Count before you fix anything
Everyone believes their enquiries are varied and complex. Almost nobody has counted.
When you do, the shape is nearly always the same: a handful of questions make up most of the volume, and they are the simplest ones.
60%
of incoming messages, in most small businesses, are one of the same three questions.
- How much does it cost?
- Are you available on this date?
- Do you do this specific thing?
Not exciting. That is the point — the questions eating your week are not the interesting ones.
How to count a week
You need five working days and a note somewhere you can reach fast.
| Do | Do not |
|---|---|
| Log every inbound message that asks something | Do not categorise as you go |
| One line: channel, the question in your own words, how long it took | Do not clean it up — log the raw question |
| Sort and group at the end of the week | Do not skip the quiet days |
If you categorise while logging, you will invent categories that flatter your assumptions. Log raw, sort later.
Two things will jump out: how few distinct questions there really are, and how much time went into the most repetitive one.
And if logging feels annoying
Notice what that tells you. A question frequent enough to make logging annoying is a question worth answering once and properly.
Write each answer properly, once
Take the top three and write the best answer you have ever given to each. Not the fastest — the best. A good answer has four parts:
The direct answer
Ranges are fine and often better. Refusing to give any number to protect a conversation costs you more enquiries than it saves.
What makes it move
«It goes up if access is difficult, down if you can be flexible on dates.» This turns a number into information and pre-empts the negotiation.
The honest limit
«Below X we are not the right fit, and I would rather say so now.» Filtering early is a service to both sides.
The next step
Something they can do immediately. Not «let me know if you are interested».
Where to put it
The answer has to live where the question gets asked:
- On the page where people land before enquiring
- In the automatic first reply — as the actual answer, not «we will get back to you»
- In the pinned message of whatever channel they use
- In the mouth of whoever picks up the phone, in the same words
The same answer, in every place. Different answers in different places is worse than no answer, because it looks like nobody knows.
The step everyone skips
Watch what people ask next. Once question one is answered up front, the enquiries do not stop — they move. That is not a failure; that is the system working, and it tells you what to answer next.
Every month, look at the new top three. This is the only part that never finishes, and the part that compounds.
What this changes
Two things, and the second is bigger.
- Time. Fewer hours on the same reply
- Quality of enquiry. When price and scope are answered up front, people filter themselves
Fewer enquiries, more work
Businesses that do this often report fewer enquiries and more work — which looks like a problem on a dashboard and is the opposite. Watch the second number, not the first.
What not to publish
- Prices that vary so much a range would mislead
- Anything you would need to renegotiate constantly
- Availability that changes hourly — publish how to check, not the state
For these, answer the shape: how pricing is decided, how to check availability. That is still an answer.
Want the counting sheet?
We do a free Process Diagnosis: we count a week with you, find the three questions, and write the answers. No cost, no commitment.