MBA1005 Q&A Wednesday: How do I close my business for good without upsetting my customers?

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Hey oh. Welcome to the Hundred Dollar MBA show. Making the most of ten minutes to make your business better every single day with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of the Hundred Dollar MBA, a complete business training and community online over at 100mba.net and today's episode is a Q and A Wednesday episode. On our Q and A Wednesday episodes we answer a question from you, a listener of the show. If you have a question you want to ask, just email me over at Omar MBA net Today's question comes from Vicky and Vicki asks how do I close my business for good without upsetting my customers? A super solid question Vicki. Sometimes we will choose to close our business forever and it could be for several reasons. Maybe it's just not profitable, it's not worth your time anymore or effort. Or maybe it's doing just fine but you want to retire and you want to close up that coffee shop. Whatever the reasons, you need to be able to communicate this to your customers properly because hey, they've been loyal customers patrons of your business for so long and they were the reason why you were in business. On top of that you want to make sure your exit strategy your transition out when you close your business that whole process needs to be smooth, headache free, with minimal issues from your own customers. So I want to be answering this question today and showing Vicky how to communicate this properly and close that business for good with no worries. All right, let's get into it. Let's get down to business. So Vicki asks, how do I close my business for good without upsetting my customers? Totally legit question. The fact that some somebody's asking this question means that they care, they care about their customers and they want to make sure they do things properly. First of all, any kind of change or update or anything new that's going on in your business should be always communicated to your customers. Now, the level of communication, how much you communicate this, how you communicate it, will differ depending on what you're communicating, how big of a change this is. And in this case, this is probably the biggest change you'll ever have to communicate. It's communicating the idea that, hey, I will not be able to serve you any longer soon and this relationship in this capacity with this business will be over. That's a tough one. So I really believe this begins with you. You need to sit down and write down why are you closing the business? You probably have your own reasons, but you want to write them down because you're going to have to communicate some of these ideas to your customers. Because the best way to communicate any message is honestly. Let's say, for example, the business has been running for three years, but it's just not profitable and it's just not worth your time and money anymore. Your finances are really suffering and you need to make a transition. You might love the business and the customers and maybe even your daily life working in the business. So make sure you write those things down too. So it starts first with just brainstorming what caused you to make this decision. Second, you need a plan where things are not interrupted or changed and this transition is smooth for your customers. So the earlier you do this, the better. If you're a physical business like a coffee shop, a month or two notice might be a good idea. But if you're a subscription business online and you have annual subscriptions, more than a year would be even better because hey, you want to give them a heads up before the they renew their annual subscription, all that jazz. If you can't give it a year, if you can't give that kind of warning, then you're going to have to have somewhat a backup plan where you're going to reimburse them or try to make up for the lost service that they're not going to get. Because they're going to be closed. So you need to have a clear plan of action. What's going to happen to your customers? How are they going to be treated? How are you going to take care of them in this event? In this event of you closing the business? Why? Because that's the first thing your customers are going to ask. They're going to want to know, hey, what about me? What's going to happen to me? And you need to be able to have an answer ready before they ask that question. Next, I highly recommend you speak to a business lawyer, even if it's just for a consultation, because you need to make sure that you're all on the up and up and you don't owe anybody anything. When you close your business, whether it's suppliers or contracts with customers, you want to make sure that you are legally protected and you're okay and you do things right. People can get really upset when you close a business, even when you communicate it properly. And you want to make sure that you have a plan of action just in case they try to, you know, demand money from you or something like that. You need to know where you stand legally so you feel comfortable no matter what they say. Now you've decided to close the business, then this is going to happen. Let's hope you have some leeway time to communicate this, because you're going to have to communicate this not once, not twice, but several times over and over because people are going to miss it. This is especially true if you have a physical business. A lot of people, especially with physical businesses, get kind of upset about this because they don't want to put up a sign that says, we're closing soon or we'll be closing on this date because they feel like it's a deterrent of business or customers coming in, new customers. If you don't want to put up a sign, you need to communicate this effectively through some other way. It could even be through a promotion where everybody who's served, whether it's at the cashier or at the barista, if you have a cafe, they're told, hey, we're going to be closing in three months. And a way to say thank you to all our loyal customers. We're offering, you know, a free biscotti with a large coffee from now until the day we close. You communicate what's happening, but at the same time, you wrap it in a way that people are given something as a gift for being a customer. It's sort of like Putting a positive spin to some bad news. Now, your loyal customers are going to be heartbroken. I know that might sound a little bit extreme, but it's true. Think about the places that you frequent or the stores or online stores that you love. Imagine they close tomorrow. You'd be so heartbroken because you just love their products, you love their services, and yeah, you'll move on, but in the moment, it's upsetting. So understand that when you're communicating with the customers, they may be upset. Now, if you have an online store or online business, this definitely needs to be communicated on email through your email subscription. But you may want to also communicate it on the website as well as inside your product. Whether it's a web app or something like that. Let them know that, hey, we are closing in a month. We're closing in two months. You have X amount of days left and you can link it to a blog post. This is what I love about having an online business. You can provide extra information with a simple link and you can say, hey, to read more about why we're closing, check out this blog post. And in that blog post, you can just then tell your whole story and share the things that you wrote down. Hey, these are the reasons why I'm closing the business. It really upsets me because I love my business, I love my job, I love what I do every day. But it's come to the time where I have to close. Being honest, transparent, and just telling your story as it is for the most part will generate people's support. But you will get some emails, you'll get some people will be asking questions, and you'll also get some people that are upset. How can you do this? How could you give up on us? I just signed up. All that kind of stuff. You'll have to deal with that. And that's okay. That's just part of the challenge and part of the process of closing a business. So to answer the question directly, you're going to do everything you can to minimize people being upset. You're going to communicate it in every way. Email, in person, if you have a physical business on your website. And then until the day you close, you know, you can have that final day saying that final goodbye. You're going to try to minimize people being upset, but you can't guarantee that you're going to have zero upset customers. You will have some upset customers. You're just trying to minimize those as much as possible. People will get upset and they will email or they will message you or say something to you in person. Your job is just to remind yourself, hey, you need to do the right thing. Remind yourself why you are closing the business and often it's just for a personal reason that you need to sort out. Meaning, hey, I just financially can't do it and my family and my personal life can't suffer. We all need to live right. We all need to eat. It could be, hey, I've been doing this for 40 years. It's time for me to retire and you've earned the right to close the business.

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To wrap up today's episode. Today's Q and A Wednesday's Question how do I close my business for good without upsetting my customers? You can minimize the number of customers that will be upset, but you'll still have some people upset and that's just par for the course. And that's normal. You can't please everybody. But my general advice is communication is key. The earlier the better and the more frequent you tell them, the better. You really can't over communicate this and no one's going to get upset for you. Just making sure they know that hey, I'm not going to be able to serve you in the future. I think that this is important to do. Even if you're just test piloting a business or an idea or an app and it's in beta and you have maybe 100 or 200 users or customers. Even if they're not paying customers, you know, maybe they're just trying out the app. You want to communicate that hey, this did not work out. This was not successful. And you're going to have to, you know, pivot or change or close this down. Now, obviously there's not a lot of damage done if they're not paying. If they did pay or it was a minimal amount and it was kind of like a monthly thing, they kind of know what they're getting into. And that's not really too upsetting because they knew it was in beta or they knew that this was just kind of a trial or a project you're trying out. But still do the right thing. Communicate. Let them know. Thank you so much for listening. I hope that answers your question. Vicki, if you have a question you want to ask on Q and A Wednesdays, just email me@omar100mba.net thanks again for listening to the $100 NBA show. That's it for me today, guys. But before I go, I want to leave you with this in today's business world, communication is key. Updating your customers, letting them know what's going on. Even if you have nothing to report, let them know, hey, nothing new. We're working on these things. I'll update you. I found that this is so important. Sometimes we get busy in our day to day that we don't do this. And the days become weeks and the weeks become months before we know it. It's been six months and I haven't emailed my customers. No, no, no. Right. Have a regular schedule. You update your customers, communicate with them regardless of what's going on. Great stuff, bad stuff. You're closing down, you're expanding, whatever it is. All right, I'll check you in tomorrow's episode. I'll see you then. Take care.

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