How is your customer service?



Most people today complain about customer service because for the most part it is bad across the board. Many big corporations looking to cut cost are cutting the people who directly deal with their customers so that the CEO's and other big wigs can make their bonuses despite the fact it is hurting the company long term.

As I have stated before this is one of the biggest advantages small companies have over the large corporations. Although you cannot advertise it to an advantage, word of mouth advertising works great. Every time you make a customer happy when they walk out the door, you have improved your competitiveness in the market. Remember, the person who is happy may tell 3 people but the unhappy person will tell 10 so it is important to keep the unhappy to the smallest number possible.

The Entrepreneurs-Journey blog talks about something that Starbucks does for its customers. When the writer was a customer at Starbucks they forgot her tea so when she went to the cashier they gave her a coupon for a free drink on her next visit. They did a great job of taking care of the customer. Of course they should have gotten it right in the first place but mistakes are going to happen, you are going to make them so take care of the customer when it does.

My business does some selling on Ebay to rid of some product and a couple of times we have made mistakes in shipping. When this has happened, I have given the customers free shipping plus 10% off on their product. This has not happened often so it doesn't cost us much plus the customer is really happy. The customers have come back to purchase from us again.

Your customers are the life blood of your business so be sure to treat them like gold. If you do make a mistake be sure to take care of it quickly and show the customer that you care about them and you want them to return.