How Would You Like an Unpaid Employee?

“You have reached the highest level in sales when your Client views you as an unpaid employee.”                                                                                           ~ Zig Ziglar

That statement has had a profound impact on my life and now that I teach customer service I change it to, “You have reached the highest level in sales when your Client views you as an unpaid employee.” 

I’m not bragging, but when I was a sales rep I did very well, and it was because I believed and practice the statement above from Zig Ziglar.

When I started at American Retail Supply (Thompson Marking Service) in 1978 the only products we sold were hand-held price marking equipment and labels.  My job was to drive, or walk, from one retail store to the next, sell price marking guns, service the guns for existing Clients, and sell them labels for their price markers.  I was paid on straight commission.

Zig’s statement of, “You have reached the highest level of sales when your Client views you as an unpaid employee” was right in line with what I learned from Dick Thompson, the founder of American Retail Supply.  Dick said, “You can only get in direct proportion to what you give.”

With Dick and Zig’s advice, along with parents who taught me the same principles, I headed out to sell price marking equipment and labels.  The Client’s in my territory hadn’t had anyone calling on them for almost three years and I found that most of them had started buying from another company who had a sales rep coming around periodically.

As I entered the Client’s store I looked at the labels on their product to determine the type of pricing equipment they used.  While I did this I looked for labels that weren’t printing properly.  In those days the price marking equipment needed periodic adjustments and the tracks needed to be cleaned for the price marker to work properly.

As I introduced myself, many of the Clients told me they didn’t buy from us any longer because we had not been around to service them and another company came in once in a while.

I had learned from my parents that what you say isn’t nearly as important as what you do, so I simply told them that’s fine, and let them know I would still love to clean and service their labelers.  If they hesitated, I would point out the labels that weren’t printing properly and almost always was able to clean and service their labelers.  Then I showed them what I did to fix the problem and often gave them a hint or two on maintaining the labelers.  Sometimes I walked out with an order.

Most of the time I thanked the Client and told them I would be back in a few months.  Most of the time when I told them I would be back in a few months they reminded me that they didn’t buy from us any longer.  I simply replied, “That’s fine.”

When I showed up a few months later I was often reminded that they no longer buy from us.  I again serviced the labelers and left with more orders.  Over the three years I was an outside sales rep almost every Client who originally told me they no longer bought from us became my Client and many are Clients today.

Zig’s lesson that, “You have reached the highest level of sales when your Client views you as an unpaid employee” served me well as a sales person, and is still our goal today at American Retail Supply.

I originally published my newsletter for my American Retail Supply in 1993 with the thought that I would research an issue and bring what I found to my customers with the hope that it would be of value and help their business thrive… which of course, meant they would need more supplies and fixtures.

“You have reached the highest level in sales when your Client views you as an unpaid employee.”                                                                                           ~ Zig Ziglar

You can learn more about Zig Ziglar at www.ZigZiglar.com

You can get my hardcopy book (not an e-book), The Happy Customer Handbook, 59 Secrets to Creating Happy Customers Who Come Back Time and Time Again and Enthusiastically Tell Others About You for free.  We just ask that you pay $2.97 to help cover shipping and handling.  Go to www.TheHappyCustomerHandbook.com.

A Pleasant Customer Service Surprise

I’m often amazed at the places where I expect to get Make-You-Happy Customer Service and don’t get it, and the places where I would expect less-than Make-You-Happy Service and get great service.

Where would you expect to get Make-You-Happy Customer Service?

  • At a Denny’s Restaurant or,
  • The Expensive 5 Star Resort Hotel on the beach?

I’ll let you decide which actually had Make-You-Happy Customer Service.

The first morning, at the hotel, I got up and headed out for breakfast.  I asked the guy at the bell desk if the Denny’s was still across the street and down a couple blocks.  He replied, “It’s just across the street.”

So I went out to the street, looked across, and didn’t see a Denny’s.  So I thought, OK it must be somewhere in that shopping area across the street.  So I went across the street and into the shopping area and eventually found that the Denny’s was actually, through the shopping area, down the alley and over another 1/2 block.  It certainly wasn’t anywhere near, “just across the street.”

When I finally found the Denny’s and entered the restaurant, I was greeted by a nice clean wooden sign that said.  “Welcome to Denny’s.  It Will Be Our Pleasure To Seat You.”  I thought, they really understand Make-You-Happy Customer Service Secret #28.  Are Your Signs Positive or Negative?

I was, almost immediately, greeted by a lady with a sincere smile and greeting who showed me to my seat, gave me a menu and took my drink order.  Within seconds I had my coffee and orange juice.

When I ordered my breakfast the waitress told me that I should get a different item on the menu because it was the exact breakfast that I ordered but it included coffee and orange juice and my bill would be less.

She then proceeded to give me great service during the rest of my breakfast.

When I visited the restroom on the way out I saw a sign that said, “Please tell any Denny’s team member if this restroom needs attention.”  It didn’t say what I usually see in restrooms, “Please notify a manager if this restroom needs attention.”  “Ya sure, I’m going to ask for a manager and wait around until (s)he shows up to tell them their restroom needs attention.”  But if the restroom needed attention, I would have taken the time to tell a team member on my way out.

Secret #29 in The Happy Customer Handbook is “Are Your Signs Positive or Negative?”

Signs are not passive.  They are capable of delighting as well as disappointing.  Review each of your signs and ask yourself, does the way it is written create a feeling of delight for the customer?   If the answer is “No”, change the sign to produce the intended emotion.

Minimize the use of words like “no”, “don’t”, “can’t”, “policy”, and “prohibited”.  Instead, tell people what they can do.  Instead of “No refunds after ten days” maybe “Refunds gladly accepted up to ten days after purchase.”

Rather than “Two forms of identification are required to pay by check.” How about, “Please share two forms of identification when paying by check – Thank You.”

Getting back to the question of, who would you expect Who’s The Boss Service from, The Denny’s Restaurant, or the 5 Star Resort.

The next day I got done with work early enough to make it down to the pool for an hour before it got dark.  When I got to the pool I found that it was closed for a private party.

“OK, no big deal, I’ll go for a swim in the ocean.”  When I got out of the ocean I found that not only was the pool closed but towel kiosk was closed for the private party.

“OK, no big deal, I’ll just rinse off and dry off in my room.”  Well, you guessed it the showers were turned off.  “So, I’ll just walk through the lobby with my sandy feet and salty body dripping wet.”

Like I said, I’m often amazed at the places where I expect to get Make-You-Happy Customer Service and don’t get it and the places where I would expect less-than Make-You-Happy Service and in fact get great service.

Remember, according to the Harvard Business Review, if you can prevent 5% of your customers from leaving you, you can increase your profits 25-93%.

You can get my hardcopy book (not an e-book), The Happy Customer Handbook, 59 Secrets to Creating Happy Customers Who Come Back Time and Time Again and Enthusiastically Tell Others About You at www.TheHappyCustomerHandbook.com.  Your cost is $2.97 and that includes shipping and handling.

11 Customer Service Lessons from One Phone Call

Phone call

I called one of our very good clients who has a brick and mortar store, excellent mail order business, superb telemarketing organization, and a top notch web site.  They don’t have a retail store in my area, so I usually order online or call them.  I order from them for a number of reasons:

  • They are a very good client of ours.
  • Their products are superb.
  • Their service is almost always at the Make-You-Happy level.

 

But even the best businesses fall short, and that’s why we need consistent and persistent reinforcement of Make-You-Happy Customer Service.  One of the areas that continually amazes me is how often people assume they know what you are going to ask and therefore don’t really listen to what you’re saying.

 

I had ordered top quality expensive wading boots from them – I use them for fly fishing in rivers. When I got them, they were too narrow.  I looked through their catalog and saw that the only boot they had in the catalog that was available in wide widths was a lower price model.  Now, I’m not snobby, but my feet are old enough that I need the support and extra sole thickness that most low price models don’t have.

 

So I called the 800 number to ask if they had any higher quality boots in wide widths.  A very nice, good customer service person told me that was the only boot that actually came in a wide width, but suggested that I call back in the morning and ask for a “boot product specialist” and see if one of the boots “ran” wider than the model I ordered.

 

I thought that was a great idea!  I buy New Balance Tennis Shoes for that reason.  I don’t need to get a “wide”, their shoes just “run” wider.  So I called back the next day and asked for a product specialist.  I told him that I had already found out that the only boot they carry in a wide was their inexpensive model and that the customer service person suggested I call back to see if any of the more expensive models “ran” wide and might work for me.  He said, “Let me check.”

 

It was quiet for a while, so I thought he was “checking” with someone else to see if any of their boots “ran” wider.  But then I heard him mumbling on the phone.  He was reading from the web page.  I told him I had already read everything on the web and none of the other boots came in wide widths and asked again if he or anyone there knew if any brands “ran” wider.  He just went back to reading the catalog.  Finally, I just said, “Never mind” and hung up.

Keith Lee's Free Book

I went to the local fly shop that is not very convenient for me to get to and found that they didn’t have any boots that came in wide widths either.  But they did have a great boot that ran wide.  I bought a $139.00 pair of boots.  And yes, you guessed it.  The company I called in the first place has the same boot.

 

The “product specialist” was very nice and polite and I’m sure he had customer service training.  The company’s customer service is consistently too good to think it just comes about without training.  With that said, there are at least 11 lessons to learn from this one call.

 

  1. Train your team to truly listen.

    Pay particular attention to people in your organization who tend to answer questions from you and others before they listen to the entire question. Pay particular attention to those who like to finish questions for others.  Truly listen and don’t assume that you know what someone is going to say.  You know what happens when you assume.  You make ass-u-me.

 

  1. Monitor your customer service.

    This seems almost too obvious, but while it may be obvious, almost no one does it. Whether you use secret shoppers, your own people, or recordings, don’t ass-u-me that your people are doing what they’ve been trained to do. And don’t ass-u-me that they do the same things when you or another manager are around and when you’re not.  You surely can’t monitor every customer service interaction, but in this case, over time, the business I called would certainly hear a similar customer service interaction and be able to address it in their training.

 

  1. Make sure your customers know what to do when they are not being served properly.

    This is included as Customer Service Secret #4 in The Happy Customer Handbook. Be sure your Customer’s Know Your Extraordinary Customer Service Expectations.  But they not only need to know your extraordinary customer service expectations, they need to know what to do when they don’t get Make-You-Happy Customer Service.  In as many ways as you can, tell your customers what them to do when they don’t get Make-You-Happy Customer Service.  Tell them when they are on hold on the phone.  Tell them in any communication that you send to them.  Tell them with signage.  At American Retail Supply we tell our clients to call us at 800-426-5708 if we ever let them down and if they are still not happy call me, Keith Lee, the owner of the company, at 253-859-7310.  If I had been told, “If we ever let you down, please call Bill at xxx-xxx-xxxx I would have likely called Bill who would have found out that they do have a great brand of wading shoes that runs wider.  They would not have only thrilled me, they would have me writing an entirely different story about their Make-You-Happy Customer Service and I would have told you their name and I would have spread a huge amount of positive word-of-mouth advertising!

 

  1. Know Your Product.

    I’m not going to harp on this too much because we are human and we can’t know everything. But I do think that a “boot product specialist” should have known if any of the brands “run” wide.  And if not he should have been trained to do #6 below.

 

  1. Know Your Customers.

    I am a very good customer for the company I called. Good enough that they send me a hard back version of their master catalog that is about an inch and a half thick. I believe in giving every customer Make-You-Happy Customer Service.  With that said, your best customers should be taken care of even to a higher degree.  Yes, the customer that buys $200,000 a year from us gets Super Duper Make-You-Happy Customer Service.  But you say, “How can they know that you’re a great customer?”  That’s Make-You-Happy Customer Service Secret #27.   Have a Great Data Base. I’m going to be blunt here.  With the price of computers and software today, there is simply no excuse for not knowing who your great customers are, and you are throwing money away by not marketing to and treating them differently.  And that difference should not affect giving your other customers Make-You-Happy Customer Service.  In this instance, the product specialist should have pulled up my account, saw that I was one of their best customers and done something special to take care of me. What could he have done?  He could have called someone in the company that knew my answer and called me back.  He could have called his manufacturers and called me back.  He could have gone to the warehouse and tried on some boots to see if any “ran” wide. He could have done something.  Should he have done those things for someone who buys $3.95 a year?  Probably not.  But he should have for one of their best customers.

 

  1. Train people to know where to go to get answers.

    I covered this a bit in #5. There are a lot of things he could have done to answer my question, but the biggest frustration was that he never seemed to listen well enough to hear the question properly. We have a lot of products at American Retail Supply. So regardless of how much training we give them, there is absolutely no way our new reps can know everything when we put them on the phones.  So we spend a lot of time in our training teaching them where they need to go to get answers.  When they start, we constantly remind our reps of the most important sentence to learn, “I’m sorry, I don’t know, but I’ll find out and get back to you by …”  And then get back to them when you told them you would.

 

  1. Create loyal customers.

    In this instance, one of my favorite places to shop let me down. But that’s unusual.  Their service, products and delivery are usually superb and because they are, I’m loyal and I’ll continue to shop with them.

 

  1. You can learn multiple lessons from poor customer service in your business.

    The normal response to bad customer service is to simply blame the person who delivered the poor service. As you can see by the ten things we learned from this one phone call, you can learn a great deal from one instance of poor service and there are lots of things that could have been done so that this didn’t happen.  It’s not just the reps fault.

 

  1. If you truly believe in, and practice, Make-You-Happy Customer Service you will have multiple ways to catch and fix poor customer service.

    When you implement Make-You-Happy Customer Service, you have many more ways to identify, catch, and fix service that is less than Make-You-Happy. One of the basics of Make-You-Happy Customer Service is that you can only expect what you inspect.  In others words you need to have systems in place to inspect your customer if you expect Make-You-Happy customer Service.

 

  1. Your customer service will improve when you implement the Make-You-Happy Management System with the Make-You-Happy Customer Service.

    When you implement the Make-You-Happy Management System all team members are trained to recognize service that falls short of Make-You-Happy Customer Service. They are trained to not only recognize it, but also do something about it.  I don’t have room to go into the Make-You-Happy Management System here, but it not only reinforces Make-You-Happy Customer Service, it creates it!

 

  1. Three Fingers Pointing Back at You.

    I learned a lot of wonderful lessons from my mentor Dick Thompson. One of them is, “remember, when you point your finger at someone else, three fingers are pointing back at you”.  If I’m with someone else and we get poor customer service the other person will often say “I can’t believe how rude (stupid, incompetent, whatever) that person was.”  My response is always the same, “That’s management’s fault.”

 

You can get my hardcopy book (not an e-book), The Happy Customer Handbook, 59 Secrets to Creating Happy Customers Who Come Back Time and Time Again and Enthusiastically Tell Others About You at www.TheHappyCustomerHandbook.com.  Your cost is $2.97 and that includes shipping and handling.

What Do Hilary Clinton and Keith Lee Have in Common?

Hillary Clinton and Keith Lee - What do they have in common?

 

I wrote this article a while ago, but it is still very relevant.

When it comes to politics, Hilary and I have almost nothing in common.  When it comes to being knocked for a loop with a concussion, a LOT.

When I first heard that Clinton could not testify about the Benghazi attack because of a concussion, I thought, “How convenient.”  Today I’m still not sure if it was a convenient excuse or not, but I can say, a concussion can throw you for a loop.

News reports say it was six months before Clinton was fully recovered from her concussion. My concussion occurred about 4 months ago and I’m almost fully recovered.  Sometimes when I’m tired and working on something that takes some thinking I just call it quits.

I suffered a severe concussion on March 1 while on a ski trip at our Montana house.  This was the second major concussion I’ve had in 5 years.  The previous one knocked me out of my “mental saddle” for about 4 months.  But what’s great is that because of the systems we have, I was barely missed at work either time.  These are the Make You Happy Management Systems you should be implementing in your business right now.  With the Management System everything you do in your business should be documented, all of the duties should continue to improve, and YOU should not be needed for any day-to-day, or even week-to-week duties.

Discover how you get your business to improve even when you’re not there.  Get my hardcopy book (not an e-book), How to Control Your Business and your Life, Proven Secrets to Creating Highly Productive Teams at www.HowToControlYourBusiness.com.  Your cost is $2.97 and that includes shipping and handling.

Grumpy Must Have Been a Make-You-Happy Customer Service Fanatic

A story from a Customer Service Fanatic…

Often when I speak to a crowd, I ask people in the audience how often they get “Who’s the Boss” Customer Service” (See secret #40 in my book – The Happy Customer Handbook)  It’s the kind of customer service that shows they really understand that “you, the customer, are the boss.”

When I ask, “How many of you get that kind of customer service most of the time?”  No hands go up.  When I say, “Half of the time,” a few hands go up.  When I say “25% of the time,” most hands go up.

Frankly, I’m surprised that people say they get “Who’s the Boss” customer service 25% of the time, because for me it’s more like 10% of the time.  I think it’s because I’ve harped on exceptional customer service so long that maybe I have gotten a bit jaded.  Maybe my expectations of exceptional customer service have gone beyond what’s likely to happen.  Well, I do get it 10% of the time so I know it’s possible so I’m going to stay where I am.  I’m going to stay with my fanatical approach to exceptional customer service.

But I need to warn you…

When you get to the point where I am, you’re likely to be grumpy more often, because you’ll go into places wanting and expecting exceptional customer service, and you’re not going to get it.  Like today, when I went to lunch.  Most of the time when I go shopping or to a restaurant, I’ll say something to the clerk whether the clerk says anything or not.  But every once in a while, because I’m a customer service fanatic and a guy who writes customer service newsletters and gives customer service advice, I don’t say anything.  I want see what their customer service is like if I don’t saying anything.  I’m absolutely amazed at how often the clerk on the other side of the counter says absolutely nothing.

When I went to restaurant today, I did my little test and planned to not say anything until the clerk did.  The clerk came to the register and looked at me – no smile – not a word.  She just came to the register and looked at me.

I gave her my order, she told me the price – I gave her my money – she gave me my change – and said nothing.  In the entire process the only word that was spoken by the clerk was the price of the meal.  No greeting, no thank you… nothing – just the price.

While you may be Grumpy more often when you become a Make-You-Happy Customer Service Fanatic, it will also put a smile on your face when you realize how crummy most service is.   You’ll smile as you realize that the more people get crummy customer service, the easier it is for you to give what is perceived as Exceptional Customer Service!

You can get my hardcopy book (not an e-book), The Happy Customer Handbook, 59 Secrets to Creating Happy Customers Who Come Back Time and Time Again and Enthusiastically Tell Others About You at www.TheHappyCustomerHandbook.com.  Your cost is $2.97 and that includes shipping and handling.

How to Get Hundreds of Ideas to Improve Your Business

Improve Your Business

How to Get Hundreds of Ideas to Improve Your Business

by Keith Lee

Sometimes it amazes me at how long you live before you hear a very simple idea.  I was at a seminar just a few years ago when I learned this. Here’s how you can get hundreds of ideas to improve your business.  Since everyone can picture a retail store, I’ll use a retail store example.

 

1. Get your team together and brainstorm ways to improve your store.  Remember that when you are brainstorming you are looking for quantity of ideas not quality.  At this point don’t comment
on the ideas at all, just get as many as you can.

 

2. Now here’s the secret to get hundreds of ideas.  Continue Brainstorming, but limit the discussion to one specific area.  The first time I did this I was blown away.  By limiting the discussion we actually got many more ideas.

 

Improve Your Business

 

Here’s an example:

 

Get your team together and begin brainstorming ways to improve your store.  When the ideas stop, limit the discussion to specifics like, “ways to improve our dressing rooms”.  You’ll get a dozen ideas more.  Then limit it to, “ways to improve the client experience when they return an item.” 

 

Always remember at this time you’re not commenting on the quality of the idea – just trying to get lots of ideas.  Then limit the discussion to “ways to improve our entry area”, “ways to improve client flow at check out”, “things we can do to increase impulse sales”, “things we can do to increase add-on sales”, “specific items to add onto a sale of item y”, “item x”, “item z”, “things we can do to improve our in-store signing”,  “things we can do to improve the way we take incoming phone calls.”

 

You can go on and on.

 

As you can see, by limiting the discussion you’ll come up with hundreds of ideas to improve your store. 

 

How are you able to use this simple idea in your business?      

P.S. Click here to get my newest customer service book for free! (I just ask that you pay $2.97 for shipping)

You Will Increase Your Bottom Line Take Home Profits by 25-95% When You Stop 5% of Your Customers from Leaving You and Going to a Competitor

Save money and increase profits with excellent customer service

So 82% of people who leave one business and go to another do so because of a customer service issue!

Have you ever wondered why customers leave and never come back?

Most people think it’s because of price, the person moved, the person died, etc… Well you don’t have to look far to find out the REAL reason that customers leave.

A US News and World Report study found that the average American business loses 15% of its customer base each year:

  • 68% of customers who stop buying from one business and go to another do so because of poor or indifferent service.
  • 14% leave because of an unsatisfactorily resolved dispute or complaint.
  • 9% leave because of price.
  • 5% go elsewhere based on a recommendation.
  • 1% die.

The Harvard Business Review reported that if you can prevent 5% of your customers from leaving, you can increase your bottom line profit by 25–95%.

See Ya Later!But what’s really sad for you and me, is that most of those customers who leave don’t bother to complain.  They just leave and don’t come back. Then you’re stuck spending a bunch of time, money, and resources trying to get new customers when with some consistent and persistent messages and training to both your team members and customers, they would never have left in the first place.

It’s been shown time and time again that getting new customers is one of the most expensive things you can do to grow your business.  Once we get a new customer, we simply can’t afford to lose them.

Getting New Customers

But this is great news for you!

Every business category is seeing more and more competition every year.  Just about every category has a version of national chain competition, competition from discount franchises, price competition, and competition from the internet, all making it harder and harder for you to thrive.

But the great news is that in this most important area, the reason most customers leave one business and go to another, you can not only beat the competition – you can crush them. 

To illustrate this, lets talk about mindset for just a bit. Have you ever been asked the following question…

“What do you do for work?”

It comes up all the time, especially when you meet someone new. It’s a natural question, and most people answer almost without thinking. What would you say?

Well, if you’re like most people, you’re going to say something about the product or service you work with. You’re going to focus on the deliverable and there’s nothing wrong with that. But here’s the thing…

That is a large part of what you do at work, but that’s not necessarily the business you are in.

In just a bit, I’ll give you the powerful 2-step strategy to creating happy customers, but I need to go over something else first…

Before you start implementing these strategies in your business, it’s critical to understand that half the battle is getting in the right mindset. You can do all of the right things when it comes to customer service, but truly exceptional customer service  first comes from a way of thinking that is far to rare these days.

Let me explain a little bit…

I used to tell people that we were in the business of selling retailers everything they needed to operate their stores. But I was wrong. Dead wrong.

Make People Happy

In the early 1980’s I watched Tom Peters and Robert Waterman’s video In Search of Excellence.  The video shows first day employee training at Disney World. The trainer at Disney asks the new cast members, “What business are we in?  We know that GMC makes cars, and Whirlpool makes refrigerators.  What do we make at Disney?” The answer is, We Make People Happy.”

From that moment on I knew what business we were in: We Make People Happy. That’s why we call the customer service we provide and teach, Make-You-Happy Customer Service.

By the way, I explain this and more in detail in by newest customer service book. You can get a free copy of my book The Happy Customer Handbook by clicking here.

I’m often asked, “What is the #1 thing business owners can do to improve their customer service?” Another question I get is, “Why is customer service so poor?”

The answer to both questions is the same. To illustrate this, let me tell you about some results we get when talking to actual business owners. When I speak to live audiences I often ask this question…

“What SHOULD you be doing when it comes to customer service training in your business?”

Customer Service Survey

With every audience almost all hands go up for answer (E).

Sounds great right? Everyone knows that their team should have customer service training up front and also reinforce it. But there’s a catch…

We’ve surveyed thousands of business owners about customer service as well.  We ask them the exact same question, but we flip one word. We ask:

“What ARE you doing when it comes to customer service training in your business?”

Only 2% answer (E)!

Why is it that everyone knows their team should have customer service training up front and consistent reminders, but almost no one does it?

Here’s what happens in most businesses.  With the best of intentions, the business owner has a “rah, rah” meeting about customer service, and the service improves for a few weeks, and then without reminders you’re back where you started.

And it’s simple, the reminders don’t come because you’re a busy business owner and you have lots of other things to do.

But this may be even more amazing.  More than 75% of all businesses have no upfront consistent customer service training for new employees.

So the answer to both questions, “What can business owners do to improve their customer service?” and “Why is customer service so poor?” is the same, and it’s all contained in the 2-step process below:

Keith Lee's Free Book

 

The 2 Step Formula to Customer Service Success

1.  Train your entire team to deliver exceptional customer service.

At the very beginning, your entire team needs to get trained with your exceptional customer service expectations. This is the “rah, rah” training I talked about above.  But it can’t stop there.  You need to consistently and persistently reinforce those expectations.

Zig Ziglar says, “Repetition is the mother of all learning.”

Repetition

But learning something doesn’t necessarily lead to behavior change, so when it comes to customer service in your business I tweak Zig’s quotation to,

“When it comes to customer service, repetition is the mother of all learning and permanent behavior change.”

Let’s take a second at this point and look at the bigger picture. Why is customer service so important in today’s business world?

I own four businesses, and all of them are dependent upon small independent businesses for their survival and growth. My businesses can only thrive when their business thrives, so I’m dedicated to seeing that independent small businesses not only survive, but thrive.

At our American Retail Supply 35th Anniversary customer Appreciation Conference and EXPO, one of the speakers asked all 800 people in attendance if they had a unique product that people couldn’t get anywhere else. In the entire room, only two hands went up, and I’m betting their competitors think there is a substitute product.

Almost no one has unique products or services that people can’t get elsewhere, so we need to give them a reason to do business with us rather than someone else. 

The one area you can do that with the biggest return for your effort and money is with Make-You-Happy Customer Service.

I’m not talking about customer service in a box.

Customer Service In A Box This isn’t about the canned, ‘Thanks for shopping at Mega-Mart, have a nice day’ kind of customer service.

We’re talking about Make-You-Happy Customer Service in which, even if you mess up, the customer is going to come back because they like and believe in you and your staff!

We’re talking about the kind of customer service in which customers are not just satisfied, but loyal.  Customer service in which customers not only come back time and time again, but enthusiastically tell others about you.

Another great reason to give Make-You-Happy Customer Service is, it’s fun.

People love getting Make-You-Happy Customer Service.  But people also love, and have a huge amount of pride, when they give Make-You-Happy Customer Service. Make-You-Happy Customer Service is fun for you!  It’s fun for your team!  Your customers love it!  And the day goes much faster when everyone has fun.

Make-You-Happy Customer Service is not just great customer service when you’re watching, but all of the time. In the following video, I explain a few of the reasons exceptional Customer Service is critical to small businesses. After watching it, continue reading to find out the 2nd ingredient in creating exceptional customer service…

2.  Consistently and persistently reinforce your customer service expectations with your team.

First, lets go over consistency:

I spent eight years working in the grocery business.  I thought the company headquarters had consistent customer service messages and expectations, but those expectations were totally undermined when, in the break room, the business manager made fun of customers and joked about how stupid they were – even to the point of making fun of their appearance.

Is it any wonder, that with a few exceptions, our customer service was indifferent?

It’s also no wonder that when a new manager came in with respect for everyone, team members and customers alike, our customer service level improved dramatically along with the business sales.

You must never put down a customer in front of your team members.

Be sure that your signs respect your customers and are positive rather than negative.  Good Signs

Rather than, ‘No returns without sales receipt,’ how about ‘Returns gladly accepted with sales receipt.’  Or ‘Cash Refunds allowed with your sales receipt’ instead of ‘No cash refunds without sales receipt.’  Or ‘Checks gladly accepted with two forms of ID’ instead of ‘You must have two forms of ID to pay with a check.’

So we know we have to be consistent in our customer service messages. But what about persistence?

One day a newspaper reporter asked Zig Ziglar about the “motivation stuff” he was talking about.  The reporter asked, “If someone attends this seminar, would they be set for life when it came to motivation?”  In other words, they were asking, ‘Is motivation permanent?’

Zig’s reply, ‘No, motivation is not permanent, but then again, neither is bathing.  In fact I recommend that people bathe daily, and get a dose of motivation daily.’

The same is true of customer service; I recommend and in fact, Make-You-Happy Customer Service requires that you – company management – are persistent with your customer service message.

You must find as many ways as you can to reinforce your customer service message persistently to both your customers and your team members.

Here are a few ways we’re persistent with our customer service message:

Every contact with a customer that comes from me ends with the sign off, ‘Only Happy Customers Come Back.’ 

Whether it’s a letter, an email, the Retail Tip of the Week, invoice stuffers, or a message to customers in our monthly newsletter, I always sign off with ‘Remember, Only Happy Customers Come Back.’

On eight walls throughout our offices, we have a stenciled quotation from Walt Disney that says, ‘ Do What You Do So Well That People Can’t Help Telling Others About You.’  In addition, we have over thirty Disney prints throughout the office to remind people of the Disney quotation and that our job is to Make-People-Happy.

Disney Quote

On the mirror above each sink in each bathroom, we have a small sign that says,

‘The next person using this sink may be the person who makes your mortgage payment… OUR CUSTOMER. Show him the pride you have in serving him by leaving this restroom spotless.”

We have eight different versions of this with different colors and different sayings.  For instance, a red one says, ‘The next person using this sink may be the person who puts your kids through college – our customer…’  A blue one says, ‘The person who will buy you your next car…’

They are in different colors so that when changed, our team members are more likely to see and read them.  In addition, to ensure our team members see them, we periodically move the sign to a different spot on the mirror.

This not only reinforces our customer service philosophy with our team members and our customers who use our restrooms, but the restrooms are actually kept cleaner.

Here are just a few other ways to be persistent with your Make-You-Happy Customer Service message:

  • Your on-hold phone message
  • Signage throughout your business
  • In your advertising
  • On your web site
  • In emails

So that’s the two step process:

1.  Train your entire team to deliver exceptional customer service.

2.  Consistently and persistently reinforce your customer service expectations with your team.

“So that’s great,” you might say, “but how do I do that? Where do I start?”

It all starts with the little things. In my book, The Happy Customer Handbook, I give 59 secrets to creating happy customers who come back time and time again and enthusiastically tell others about you. These tips are a great way to get started implementing customer service in your business right now.

 

Keith Lee's Free Book

 

So there you have it. You have the 2-Step Process for Customer Service Success and 5 action tips that will help you start this in your business RIGHT AWAY.

Remember, Only Happy Customers Come Back
Keith Lee
keith 2012 shoulders up
www.keithlee.com

P.S. If you want to see the other 54 secrets, you can get them in my book The Happy Customer Handbook. And you can get the book for FREE by clicking here.

What Do Customers Want?

What Do Customers Want?
A survey of 1 million consumers provides valuable insight for today’s marketers.

By Keith Lee

This article was adapted from an article Murray Raphel wrote.  You can find out more about Murray and his works at the end of this article.

In the immortal words of Andy Rooney, “Didja ever wonder…..?”  Today’s question is whether or not you read those weekly polling reports from The Wall Street Journal, ABC News or the bottom left-hand corner of USA Today and wonder how accurate they are?

If you look at the tiny print at the bottom, most say they are based on interviews with about 1,000 people and have a plus or minus factor of 5 percent.  One thousand people?  To tell me if we should have a health plan, how the President’s doing, how many diet Cokes are sold in one day, and how many angels fit on the head of a pin? (Only kidding.)

How can that be?

And so I always look askance at the results of this small sampling.

But when I ran across a survey taken by Brit Beemer and America’s Research Group, I sat up, took notice and read everything very, very carefully.  What made me sit up?  This sentence: ‘The statistics are based on over a million interviews giving valuable insight into consumer behavior and how stores match the needs and values of customers.’

“Whew” — 1 million interviews.  Now is the time for all good merchants to come to the aid of their business by knowing what the customer really thinks of your business — well at least one million of them…

Here are some conclusions from the interviews:

“Customers decide if they feel comfortable to buy in your store.”

And: “4 out of 10 customers judge how much you know by how professional you look.”

What does that have to do with your store?  What is the first impression your customers get when they walk into your store?  What is the first impression they get when you mail them something?

“Most customers know very little about the product you have to sell.”

We recently went shopping for a DVD player.  We asked the salesman in the appliance store this question:  “This VCR is $89.  And this one over here is $149.  What’s the difference?”  And he said, “fifty dollars.”  (now you can’t make that  up).

What does that have to do with your store?  The old adage of, “the more you tell, the more you sell” works for your business.  The more specific you are about what you sell, stressing the benefits you offer, the greater degree of comfort you give your customers.  The same is true with your direct mail advertising.

Years ago, Murray Raphel did a mailer to his customers on children’s yellow raincoats that had a place to write the child’s name on the inside collar.  Since most children at the time wore yellow raincoats to school they are often mixed up and switched.  We emphasized this benefit in a mailing and sold out the coats in three days.

“Most customers say all consumer ads look the same.”

In his advertising class Murray would often place five ads from local supermarkets, with their name cut out, on the board.  Each student is given a sheet of paper with the names of the five supermarkets.

“Match up the name of the supermarket with the ad?” Murray asked.

No no one ever got it right!

What does that have to do with your store?

You need to avoid what Dan Kennedy calls Marketing Incest!  In almost every industry everyone copies everyone elses advertising so it all looks the same and nothing is effective.  Get a Free Trial to Dan Kenndy’s newsletter at www.nobspugetsound.com to find out how to avoid Marketing Incest.

“Customers expect a specialty store to have the largest selection in their chosen product area.”

Many years ago when Murray first started in business, his annual volume was around $20,000 a year.  He couldn’t afford to advertise… anywhere.  But he knew people would shop with him if he had the biggest selection of… something.  He chose children’s hats and gloves because they were so inexpensive.  He put hand-lettered signs on his windows: “We have the largest selection of children’s hats and gloves!”

He soon became known as the store to go to for children’s hats and gloves.  Not big sales, but once in the store the customer might buy a snowsuit – which was like selling 20 pairs of gloves.  They became important, well-known, and business grew.

       What does this have to do with your store?

Be a specialist in what you sell.  It does not have to be merchandise… it can be service.  Murray once asked an elderly woman why she shopped the local pharmacist when the chain store’s prices were lower.  Her explanation: “They say hello to me when I come in.”

The customer is reassured when you offer an in-depth selection of any item.  It makes them feel you are an expert in that field and gives the perception you are an expert in other areas as well.

When Murray bought clothing in Europe the total inventory was less than 10 percent of what he carried.

He promoted, advertised and talked about the European clothing so much that it became the main emphasis of his inventory.  Soon the customer felt everything in the store was imported from Europe.

“Half of America buys with credit, half buys with cash.”

Some of the best and smartest marketers are the credit card companies.  First came the cards.  Then came the affinity cards.  (When you use your credit card you are giving money to your alma mater.  Or the humane society.  Or building mileage on your favorite airline.)  Now there’s co-branding, where the name of your business appears with the name of the credit card.

What does that have to do with your store?

This: The more ways you offer the customer to pay, the higher the return.  Offer cash.  Or check.  Or credit card.  Or lay-away.  Or monthly payments.  Or your own co-branded card.  Better: offer them all and then be sure to include the internet.

“A private sale flyer must scream value.”

Retailers have negatively impacted between 25 percent and 40 percent of their core customers by sending false pretense private sale mailers.  Many businesses are mailing more often and giving less value.

Here’s what customers see as real value: real lower prices.  Deferred credit promotion.  Free delivery.  Free vacation promotions.  Free gifts.  First choice at a warehouse or clearance sale.

What does this have to do with your store?

An old and works-every-time adage: “Make sure the story isn’t better than the store.”  Another one (Cont. P.6 – What Do Customers) to remember: “Promise a lot.  Deliver more.”

If your product has six good selling points, only tell five.  Have the sixth featured when the product arrives at the house or is purchased at the store.

This gives the customer even greater confidence that their purchase is even better than “what you advertised.”

Some other guidelines from the survey:

  • “The number one reason for buying a big ticket item is No Down                      Payment.“
  • “The number two reason for buying is No Interest.“
  • “A very low interest offer will beat out a ‘6-month interest deferred’ offer.”
  • “Radio reaches the youngest audience, newspaper the oldest. Radio is the best medium to create a personality for your store.”
  • “The word ‘FREE’ in an ad has the greatest impact.”

How much attention should you pay to all this information?  A lot.  Remember the basic rule in selling is only one sentence: “Find out what the customer wants… and give it to them.”

For more great tips on customer service, go to TheHappyCustomerHandbook.com and get a FREE copy of my book. I reveal 59 secrets to creating happy customers who come back time and time again… AND enthusiastically tell others about you.

Remember, Only Happy Customers Come Back
Keith Lee

Murray Raphel has been telling the retail direct mail story as a columnist in Direct Marketing for more than 30 years.  He has developed Gordon’s Alley, a multimillion-dollar pedestrian mall in Atlantic City.   

       You can reach Murray at Raphel Marketing Inc., 12 S. Virginia Ave., Atlantic City, NJ  08401.  His phone number is 609-348-6646.

Leading & Motivating by Brian Tracy

*Note from Keith:

Brian Tracy is an absolute living legend.  Brian’s goal is to help you achieve your personal and business goals faster and easier than you ever imagined.  His exciting talks and seminars on Leadership, Selling, Self-Esteem, Goals, Strategy, Creativity and Success Psychology bring about immediate changes and long-term results, and you can bet his articles will inspire the same in YOU to bring about huge, long-term success.

Here is an article from Brian Tracy that reinforces the principles in the Make-You-Happy Management System.

Leading and Motivating

By Brian Tracy

It’s been said that Leadership is not what you do, but who you are.  This, however, is only partially true.  Leadership is very much who you are, but it cannot be divorced from what you do.  Who you are represents the inner person, and what you do represents the outer person.  Each is dependent on the other for maximum effectiveness.

The starting point of motivational leadership is to begin seeing yourself as a role model, seeing yourself as an example to others.  A key characteristic of leaders is that they set high standards of accountability for themselves and for their behaviors.  They assume that other are watching them and then setting their own standards by what they do.  In business, there are several kinds of power.  Two of these are position power and ascribed power.

Position power is the power that comes with a job title or position in any organization. If you become a manager in a company, you automatically have certain powers and privileges that go along with your rank.  You can order people about and make certain decisions.  You can be a leader whether or not anyone likes you.

Ascribed power is the power you gain because of the kind of person you are.  In every organization, there are people who are inordinately influential and looked up to by others, even though their positions may not be high up on the organizational chart.  These are the men and women who are genuine leaders because of the quality of the people they have become, because of their characters and their personalities.

Over the years, we have been led to believe that leaders are those who stride boldly about, exude power and confidence, tive orders for others to carry out.  However, that is old school.  The leader of today is the one who asks questions, listens carefully, plans diligently and then builds consensus among all those who are necessary for achieving the goals.  The leader does not try to do it by himself or herself.  The leader gets things done by helping others to do them.

This brings us to five of the qualities that you already have to a certain degree and that you can develop further to stand out from the people around you in a very short period of time.

The first quality is vision.

This is the one single quality that, more than anything separates leaders from followers.  Leaders have vision.  Followers do not. Leaders have the ability to stand back and see the big picture.  Followers are caught up in day-to-day activities.  Leaders have developed the ability to fix their eyes on the horizon and see greater possibilities.  Followers are those whose eyes are fixed on the ground in front of them and who are so busy that they seldom look at themselves and their activities in a larger context.

The most motivational vision you can have for yourself and others is to “Be the best!”  Many people don’t yet realize that excellent performance in serving other people is an absolute basic essential for survival in the economy of the future.  Many individuals and companies still adhere to the idea that as long as they are no worse than anyone else, they can remain in business.  That is just plain silly!  It is prehistoric thinking.  We are now in the age of excellence.  Customers assume that they will get excellent quality, and if they don’t, they will go to your competitors so fast, people’s heads will spin.

The second quality, which is perhaps the single most respected quality of leaders, is integrity.

Integrity is complete, unflinching honesty with regard to everything that you say and do.  Integrity underlies all the other qualities.  Your measure of integrity is determined by how honest you are in the critical areas of your life.

Integrity means this: When someone asks you at the end of the day, “Did you do your very best?” you can look him in the eye and say, “Yes!”  Integrity means this: When someone asks you if you could’ve done better, you can honestly say, “No, I did everything I possibly could.”

Integrity means that you, as a leader, admit your shortcomings.  It means that you work to develop your strengths and compensate for your weaknesses.  Integrity means that you tell the truth, and that you live the truth in everything that you do and in all your relationships.  Integrity means that you deal straightforwardly with people and situations and that you do not compromise what you believe to be true.

The third quality is courage.

It is the chief distinguishing characteristic of the true leader.  It is almost always visible in the leader’s words and actions.  It is absolutely indispensable to success, happiness and the ability to motivate other people to be the best they can be.

In a way, it is easy to develop a big vision for yourself and for the person you want to be.  It is easy to commit yourself to living with complete integrity.  But it requires incredible courage to follow through on your vision and on your commitments.  You see, as soon as you set a high goal or standard for yourself, you will run into all kinds of difficulties and setbacks.  You will be surrounded by temptations to compromise your values and your vision.  You will feel an almost irresistible urge to “get along by going along.”  Your desire to earn the respect and cooperation of others can easily lead to the abandonment of your principles, and here is where courage comes in.

The forth quality of motivational leadership is realism.

Realism is a form of intellectual honesty.  The realist insists upon seeing the world as it really is, not as he wishes it were.  This objectivity, this refusal to engage in self-delusion, is a mark of the true leader.

Those who exhibit the quality of realism do not trust to luck, hope for miracles, pray for exceptions to basic business principles, expect rewards without working or hope that problems will go away by themselves.  These all are examples of self-delusion, of living in a fantasyland.

The motivational leader insists on seeing things exactly as they are and encourages others to look at life the same way. As a motivational leader, you get the facts, whatever they are.  You deal with people honestly and tell them exactly what you perceive to be the truth.  This doesn’t mean that you will always be right, but you will always be expressing the truth in the best way you know how.

The fifth quality of motivational leadership is responsibility.

This is perhaps the hardest of all to develop.  The acceptance of responsibility means that, as Harry Truman said, “The buck stops here.”

The game of life is very competitive.  Sometimes, great success and great failure are separated by a very small distance.  In watching the playoffs in basketball, baseball, and football, we see htat the winner can be decided by a single point, and that single point can rest on a single action or inaction, on that part of a single team member at a critical part of the game.

Life is very much like competitive sports.  Very small things that you do, or don’t do, can either give you the edge that leads to victory or take away your edge at the critical moment.  This principle is especially true with regard to accepting responsibility for yourself and for everything that happens to you.

You become a motivational leader by motivating yourself.  And you motivate yourself by striving toward excellence, by committing yourself to becoming everything you are capable of becoming.  You motivate yourself by throwing your whole heart into doing your job in an excellent fashion.  You motivate yourself and others by continually looking for ways to help others to improve their lives and achieve their goals.  You become a motivational leader by becoming the kind of person others want to get behind and support in every way.

Your main job is to take complete control of your personal evolution and become a leader by becoming the kind of person others want to get behind and support in every way.

Brian Tracy is legendary in the fields of Management, Leadership, and Sales.  He has produced more than 300 audio/video programs and has written over 40 books.  www.BrianTracy.com

Ya Sure…George S. Patton Was a Make-You-Happy Leader

"George S. Patton 1919" by U.S. Army - https://www.ftmeade.army.mil/museum/archive_patton.html. Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:George_S._Patton_1919.jpg#/media/File:George_S._Patton_1919.jpg

Ya Sure…George S. Patton Was a Make-You-Happy Leader

by Keith Lee

Managers in the Make-You-Happy Management System are coaches, cheerleaders, facilitators, and nurturers of champions, rather than cops, referees, and nay-sayers.

This leadership principle is from the magazine “Armchair General” available from Armchair General, LLC 386-246-3456.  Let’s learn about management from Old Blood & Guts, George S. Patton, America’s greatest World War II battle commander.

General George S. Patton Jr. studied – and practiced – leadership all his life.  What “Old Blood & Guts” left behind is a priceless leadership legacy containing a wealth of material for today’s military and business executives.

Providing “Mission-Type” Orders

An organization benefits from both the individual and collective intelligence and experience of its members.  Too often, leaders attempt to provide a solution without tapping into the wisdom and abilities of those in the command structure.  Patton’s rapid, slashing, war of maneuver campaigns in World War II were propelled by issuing “mission-type” orders – assigning broad objectives and letting subordinates work out the details.

He advised, “Never tell people how to do things.  Tell them what to do and they will astonish you with their ingenuity.”

The Make-You-Happy Management System was created out of my frustration in having no time for myself, no time to work on the important things in my business because I was babysitting employees and making every King Solomon decision in the company.

In order to alleviate this you need to issue “mission-type” orders:  Assign broad objectives and let subordinates work out the details.  You’ll be amazed at the results and the freedom you achieve.

Demand Discipline

Discipline is the bedrock characteristic of any successful military unit or corporation.  Commanders and executives who want to win must teach it to subordinates and then demand that they act accordingly.  The fiery and headstrong Patton may have suffered lapses in regulating his own behavior from time to time, but he always understood that the controlled actions of his units remained the key to battlefield success.  “You cannot be disciplined in great things and undisciplined in small things,” said Patton.  “There is only one sort of discipline – perfect discipline.”

As this article suggests Patton may have suffered lapses in his own behavior in this regard, but we can still learn from this principle.

While I’m not suggesting peeling potatoes or forcing your Team to run miles when they don’t perform, I think that it is absolutely imperative that your Team understands your core beliefs and they understand that those core beliefs are unwavering.

Here’s an example.  Everyone in our company understands that the minimum level of Customer Service that is acceptable is “truly appreciative service.”  And while we may fail at this at times in the eyes of our Client, everyone understands that indifferent, or heaven forbid anything approaching rude service means immediate termination of employment.

Another example is seen in our company values.  Again, everyone understands that one of our values is, “We will do nothing illegal or unethical.”  If someone decides to consciously do something illegal or unethical they will be dismissed.

Take Timely Action

Perhaps because they fear failure, commanders and business leaders often become timid in their decision making, delaying final orders until the plan in “perfect.”  Patton, however, recognized that seizing the unforgiving moment is vastly more important to success than postponing an action until the ideal plan is devised – too late to produce positive results.  Remember Patton’s admonition, “A good plan executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week.”

One of the basic tenants of Make-You-Happy Management is empowering your Team to make decisions.  You’ll obviously want to give some guidelines concerning those decisions, but as you and your Team understands the system and each other, those guidelines can be very broad.

For instance, while using our L.E.A.R system to take care of upset Customers, after finding out what the Customer wants to make them happy, the guideline for our front line Team member is unless it’s NUTS, do it!”

Instill Self-Confidence

Self-confidence on the battlefield of in the boardroom is crucial for success.  Patton created within his Third US Army a tradition of winning and a corresponding leadership climate that let his Soldiers know they were second to none.  The proudly exclaimed, oft-heard cry of the Third Army Vets, “I fought with Patton!” testifies to his ability to encourage and instill faith in oneself.  Patton wrote, “The most vital quality a Soldier can possess is self-confidence; utter complete and bumptious.”

When you empower your Team to make decisions and take care of Customers, they will have the confidence they need to create Happy Customers.

But what happens when your Team Member makes a bad decision?  In the Make-You-Happy Management System the first thing to do is look at your systems to make sure they are not getting in the way of making a better decision.

Once you find the system is OK, then you need to RETRAIN and not beat up the Team Member.  The first thing you need to do is thank the Team Member for making a decision.  Then and only then, discuss how a better decision might have been achieved.

Motivate Subordinates to Excel

The notion that Patton merely drove his men to excel through fear and intimidation is a gross misinterpretation of both his motives and his methods.  Few contemporaries understood as well as Patton how to motivate and get the most out of the American Soldiers.  His leadership philosophy regarding this point is best summed up in his characteristically blunt saying, “We herd sheep, we drive cattle, we lead people.  Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.”

Remember, managers in the Make-You-Happy Management System are coaches, facilitators, cheerleaders, and nurturers of Champions; not cops, referees or nay-sayers.

L’audace, L’audace, Toujours L’audace!

Finding and adhering to a core belief, as Patton certainly did, will help guide leaders both professionally and personally.  One of Patton’s favorite French sayings, ” L’audace, l’audace, toujours l’audace!” translates to “audacity, audacity, always – audacity!”  Both military and business leaders would be well-advised to follow Patton’s guidance and never fear to act promptly and decisively on reasoned, calculated risks.

The Make-You-Happy Management System starts with your Company Vision which is the combination of your values and Beliefs.  Whatever those Values and Beliefs are it is critical that they are strong enough to carry you through tough decisions.  Often, when I have a hard time with a decision that answer is clear when I review our Company Vision.