PEOPLE PLEASERS!

You know when it’s time to leave a job.  You go to the workplace each day with a knot in your stomack.  You look at the clock at 9  AM wishing it were 5  PM.  You have no motivation to do any work related activities.  The most difficult thing is not looking for a new job, but making the decision to quit and look for a new job.  This requires a great amount of courage.  Your concerns are about the unknown future.  None of us want to commit “financial suicide”.  Once the decision is made the rest is relatively easy.  Now you have  a direction and a goal.  Plan a “clean” exit.  Don’t complicate it.  Turn in a notice and don’t look back.  Most companies will ask you to leave the moment you give notice which is actually easier on you.  Plan for this financially.  Watching the NFL recently the commentators indicated the coaches would watch players closely in a losing situation or a game when there was no chance of making the playoffs.  The players were playing for a roster spot on next year’s team.  I don’t agree with this philosphy.  Why would I waste the energy on a losing situation?  Save it for a better opportunity.  Give it your all then.  Don’t waste time and energy in a deadend job.  If the deck seems stacked against you go in a new direction.  The “When” is now and there is no “If”.

Two times in my business life I have seen owners who will destroy the relationship that an employee has built with a customer.  The first was when I was the customer and had a great relationship with my dedicated salesperson.  I also new the owner very well.  Many times the salesperson would try to take care of me by doing the necessary things to maintain my account.  This was not out of the ordinary, but basic like cleanups of various lines and handling defective merchandise.  Needless to say that relationship deteriorated fairly quickly.  I would always tell the salesperson it was difficult to maintain the relationship when the owner was lobbing hand grenades in front of him and blowing up the relationship.

The second time I was the salesperson and the owner would do it to me and I have to tell you it didn’t feel very good that time either.  As the owner or sales manager you have to give full support to your sales staff.  Naturally they need to know where the limits are and what the rules are, but those have to remain consistent.  They can’t be based on how the owner or manager feels that day about the customer or if he’s having a bad day at home.  As the customer you should feel as though your safe in your relationships with suppliers and no one should be hollering, “Incoming!”

I had a customer in a previous life who thought rats were just the coolest thing.  In his customer service area he would have caged white rats.  At times he would let them run free in his service desk as he talked to customers about the repairs they needed.  They would nibble the corners of his work orders and of course when rats eat they also….well you get the picture.  Since at least 50% of the cars are owned by women these days, when a woman came into his shop he would prop a rat on his shoulder and discuss the repairs needed.  Needless to say this reduced the number of female clientele coming into the shop which was OK by the owner. 

Please respect the customer.  This is not supposed to be an adversarial relationship.  As the owner you shouldn’t be trying to get back at the customer by imposing your interest on them.  Don’t offend them.  Nurture the relationship.  Find out what their interests are and talk to them about their interests.  I had a customer who was just the most arrogant guy you could ever imagine dealing with.  Had my 1968 Mustang Fastback at work one day and he came in just gushing about how much he loved Mustangs.  I also discovered that day he had significant hearing loss due to his job.  To this day we are still buds when we see each other.  I thought he was a jerk, then discovered all I had to do was talk to him about what he liked and do it loudly.  When dealing with the public you can’t really have an opinion on much, because you’ll just offend someone and that will cost you income down the road.  Try to remain neutral on most issues even when you have a strong opinion.  Remember you want a customer that feels good about you when they leave so they come back again.  You don’t want that last image to be rat droppings on the customer’s invoice when they sign it.

THE GOOD:  If you want to build a loyal customer relationship you should consider treating the customer the first time they visit your store with an unexpected surprise.  As an example, the last time I went to Mexico at the hotel check-in desk my wife and I were pleasantly surprised with the delivery of 2 pina coladas. Do something to surprise your customer that is unexpected.  A couple pieces of chocolate when they enter or even some networking coupons to businesses who in turn distribute coupons for you would be good.

THE BAD:    Nothing is more frustrating as a customer than to enter and not be greeted or asked what was needed.  To stand in a store with money in hand and no one paying attention to you is inexcusable.  Worse even is the employee or owner taking a personal call when you are there.   If your busy at least acknowledge the person and let them know you’ll be with them asap.  Get off the personal call immediately if a customer enters.  You never want to look bad to a customer.

THE UGLY:  There are times when the last experience a customer has after leaving your store is out of your control.  The town where my retail location was located ran a parking meter ticket program.  If the meter enforcement officer saw you enter a store and not plug the meter you were instantly issued a parking ticket.  Do you have any idea how many irate customers this created.  Close to 100%.  Every positive I did for the customer experience to be a good one from the time they entered until they left was just wasted by a 2$ parking ticket.  I went to town council meetings about this and the reaction from the mayor was to cover his ears.  Nothing changed nor has it since.  Somethings are just out of our control and it can get ugly fast.

There’s a term CEM (Customer Experience Management) which many business coaches use to teach how the customer should be treated.  Most of the training is just common sense.  Ask yourself, “How to I like to be treated?”, and you’ll have the program down.

I Got My Eyes Closed!

You can’t close your eyes to a problem.   A friend’s business has a counter that is where the customer service advisers are seated.  Problem is that unless your seven feet tall they cannot be seen due to the fact the counter is over four feet tall.  No one greets the customer until the customer peers over the counter usually to find the service adviser on a phone.  Customer’s should be greeted, or at least acknowledged, as soon as they enter your business.  Nothing feels better than to have a smiling face greet us when our car needs service and we need help.

Some of the my business training taught me to be aware of what the customer sees when they enter our place of business.  We would actually video a walk-up to the business unannounced and critique the video with the owner at a later date.  We, as the owner and employees, don’t “see” the appearance of our store front because as we enter the surroundings are too familiar.  We sit behind our counter and see the world outside, but not our own appearance.

Try the video camera trick.  You’ll be amazed at what you see.