Back in the day
Just role our minds back to a time where you walked in to a clothes shop and you received personal service from someone who actually cared. They cared that you left with the right item for you even if that meant delaying the purchase to order that item in. You would be attended to, offered a coffee, engaged in conversation about you and your life, thanked for your business and you left with a sense of belonging to that business.
You could often expect a hand written Christmas or birthday card from that business too. Every time you bumped in the shop owner in the street they embraced you like a friend and asked you how you were in a way that you knew they had remembered your previous conversation, just like a friend would…..
The big race to the line
Everyone is in the pursuit of new customers like its a race for the line. That finish line is usually an order or use of a product but if you are busy running this race you are on the wrong track.
Winning new customers if you are fortunate to do so is great but creating fans is better for everyone. Fast forward a year or two where some of these potential customers are now using your product or service. Do you want them to just be a customer of a product or service? Or do you want them to be so delighted with what you do for them that they are compelled to tell everyone they know just how good you are? Delighted customers are the best marketing function your business could ever have.
Winning fans isn’t easy
You have to give much more than you do now and do it for the right reasons, because you care!
This can’t be a tactic it has to be a strategy and a long term one at that. It has to become part of your culture for it to really work. Top to bottom across every department everyone has to understand what it means to delight your customer and turn them in to fans and sales people of your business in their own right. If one of the components of our business is not aligned and the customer experience suffers then you will not achieve the status you want with that client or the market.
You can’t fake it until you make it.
If you think you can turn the love tap on for a few months and create a fan base you are mistaken and people will see through it. You have to make a culture shift in your business to truly win the hearts and minds of your customers, anything else is just an empty trial!
It’s win/win
Getting this culture shift right in your business takes commitment and a willingness to change. If done well under the leadership of people who genuinely want it to be this way it makes for an excellent business culture. Everyone aligned and happy customers means happy departments throughout your organisation, regardless of you having 2 employees or 2000.
Customers also get what they deserve which is good old fashioned service in return for their commitment to you as a vendor.
Good customer service isn’t good enough anymore, it has to be exceptional!
Happy selling!
Richard
