Delayede-mail responsesare losing UK
business an estimated £31.6bn a year.
One-in-three businesses will take their custom elsewhere if a
potential supplier does not get back to them within just two hours,
according to research from
Vodafone UK.
Vodafone questioned 1,000 business owners and managers about how
long they were prepared to wait for a response to a business
enquiry via
e-mail, and found that tardy response rates were losing firms
an average of £18,000 each time.
Despite the potential losses and tight expectations on
turnaround - 79% of business decision makers expect almost
immediate responses to new business enquiries - the majority of
companies admitted they had no proper policy in place for following
up with potential customers.
Fewer than one-in-five have a set response time and leave
e-mails simply unanswered.
Vodafone said less than a quarter of workers say they respond to
an e-mail from a potential customer, and one in ten confess to
responding to e-mails from friends and family ahead of work-related
items.
The survey found that 85% of businesses have experienced no
response to a new business enquiry, and one in ten say this happens
frequently.
Vodafone unsurprisingly suggested more extensive mobile working
and connectivity could alleviate the problems.
It said Manchester is the least switched-on city when it came to
mobile working, whilst Glasgow had the best remote working
practices in place.
Managers in Brighton were the least patient about waiting for
business responses before taking their business elsewhere, whilst
Norwich managers were the most laid back.
Another survey found that the majority of leading Nasdaq and
FTSE listed companies failed to respond to e-mails from potential
investors in good time, if at all.