President, Training for Success, Inc.
1-800-2ATTEND (1-800-228-8363)

1. Empower your employees
   Give your employees the authority to go with their responsibility of satisfying and keeping the customer.
2. Train your employees
   Train, train, and then retrain your employees. Give them the tools to do their jobs better.
3. Market your service
   All of your marketing should communicate that you provide superior customer service and will do everything possible to keep the customer satisfied.
4. Hire Good People
   Hire people who like people and are well qualified. People skills go a long way toward helping you to provide superior customer service and retain customers.
5. Reward loyalty
   Reward both your customers and employees for their loyalty, and they will both stay with you a long time.
6. Inspect what you expect
   What gets measured gets done. Measure job performance and you will see an increase in quality and productivity.
7. Handle complaints properly
   Show interest, listen carefully, reassure them, thank them and then resolve the complaint.
8. Train employees to do it right the first time
   Repair and rework are costly. Doing it right the first time guarantees a happier customer.
9. Every customer has a lifetime value
   Consider the potential income each customer brings to you. That is the lifetime value. They should receive that type and level of service each time.
10. Beg for customer feedback
    Send out survey cards, talk with customers, and solicit their opinions and comments and then act on their suggestions.
11. Get and use employee ideas
    Get feedback from your employees, listen carefully to their suggestions and implement as many as possible. This shows you think as much of your internal customer as you do your external customer.
12. Be fair and consistent
    Consistency enhances your credibility and reliability. Customers may not always like or agree with your decisions, but as long as you treat each one fairly and consistently, they will respect you.
13. Under promise and over deliver
    Set realistic expectations for quality service levels and then exceed those expectations. The customer will be more than satisfied.
14. Ask customers what they want
    Constantly ask customers what you can do for them and how you can do it better. Then act on their suggestions.
15. Know the cost of losing a customer
    All employees should know the lifetime value of a customer, the cost of losing a customer and the effect that loss can have.
16. Know your competition
    Find out what kinds of customer services you competitors are providing. If they are doing something you are not doing, try it with your customers. It may work for you.
17. Know what your customers need, want and EXPECT
    Find out what your customers need, want and expect, then give it to them.
18. Communicate effectively
    Train employees to listen, speak, receive, and give feedback and how to develop rapport with customers.
19. Smile, "A little curve that sets a lot of things straight"
    A smile will usually get on in return. It makes you and the customer feel good.
20. Make customers feel important
    Call them by name. Everyone likes to hear his or her name. The more important you make the customer feel, the better they will feel about doing business with you.
21. Accept only excellence
    Good enough should never be good enough. If you expect average performance and service, that is what you will get. Set your expectations high. Accept only excellence.
22. Let customers know you care
    Send them thank you cards, birthday or holiday cards and anything else you can to show them you care. Spend time and money marketing your caring attitude.
23. Make service results visible
    Create a testimonial book for customers to read. Display service awards for customers and employees to see.
24. Go the extra mile
    Solve the customer's problem, then do something extra. They will be grateful.
25. Employees are customers too
    Employees are internal customers. Each employee must provide excellent customer service to every other employee so they all can provide superior service to the customers. This is the only way to guarantee customer satisfaction and retention.
    

1-800-2ATTEND (1-800-228-8363) Biography | Schedule | Articles | Seminar Topics | Resources | Home | Endorsements Click here for 100's of marketing ideas   Designed and promoted by Webmastery.Org - Building The Web One Site At A Time.