Tips of the Month >

Do your customers experience an "experience"?

How can you achieve a customer care experience when sometimes all that you have is a few moments…?

Hire people with a "service" attitude - some people just totally believe in the spirit of service- it dominates their personalities. It has nothing to do with money or background, and people who have this attitude are not necessarily the "bubbly" "outgoing" type. The "service" focused people are the ones that will drive your business forward.

Always ask yourself how you can make the short time that you spend with your customers an experience. You don't have time to complain about your day - you want to create and control the environment they are experiencing, and exceed their expectations, creating something that is memorable and compelling.

Communication - let your whole team know what is going on - new products and services, new team members - the more your team know the better their customer care.

With every decision keep the customer in mind - ask yourself "would customers like what we are doing?" Change the way you look at things from having it centred on you, to focusing on what customers need.

Make the customer an agenda item at every team meeting. Get your team to present their point of view on: What would the customer think of this? Is it fair to customers? How can we serve our customers differently?

Empower your team to do the right thing. Give your team the power to do whatever has to be done to create a WOW experience. People will make mistakes - but they will develop with your help.

Continually ask yourself how you can improve and add value. If you don't keep pushing yourself, you'll slip behind the competition. Customers have more than one choice and your competitors are marketing to them aggressively right now!

Create an atmosphere of excellence - do everything with the aim of being the best, and expect the best from your team. If you aren't continually pushing to do better than yesterday you will be left in the dust of your competition...