customer-service Archives - Page 7 of 7

There is a Place Beyond Great Customer Service

April 20, 2010 by Guest Author

A Guest Post by Barry Moltz

Customer Service is job number one. We have heard this rallying cry within companies forever. Ironically, few of them have been able to implement it. The level of service that most businesses offer is pathetic.

However, this has been changing. With the advent of social media, customer service is now the new marketing. It has become the only sustainable competitive advantage and the current way to keep loyal customers. Advertising and company directed public relations can no longer control the conversation on what people are saying about your company and products. Small businesses have turned to social media tools to monitor what is being said about them and to get involved in that conversation. There are many well known examples of companies that are good at this such as Southwest Airlines, Peachtree, and Lands End.

However, there is now a place beyond great customer service that can even bind the loyalty your customers even more closely to your business. That place is called community.

If you look at the mission or purpose of most companies, it inevitably talks about providing a great product and excellent customer service. For example, Dominoâs Pizzaâs mission is

âExceptional People On A Mission To Be The Best Pizza Delivery Company In The World’. This is part of Domino’s ‘Vision and Guiding Principles’ including these statements:
* ‘We Demand Integrity
* Our People Come First.
* We Take Great Care Of Our Customers.
* We Make Perfect 10 Pizzas Every Day.
* We Operate With Smart Hustle and Positive Energyâ

However, the starting point for any small business owner is to have a great product, people and service. In order to be successful today, the owner needs to go much further.

Nick Sarillo has been running his pizza restaurants, Nickâs Pizza and Pub in the suburbs of Chicago for over 15 years. When Nick started, he wanted to have a purpose to his small business beyond offering a great product with great service. So, Nick created âPizza on Purposeâ. The mission statement that he came up with 15 years ago for his restaurants was:

âOur Dedicated Family Provides This Community an unforgettable Place; to Connect with your Family and Friends, to Have Fun and to Feel at Homeâ.

Notice that his mission statement does not talk about having great food or friendly people to serve the customer. Nick set out to use his restaurants to create a community where people can connect. Isnât this the goal that we have for our social media business efforts? Nick put this in practice 15 years ago. His restaurants now support over 40 organizations in his community through fund raisers.

Nickâs small business gives something beyond great customer service. He offers a community for his customers and a way for them to connect with each other. When they are at Nickâs, they feel good about themselves, their community and his business. As a result, there is no longer a dividing line between his company and his customers. With his business, Nick has created a community which just happens to be a pizza restaurant. This is similar to Zappos, where they are not a company that sells just shoes, but a company that delivers great service regardless of their product.

There is no way to create more loyal fans than for them to be part of your community and have them raving about you. Forget creative marketing. Forget great customer service. Go to the place called community and your business will have its most sustainable competitive advantage: The raving loyalty of its customers.

___
Barry Moltz is a Author & Speaker who loves technology and writes about service and small business at Barry J. Moltz You’ll find him on Twitter as @barrymoltz

Thanks, Barry. Customer service with deep ties to the community is truly the competitive advantage. I’m so with you on that!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
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I Asked for Hot Fudge and Cool Whip but I Got Skittles

January 27, 2010 by Liz

The Gesture Was Lovely

It was a mission. The task was simple.
On the way home from dinner, he said “I need to go to the store.”

We hired a taxi to place him at his destination.

On the way out of the car he asked, “What for you?”
I said, “hot fudge and cool whip.” I was thinking hot fudge with the butter pecan ice cream we had for a late night sundae. I was thinking Cool Whip for an early morning “blogger’s latte.”

Didn’t get the hot fudge or the Cool Whip.

What he brought home was Skittles.
I like Skittles, but Skittles — they are his favorite!

The gift was lovely, but … he got me what he liked, rather than what I asked for. It was nice thought and I said, “thank you.”

Still uou can’t make a blogger’s latte with Skittles, no matter how much anyone loves that candy …

Ever been there? How do you respond when someone — maybe a favorite company — gives you what THEY want.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
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15 Ways to Help the People in Your Business and Your Life

December 21, 2009 by Liz

A Guide to Customer Service and Relationships of Sorts

Our economy has become so self-service, we’ve all gotten good at knowing what we need and how to get things done for ourselves. Yet, the social business culture has also taught us that the most powerful question in business is “How can I help you?” Imagine if we took that “help you” view to every person we know.

In his book, B-A-M!: Delivering Customer Service in a Self-Service World, business author and entrepreneur Barry J Moltz replaces customer service myths with a tactical approach that shows companies how to make more money through attitudes and actions that will help their customers feel satisfied in good times or bad. Creating satisfied customers is the only enduring competitive advantage left in a world market where virtually everything is a commodity. His advice applies to every blog, every business and every life.

He’s talking about treating customers — people — as if they count.

I’ve read Barry’s book twice now. Once as a manual on customer service and again as a guide for relationships of every kind. The validity of his guidance is that the advice works both ways. I don’t think he’ll mind if apply his customer service ideas to business relationships and replace the word customers with the word people when I restate of few of his ideas.

Define your relationships deliberately, conversationally, and indirectly by observing and listening to what people say to and about you.
Be personable and gracious toward every person at all times.
Treat people with dignity and respect.
Consider the other person’s needs, deadlines, goals, and point of view first.
Encourage them to talk and listen carefully to what they say.
Understand their expectations before we go beyond them.
Anticipate in good ways with friendliness, openness, and patience.
Talk to people one at a time and treat every person as an individual.
Build trust by letting them be part of a balanced give and take.
Remove negative talk and negative views from all of your interactions.
Put quality in everything you do.
Find some quality to admire in the actions of everyone in your life.
Offer training or guidance and leave room for people who color outside the lines.
Celebrate your advocates and fans. Get to know your critics, they understand you better than you might suspect.
At the end of each day, measure your success by looking in the mirror.

Not every person’s opinion is of equal value, of course. Not every one will see you as you truly are. But every person is a human, at the very least find room to respect the lifeform.

People don’t care how good we are, until they know that we care. It’s the care that drives the service. A problem handled with respect and care brings us closer. It’s the care that keeps them with us even when things go a little wrong.

We’re learning about that “how I can help you”? question. Have you found it has power in your life too?

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The Best Business Advice Ever . . . in 50 Words

December 12, 2007 by Liz

Have you been following the b5media Business Apprentice Team Challenge? Up to now, two teams have been advising a fictional entrepreneur called Kay on her business decisions. Last week, while I was gone, my team — the Aces — won again. They are a brilliant group. You can catch up on what’s happened so far at b5media Business Apprentice updates.

This week it becomes every blog on our own.

Our Task: Give Kay the best business advice we’ve ever heard . . . in 50 words. –Liz

Some Advice for Kay

My father listened more than he talked. After a large sit-down at our house, a friend once remarked, “That meal was over an hour. The only word I heard your father say was bread. He didn’t even ask for the butter.”

When I told my dad, his reply made me laugh. He said, “I don’t like butter much.”

My dad left home and school in 1919. He was 12. Everything he knew about business and life he learned from paying attention to the world around him.

It was my dad who taught me to view the world as a lifelong business school.

The Best Business Advice Ever . . . in 50 Words

Each morning when he drove me to school, my dad would point out people we saw and tell me what he observed. When we got the place where he dropped me off, we had a small ritual — a sort of script we would go through. I can’t say quite how it started, and I no longer remember it word for word. But it went something like this . . .

Dad would park the car, turn to me, smile, and ask, “What’s the score?”

I would answer the same every time, with words I had learned from him — bits at a time — over the years. To this day it’s the best business advice I’ve ever heard.

Learn your business from your customers. Understand their minds, their hearts, and their lives. Do what you do to make their lives easier. When a problem comes, leave them a place to stand and stand tall beside them. . . . And remember, everyone is your customer, even your dad.

Then his eyes would light with smile. He’d offer his huge, work-worn hand, shake mine, give a nod, and say, “It’s a pleasure doing business with you.”

I’d answer something like, “Oh dad, you’re too cool.”

All I would add is cherish the rituals and traditions. They make moments remarkably unforgettable.

What’s the best business advice you ever heard? Is there a story that goes with it?

If you think my dad’s advice would serve a young entrepreneur, would you give Successful-Blog a vote in the poll in the sidebar at TAXGIRL?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
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Are Telcos Changing Their Ways Now?

September 7, 2006 by Liz

AT&T Call Number One

About 6 weeks ago, I paid my ATT bill online, as I have for months. I finished. I got a receipt that said, “Successful.” I put it with the bill in the file where such things go. It was 3 weeks later when I got a notice saying my bill was unpaid.

I wasn’t happy. I called them up.

My first surprise was that my call didn’t cross an ocean. My second was that the person at that end listened and wanted to help. She was patient and as perplexed as I was at what happened. She gave me the time I needed to be sure that no money was taken from any of my accounts.

We settled the amount due. She removed the late fee. Subject closed. I said thank you for a most pleasant call. I meant it too.

I was surprised that things went so well.

AT&T Call Number Two

This morning I received the usual update reminder. It’s the one that tells me that my next online bill was about to come due. The “wonky” amount was sitting there again. “Too good to be true,” were the words in my head.

I wasn’t happy. I called them up.

My first surprise was that AGAIN my call didn’t cross an ocean. My second was that AGAIN the person on the other end listened and wanted to help. She assured me that my account was fine.

Then she let me know how I could get FASTER INTERNET SERVICE AT A LOWER PRICE. Did I want that?

Our conversation was professional and pleasant — so much so that I asked her whether AT&T had moved their outsourced calls back to the US. She said that they never had all of them there, but that yes they had moved many calls back here now.

She sounded like a telephone blogger — authentic, transparent.

I’m thinking that NET NEUTRALITY and bloggers have their attention. I’ve never enjoyed a conversation with AT&T until these two — I was thoroughly frustrated with them as recently as June 22, 2006. — Now I’ve just enjoyed talking to them twice in a row!

I’m not at all sure what to think, or what to do with this information. If they start actually doing customer service, I’m not sure I’ll remember how a customer acts.

–ME ‘Liz Strauss