needlessly painful for customers to give them money. This is never good because people know they have many other options out there.

I’ve already covered this behavior in an online situation with my “Pizza Ordering” post. I had to jump through hoops to even get to the “Order Online” screen. Well, Pizza Hut is way simpler and they bring hot, cheesy goodness to my house too. Original post: Just let me log in!

In the real world, the perfect example is our friends at Wal-Mart. I can’t tell you how many times me and the fam have walked in, filled up our cart with the 5 things we needed and 20 things we didn’t and then head over to check-out only to find 30 registers and precisely ONE open with a LOOOONG, slow line. They used to have those handy “self checkout” stations but could never get them to work and pulled them out.

So, I stand there and a clock starts ticking in my head. You NEVER want to give your customers time to rethink what they’ve already casually tossed in their cart. My wife is famous for slipping items back OUT of the cart as we shop because she “didn’t really need that”. As for me, when that clock starts ticking I know if something doesn’t happen quickly what is going to happen. Inevitably after five minutes of not moving, while watching the 4 employees not working shooting the breeze, I push my loaded cart out of line and walk out the door. Rarely is there less than $100 in that now abandoned cart. That is a Benjamin just walking out the front door because they couldn’t be bothered to open another lane.

NEVER let anything come between a customer giving you their money. Violate this simple rule and you may as well hang up the “Going Out Of Business” sign. It’s that simple.