Excellent Customer Service is Your Small Business Secret Weapon

As a small business owner it can seem difficult to compete with the big boys, right?  I mean you don’t have a huge advertising budget, and your own sales department.  Let me share something that you CAN have that the “big boys” struggle to have and keep – good customer service.

Customer service is a pretty hot topic and can make or break your or any business for that matter. Consumers have little patience for lousy service and easily get tired of waiting in long lines, trying to get a live person on the phone, going through an interrogation to return something or trying to communicate through a language barrier.

If you treat this like your most valuable secret weapon, customer service can be the most important tool

you have for your small business success.  If you provide your customers and clients with a simple, efficient, pleasant experience they will revisit your business over and over. More importantly, they will tell everyone they know! (especially if you make it easy for them to share).

Three secrets to good customer service

There are three secrets to good customer service, the first one we’re going to conquer is knowing exactly what YOU want.

You are the captain of the ship and the visionary for the future of your business, so you need to have a clearly defined plan for your business and that includes customer service. There are three main goals you need to consider:

1. It needs to be easy for your customers to do business with you. You can do this with advertised discounts, kiosks, your website and other technology based programs to help them shop.
2. Doing business with you needs to be a warm and pleasant experience. Your staff has to be knowledgeable, approachable, warm and patient. Your customers need to feel like they are getting an exceptional value for their time and money. Perceived value goes beyond the price of the products and extends to their shopping experience.
3. Change your mindset and ask yourself “How can I NOT afford to do these things?” This shouldn’t be a question of expenses, but making and keep happy customers.

Which these thoughts in mind you also need to take a few things into consideration when deciding on the actual programs and standards you’ll put into place.

• Share your customer service vision with the rest of your staff.
• Connect your incentive programs and bonuses directly to customer service.
• Monitor the level of customer service your staff is putting out.
• Know when you can ignore what your customers want.
• Continuously focus on your goals.

Now, that you know what you want you can starting thinking about how to meet those wants and create a positive customer service experience.

There are lots of tactics and strategies to provide the experiences that keep them talking and keep them coming back.  If you are not sure what those would look like, book a time for us to talk. https://coloradocoachingcompany.com/contact/