Everything, everywhere is in a constant flux of change. I like this quote from Bruce Barton, author, advertising executive and politician, “When you are through changing, you are through.”

Away back in 1970, I read Future Shock, a great book by Alvin Toffler. Future Shock was about change, and the affect that the accelerated rate of technological and social change had on society. From an historic perspective the speed of change from the beginning of the industrial revolution in the 18^th century to the “super-industrial society” of the 1970’s was mind-boggling and it has only intensified thousands-fold since then.

The supermarket business too has gone through radical changes and its rapid transformation continues. Remember only you can control your reaction to changes in your business. Everyone filters information through his or her personal background, wants, needs, fears, hopes, prejudices and beliefs. The result is often the development of urban “myths” about change. Let’s explore some of those myths—and the reality of business.

Myth: This will go away.

Reality: Change is here to stay.

Myth: It will help if I get upset with this.

Reality: Controlling your emotions increases your control over the situation.

Myth: This is a bad thing for my store(s).

Reality: Progress often masquerades as trouble.

Myth: I can keep running my store(s) as I always have.

Reality: If the world is changing, you probably need to change too.

Myth: All these problems prove that change is bad for my industry.

Reality: Problems are a natural side effect of the change process.

Myth: I’m not in a position to make a difference.

Reality: You’re either part of the solution or part of the problem.

Myth: The changes weren’t really necessary.

Reality: What’s necessary now is to make the changes work.

Since you can’t stop change, try to be an agent for change. Here are some things to consider:

• Control you attitude.

• Take some ownership of the changes.

• Control you attitude

• Choose your battles carefully.

• Keep your sense of humor.

• Don’t let your strengths become weaknesses.

• Practice good stress management techniques.

• Invent the future instead of trying to redesign the past.

• Control you attitude

• Accept the past, focus on the future and anticipate.

• Consider what’s coming, what needs to happen and how you can rise to the occasion.

• Stay loose. Remain flexible. Be light on your feet.

• Instead of changing with the times, anticipate the future and change a little ahead of the times.

So embrace change and have fun with it, for a change!

Establishing a positive-price perception is critical in today’s economy. Duh! But the key is perception. You should only sacrifice gross dollars when the price point can significantly impact perception.

You don’t have to have the lowest prices on everything. You don’t have to be priced the same as your competitors. You must have your customers leave your store feeling like they received a value for their total shopping experience. This goes beyond shelf prices and integrates operations and retail execution.

When consumers do not perceive any differentiating attributes of a product or service, price becomes a factor. This becomes very evident when various competitors carry identical products. This is why you must find ways to differentiate your store(s) in other ways.

How do you identify your most price-sensitive items? Which items are most sensitive to your customers? Using some type of movement data is sometimes a good way to measure the sensitivity of an item or category. It is generally believed that the fastest selling items are usually the most price sensitive.

However, item velocity can be influenced or even manipulated by lower price points as a result of using promotional dollars from the manufacturer. Price sensitivity can also be a seasonal consideration. Some items, at peak times of year, can be very sensitive to the consumer. Items unique to the holidays or influenced by changing seasons take on different levels of significance for consumers. It’s important to be aware of these items. They tend to be less price sensitive to customers, but are still an important price consideration. Back-to-school products are a great example.

You must stay focused on what is important to your customers. Their perceptions—not yours—will keep you on track in building positive-price perceptions.

In the end, pricing and promotion strategies will only be successful if they are designed in a consistent way with all other merchandising and operational elements that provide value to the consumer. Top retailers establish a relevant point of differentiation to provide distinct value to their target audience. Base prices, promotions, assortment, service, private labels and visual merchandising all combine to create a value-to-price relationship.

Offering exceptional customer service is indeed a powerful way to differentiate your store in the marketplace. How do you distinguish yourself as a leader in service excellence?

Most retail businesses in America believe they offer good customer service, but in reality the opposite is probably more accurate. Why? With the daily demands of performing repetitive tasks in a highly productive environment, employees are often oblivious to customers and their needs. Customer service is typically given lip service by managers, who view training and developing employees to provide an exceptional customer experience as a low priority in a cost-controlling, low-margin industry. Ironically, it is just such an investment in employee training and development that can increase sales exponentially. While operational efficiencies are essential to superior corporate performance, they should not hinder the company’s ability to gain a customer service advantage.

For a retailer to gain a customer service advantage over its competitors, a serious investment of resources to train employees is critical. It is also imperative to have in place vehicles that foster communication between the customer and store, including regular interaction between top management and customers. Why is this important? Because customer service is one thing, but exceptional customer service is another thing entirely. It’s not enough that every customer is acknowledged by every employee they meet on every shopping visit to the store. It’s not enough that every customer is sincerely greeted and thanked for their business when the transaction is complete. It’s about treating every customer in such a memorable way that when the transaction is complete, the customer tells someone else how great it was.

Of course, all of this must be weighed against the fact that attracting and retaining good employees is difficult. Part of the solution is building a team of employees who share a common vision and values. Indeed, weeding out employees who do not contribute to the vision and who do not perform their work in the context of the store’s stated values could add to an unstable staffing situation. Yet staffing problems cannot become an excuse for failing to deliver exceptional customer service. A core of focused employees working to achieve a common goal within the framework of common values is a powerful force that can, in the short term, compensate for a staffing deficiency.

Service companies sell a promise. The customer’s confidence is the most precious asset for any company that sells promises for a living. Superb execution of service day after day is the cornerstone of confidence building. Strengthening the customers’ confidence isn’t about making promises, but about keeping them. When a service company loses customer confidence, it loses everything. In services performed directly for customers, such as retailing, the service is inseparable from the people performing it. An inept clerk is an inept store. Conversely, exceptional employees with exceptional training will set a store apart from the competition and keep customers coming back.

In the early years of my business we held very few meetings. With a small staff we were able to communicate easily and informally. But as the staff grew in size, so did the quantity of meetings, eventually leading to a meeting albatross. We found ourselves spending almost as much time in meetings than in producing our work. Something had to be done, so, well, we called a meeting! A meeting on meetings! It turned out to be a very productive meeting.

To help us get our arms around the too many meeting syndrome, Ryan Joy, V.P. of Creative Services, was charged with researching the nature of meetings. His findings were enlightening to a meeting weary organization. As a result of his research we decided to define the types of meetings we held and develop meeting criteria for those assigned to lead meetings. Understanding the unique nature of meetings with their differing goals and objectives has helped us improve the quality, the efficiency, and even the quantity of meetings we schedule. Still much work needs to be done to refine and improve our meeting process but we’re living in a much better place.

Here is a portion of Ryan’s findings; Three kinds of meetings by Seth Godin, bestselling author, entrepreneur and agent of change. Keep in mind these are general classifications and vary by author. We selected the Mr. Godin’s model and customized the meeting types to fit our organizational needs.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/03/three-kinds-of-meetings.html

“Meetings are marketing in real time with real people. (A conference is not a meeting. A conference is a chance for a circle of people to interact).

There are only three kinds of classic meetings:

1. Information. This is a meeting where attendees are informed about what is happening (with or without their blessing). While there may be a facade of conversation, it’s primarily designed to inform.

2. Discussion. This is a meeting where the leader actually wants feedback or direction or connections. You can use this meeting to come up with an action plan, or develop a new idea, for example.

3. Permission. This is a meeting where the other side is supposed to say yes but has the power to say no.

PLEASE don’t confuse them. Confused meeting types are the number one source of meeting ennui. One source of confusion is that a meeting starts as one sort of meeting and then magically morphs into another kind. The reason this is frightening is that one side or the other might not realize that’s actually occurring. If it does, stop and say, “Thanks for the discussion. Let me state what we’ve just agreed on and then we can go ahead and approve it, okay?”

While I’m at it, let me remind you that there are two kinds of questions.

1. Questions designed to honestly elicit more information.

2. Questions designed to demonstrate how much you know or your position on an issue and to put the answerer on the defensive.

There’s room for both types of questions, particularly in a team preparing for a presentation or a pitch. Again, don’t confuse them. I like to be sure that there’s time for the first type, then, once everyone acknowledges that they know what’s on the table, open it up for the second, more debate-oriented type of question.” Seth Godin

Meetings are a critical business activity, and it’s important to evaluate them periodically. Hopefully you will find the information in this blog is helpful.

Wikipedia defines positioning in this way: "… Positioning is something (perception) that happens in the minds of the target market. It is the aggregate perception the market has of a particular company, product or service in relation to their perceptions of the competitors in the same category. It will happen whether or not a company’s management is proactive, reactive or passive about the on-going process of evolving a position. But a company can positively influence the perceptions through enlightened strategic actions."

Overview

Right about now, you may be thinking, "Our stores are strategically positioned; what can this guy tell us that we don’t already know?" But it’s all in how you define strategic positioning.

Strategic positioning means different things to different people. We define strategic positioning as the creation of a unique and valuable position, supported by a system of activities distinct from those of your competitors. The key words here are "unique," "activities," and "distinct."

Anyone can claim they’ve positioned their store. But is it really a unique position, or just a knock-off of your competitor’s? What is your unique position? Your competitor’s? And is your strategic position supported by every activity the supermarket carries out, from pricing to signage, product assortment to employee training? And have you developed a distinctive way to carry out these activities?

While our approach may sound like common sense, very few retail food stores actually perform strategic positioning this way. In fact, many companies simply imitate one another in a type of herd behavior, each assuming the competitors know something they do not. Some modify a few of the more obvious activities to support the strategic position, and they think they’re done. But that’s just the beginning. Those businesses that create a complete system of distinctive, integrated activities are the ones that achieve a long-term competitive advantage. And often, the most successful businesses are those that have created formats that previously did not exist (we’re all familiar with alternative formats’ negative effect on supermarket revenues).

Determine your strategic position

Rather than copying formats similar to your own, focus on differentiating your store from them. Competitors that make their living in the same way cannot coexist — no more in business than in nature. Each must be different enough to have a customer-attracting distinction—a unique advantage. The most dangerous competitors are those that are most like you. The differences between you and your competitors are the basis of your advantage. The object is to enlarge the scope of your advantage, which can happen only at someone else’s expense. That’s why it’s so difficult to compete with alternative formats and why it’s so important to differentiate your store from those of your closest format rivals.

Focus, focus, focus

A strategic position is not sustainable unless it is focused. Because you can’t be everything to all people successfully, you must purposefully limit what you offer and to whom. When you are identifying your strategic position, choices about what not to do are just as important as choices about what to do. Your success depends on the trade-offs you are willing to make. Simply put, a trade-off means that more of one thing necessitates less of another. A supermarket can choose to offer more service departments, adding labor costs and higher retails, or it can choose not to, offering less service and lower retails, but it cannot do both without bearing major inefficiencies.

Differentiate your activities

Your strategic position drives which activities to perform, how to configure the activities, and how to integrate them. You need to look at all the operational and promotional activities your supermarket performs and determine what you can do to differentiate your activities from those of your competitors. Competitive advantage results when activities support one another and fit well. It is useful to think in terms of creating a theme which links activities, such as low cost, a particular notion of customer service, or a particular conception of the value delivered. Strategic positions built on integrated systems of activities are far more sustainable than those built on individual activities.

Summary

Successful strategic positioning boils down to this: identifying a unique and valuable position, focusing your efforts on a specific segment of the market, and supporting the position with an integrated system of operational and promotional activities.

Satchel Paige once said, "If you don’t know where you’re going, you might wind up somewhere else." But if you position yourself strategically, you’re sure to wind up with a competitive advantage.

The primary goal of effective advertising is to attract an audience and motivate them to action. The goal is to drive customer traffic. The goal is to differentiate your store and your ad from your competitors and to always support your stores strategic position. Effective ads do all of these things. The result is advertising that not only achieves the short-term goals of increased sales and customer count, but advertising that becomes the building blocks of tomorrow’s success and prosperity as well. Advertising store attributes often pays off in profitability even when it doesn’t immediately increase sales. It reinforces a stores differential status from competitors and reinforces many past and present experiences with satisfied customers. Indeed, image is often the only basis of comparison between similar but different alternatives.

Create Ads that people will read and respond to

The reality is most folks don’t read supermarket ads — maybe two out of 10. And of the folks who do read ads, they normally read the ads of the store where they regularly shop. So why do most supermarkets insist on putting their name and logo on the top of their ads? If the reader does not like the store, they will not read the ad, regardless of the benefit the ad is offering. The supermarket industry routinely violates this basic principle of effective advertising. Look through an issue of USA Today or The Wall Street Journal and count the number of ads that have the company name and/or logo in the headline—you won’t count very many.

Ads must have headlines and offer a benefit. Like articles in newspapers and magazines, the headline is what entices you to read or not read the article. The same is true with effective advertising: effective headlines attract readers. Remember, your primary shoppers are more likely to be interested in your ad, so focus your efforts instead on attracting new shoppers by offering a strong headline and a compelling reason or benefit to shop your store.

Ads that drive customer traffic

The most effective ads feature an appealing price, an appealing item or an appealing event. Don’t be afraid to promote mangos or papaya or kiwifruit and demo these items in store during the promotion. Produce is a great feature item because of its self-limiting markdown. How many avocados, for example, can people eat in a week? You’d be surprised how many customers 19¢ avocados can drive into your stores.

When it comes to price points, many retailers get locked in a trap. They presume that if T-bone steaks can’t be advertised for $4.99 per pound or tomatoes can’t be offered at 59¢ per pound, it’s not worth advertising them at all. Not so. What matters most is that the sale price represents a value to the customer. If T-bone steak retails for $8.99 per pound, you can feature it for $6.98 per pound and still be offering the customer an enticing savings of $2 per pound.

Promote special events like Cajun cooking or authentic Tuscan cuisine. Food is the international language, a universal experience. Promoting cooking makes good sense, after all, isn’t that what a food store is all about.

Differentiate your store and your ads from competitors

One way we have successfully differentiated our ads is by featuring a single item or a focused theme on the cover page. Some will argue a single item limits the chance to appeal to more shoppers. Some suggest you need to have an item from every major department of the store to force shoppers to shop in every department of the store. I say no, no, no! Don’t fall victim to the mentality that you must feature numerous items just because your competitor does. That’s not differentiation. Showcasing one item or theme has far more impact. Plus, it limits your markdown. Another unique approach: feature items your competitors would never feature, such as garlic or product variety in different categories like jams, mustards, or olive oils.

Support your strategic position

Another important driver in creating effective ads is your store’s strategic position. For example, if you position your store as a low price leader, then your ads should support low prices and pricing activities. If your store position is quality perishables, then promote those items, and explain why they are better than your competitors.

It takes more than snappy creative work to create an effective ad. You need a distinctive store format, a customer benefit, and a unique message that reinforces your strategic position. If you can pull all of these concepts together in a way that draws customers into your store, you’ve undoubtedly created an effective ad — and a competitive edge.

Creating a store culture of exceptional customer service requires a strong commitment to service at all levels of the company, beginning at the top. It requires executives to think about marketing and operational processes in new ways. In order to be truly effective, however, the store environment must be one in which management integrates and demonstrates exceptional customer service.

Executives who direct employees to provide exceptional customer service without changing their own behavior or making operational changes to support high service standards are doomed to failure. Worse yet, if the company begins marketing an exceptional service program but doesn’t deliver on the promise, it can seriously damage the store’s reputation and undermine customer loyalty.

Rather, management must focus on taking steps, large and small, to nurture the philosophy of exceptional customer service in all aspects of the business so it becomes deeply rooted in the company culture. The best way to begin is “practice what you preach.”

Success comes fastest to those managers who serve as role models for exceptional customer service—those who, through words and actions, strive to meet the highest service standards in day-to-day operations, promotions, and employee and customer interactions. When management begins living exceptional customer service, operational and marketing processes can be more effectively adjusted to support a cohesive program.

The checklist below will help you asses whether or not your management strategies are on track for creating a store culture of exceptional customer service. Review the “10 Essentials” and ask yourself if your company encourages similar practices and principles. If you are the rare manager who can answer yes to all 10, congratulations! You have clearly set the stage for exceptional service and are well on your way to developing loyal, long-term customer relationships. For the more typical manager with some no answers, consider these opportunities for improvement—a chance to fine-tune your management strategies and maximize your customer service efforts.

1. Executives personally and regularly serve customers.
When corporate executives regularly take part in serving the customer, they are doing more than simply helping to cement a relationship with the folks who pay the bills. The less obvious benefit is that by personally serving customers, executives who are the “visible standard” communicate that serving others is honorable and that customer service is the focus of corporate energy.

2. A visible customer feedback system gives immediate feedback to both employees and customers.
Highly visible feedback systems communicate to the customer not only that she can be heard, but also that the company actively solicits customer input. To be effective, feedback systems must get data immediately into the hands of the involved employees so the mental connection between behavior and consequence can be made. It is equally important to respond to the customer for taking the time to give input and to say in no uncertain terms that the company cares.

3. Stories about outstanding customer service are regular features of company communications and meetings.
Customer service guru Ken Blanchard talks about “legendary service.” Legends are stories told over and over about brave and wonderful deeds. It is in the telling of stories that heroes are made. Telling service stories turns ordinary clerks into heroes. Building heroes encourages future service excellence.

4. Service training gets equal importance with technical and procedural training.
Getting it right technically almost doesn’t count if the customer also receives a poor perception of commitment to a continued relationship. Training that focuses solely on the technical, procedural aspects of the business is only half done.

5. Employees from entry level up are highly empowered to make service decisions.
It is of little value to talk service unless employees are also empowered to deliver exceptional service and rewarded for it.

6. Event selling is a key marketing tactic.
Mass marketing techniques take on added significance when they are supplemented by event marketing. Event marketing can be done on a grand scale, or it can be a one-on-one opportunity to deliver exceptional customer service.

7. Failure is relevant.
If you are not failing at least occasionally, you probably aren’t growing. First mistakes are free. Exceptional customer service involves an element of risk. Managers who are punished for straying beyond, “That’s the way it has always been done,” are not likely to try new, possibly dynamite ideas.

8. Compensation is directly linked to contribution.
Companies in which innovation is not rewarded, in which longevity without contribution is prized, are not likely to make any moves that would make them either outstanding or simply stand out. Compensation tied to contribution is a powerful personal incentive.

9. Change is regarded as important, and challenging tradition is considered praiseworthy.
Success requires at least some internal friction. As long as those holding on to traditions of quality and service allow at least some freedom for creative marketing, corporate values will not be lost. Rather, they will evolve and survive. Encouraging new ideas lays the foundation for more effectively differentiating a store from its competitors.

10. Customers “play” with clerks and managers.
The most capable practitioners of exceptional customer service are constantly inviting others to “play.” Play is another word for involvement. It is the company that involves the customer in every way, and creates solid relationships, that will thrive over the long term.

Exceptional customer service is essential to sustaining business success. When management leads by example and provides employees with effective tools and incentives, a company culture of exceptional customer service will take root, customer relationships will grow, and your company will thrive.

The generational longevity of a company.

The manager of a living company understands that keeping the company alive means handing it over to a successor in at least the same health that it was in when he or she took charge. To do that, a manager must let people grow in a community that is held together by clearly stated values. The manager must place commitment to people before assets, respect for innovation before devotion to policy, the messiness of learning before orderly procedures, and the perpetuation of the community before all other concerns.

Living companies are willing to scuttle assets in order to survive. To them, assets—and profits—are like oxygen: necessary for life but not the purpose of life. These companies know that assets are just means to earning a living. A company run according to a different model scuttles people to save its plant and equipment, which it considers the essence of its being. If such a company were in the car rental business, for example, it would see itself as existing to rent cars. The company’s fleet would be considered its primary asset, and its purpose would be to make profits for shareholders. If such companies find themselves in trouble, they get rid of people. I believe that employees are a company’s primary asset and that a company’s purpose is survival which means developing and nurturing their employees potential.

Managers must decide how to position the human element in their companies. They can choose to produce wealth for an inner circle of managers and investors, or they can develop an organization that is community. The choice they make plays a large role in determining whether a company will outlive its founders. Managers who want to build an organization that can survive many generations pay attention to the development of employees above all other considerations. They give a high priority to questions such as, how can we organize for continuity from one generation to the next?

In organizations in which benefits accrue to only a few people, all others are outsiders, not members. According to their underlying contract with the company, those outsiders trade their time and expertise for money. That type of contract does not inspire people to give their all or to feel much loyalty to the enterprise or its managers.

A company whose purpose is to produce wealth for a few people is like a puddle of water—a collection of raindrops that pool into a cavity or hole. The drops remain at the bottom of the cavity. When it rains, more drops may be added to the puddle and its field of influence may broaden, soaking the ground around it. But the original drops remain in the middle.

But stagnation can lead to vulnerability. Puddles of water cannot survive much heat. When the sun comes out and the temperature rises, the puddle starts evaporating. Even the drops in the center are in danger of going up in vapor.

The company whose purpose is survival is more like a river. Unlike a puddle, a river is a permanent feature of the landscape. Come rain, the river may swell. Come shine, it may shrink. But it takes a long and severe drought for a river to disappear. From the point of view of the drops of water, the river is quite turbulent. No drop remains at the center for long. From one moment to the next, the water in one part of the river changes. New water drops succeed old ones, and they are all carried forward.

The river lasts many times longer than the individual drops of water it comprises. The river is a self-perpetuating community with its own built-in guarantees for the continuity and motion of water within its banks. A company, initiating rules for the continuity and motion of its people, can emulate the river’s longevity and power.

The living company is a river company. In such an organization, managers regard the optimization of capital as no more than a necessary complement to the optimization of people. To build a company that is profitable and will live long, managers take care to create a community. Processes are in place to define membership, establish common values, recruit people, develop employees, assess individual potential, live up to a human contract, and establish policies for graceful exists from the company.

Above all, in the living company, members know “who is us”, and they are aware that they hold values in common. They know the answer to the definitive question about corporate identity: What do we value? Whoever cannot live with the company’s values cannot and should not be a member. The sense of belonging pulls together even the most diverse members of the company.

In the living company, the essence of the underlying contract is mutual trust. Individuals understand that in exchange for their effort and commitment, the company will help them develop their potential. Money is not considered a positive motivator in a river company. If money is insufficient, people will become dissatisfied, but adding money above the threshold of sufficient pay will not motivate people to give more to the company. Before they will give more, people need to know that the community is interested in them as individuals, and they themselves need to be interested in the fate of the enterprise. Both the entity and the individual need to care more about each other.

Part of the caring is making sure that people enter and exit the company with the right understanding. Recruits are judged as much on the basis of their fit with the company’s values and principles as they are on the basis of their ability to fulfill the technical requirements of the job. People are hired into a living company with the understanding that they are there to develop their potential. This does not mean they have a contract for life. If people don’t pull their weight or share the community’s values, they must move on. And when they reach a certain age, it is time for them to go. One benefit of strict exit rules is that management becomes stewardship. Just as you took over for somebody, you will pass the baton to someone else. Your legacy at the company will depend on how well you carried out your stewardship.

Many shareholders and senior managers are not interested in building a self-perpetuating work community. They prefer the company to remain a moneymaking machine for the benefit of an inner circle. Theirs is a perfectly legitimate choice, but those who make that choice must realize that there is no free lunch. Living, learning companies stand a better chance of surviving and evolving in a world they do not control. They make sense, especially because success now depends on mobilizing as much of the intelligence at a company’s disposal as possible. The high levels of tolerance inside the living organization create the space for more innovation and learning.

What is so special about long-lived companies? They know who they are, understand how they fit into the world, value new ideas and new people, and husband their money in a way that allows them to govern their future. Those personality traits show themselves in behaviors designed to renew the company over many generations. Throughout, living companies produce goods and services to earn their keep in the same way that most of us have jobs in order to live our lives.

HR/T&D is extremely critical, particularly if a company desires to have a long long life. The costs of recruiting, training and developing the right people are high. But the cost of not allocating money for this number one priority is much higher—because employees, suppliers, communities, and shareholders all feel the loss when a company dies.

With Wal Marts, COSTCO, Trader Joes and Limited Assortment formats, the tougher the price competition in a market, the more important quality of service is to sustainable success. Why? Because without differentiated quality, without a superior total experience to offer customers, a company has few, if any, nonpricing options when key competitors cut their prices.

Achieving increased loyalty from customers and potential customers goes hand in hand with a focus on customer service. Delivering on a promise to provide outstanding and exceptional service to all customers, internal and external, is best accomplished when the promise becomes deeply rooted in the company culture. Providing exceptional customer service is aspirational. It begins with desire and is rewarded through the self-satisfaction of knowing you did the right thing by doing right for others. The benefits can be measured in small assurances or large returns. Smiling faces, exceptional morale, increased productivity, enhanced customer loyalty, and lower employee turnover rates are all tangible benefits of an exceptional customer service program.

Customer service has to do with the customer’s perception of the level of service she or he expects. Exceeding customers’ service expectations can be the defining factor in distinguishing a company from its competitors in the eyes and minds of consumers.

To customers, great service is an experience. It is the feeling that they take home with them after experiencing something positive, that “warm and fuzzy” they’re left with. Great customer service brings them back every time.

Customer service is one of he last great frontiers for a business to explore. The adventure is a journey fueled by purpose and desire. Great customer service is pure of heart and genuine. Its purpose is to serve the customer the best way possible, and its desire is to please customers in every way possible, and earn the right to do business with them again and again. It is a journey with no personal satisfaction until all customers are satisfied. The fundamental reason for every organization is to create a satisfied customer.

Achieving a reputation for great customer service does not happen by talking about it. A company’s reputation is determined by what customers say about it and how they describe it in their everyday lives. So listen to your customers. Give them exactly what they want, any way they want it. And invite them in to participate in their own service. Wise is he who listens, for in the end we all are customers. In the end, we all vote with our pocketbooks and with our efforts. And in the end it is he who listens who includes us, empowers us, and wins our loyalty.

Keeping customers satisfied is the first step to developing loyal, long-term friendships with your customers. A happy customer may be loyal; a delighted customer can be a friend for life. This is critical, especially when you consider the numbers. Countless surveys have shown that it costs about five times as much to get a new customer as it does to retain an existing one. Yet how much of a typical organization’s marketing budget is invested in keeping current customers, as opposed to attracting new ones. The more you extend a personal relationship to your customers, the more likely it will be that they will increase their patronage. Theoretically, it’s possible to double your sales without adding a single customer. All that must be done is to make your current customers feel so good about doing business with you that they come in twice as often.

Customer service has it roots in the neighborhood grocery store. In the early days, when supermarkets, UPC codes, and scanning cash registers were concepts from Star Trek, the corner store was usually run by Ma and Pa and the rest of the family. They lived by one simple rule in those day: The customer is king. Ma and Pa took pride in taking care of each and every customer that came in. These hearty grocers were linked to their communities. In rural areas, they felt the pinch along with their farmer customers when weather affected crops and livestock. These grocers were pioneers in creating value. They experienced and shared in the joys and hardships of each customer. They knew each and every adult and child by name, not because some training manual told them to but because they believed it was just “how people wanted to be treated.” Ma and Pa even knew their best customers’ favorite cut of meat or vegetable or cereal or coffee, and they did all this without the aid of computers and without invading the privacy of their customers.

Not much has changed. Even in this age of technological innovation, business is still about people. Today, just as then, the customer comes first (and is always right). Small-town merchants know their customers on a personal basis, they genuinely care about them as people, not just because it will improve margins or increase sales, but because it helps them do a better job. They believe in the golden rule of business: Treat others, as you would want to be treated. Then, because they are your customers, treat them just a little better yet.

I’m an ardent proponent of product and service guarantees. A guarantee is a promise or assurance that a company will stand behind the quality of products it sells or services it performs. Guarantees build trust and loyalty with consumers. In a sense, a guarantee is a company’s commitment to the well-being of its customers. Wow, what an intriguing approach to serving the customer. Imagine a conscious intention by company leaders to enhance the well-being* of a customer. Is that possible?

5 Reasons Why A Guarantee Works

First, it pushes the entire company to focus on customers’ definition of good products/service, not an executive’s assumption. Second, it sets clear performance standards, which boost employees performance and morale. Third, it generates reliable data (through payouts) when performance is poor. Fourth, it forces an organization to examine its entire service-delivery system for possible failure points. Last, it builds customer loyalty, sales and market share.

What is a good guarantee? It is (1) unconditional, (2) easy to understand and communicate, (3) meaningful, (4) easy and painless to invoke, and (5) easy and quick to collect on.

Cheating. Fear of customers cheating is a big hurdle for some when considering offering guarantees. Sure, there will be cheats—the handful of customers who take advantage of a guarantee to get something for nothing. What they cost the company amounts to very little compared to the benefits derived from a strong guarantee. Too often management worries about the 1% of people who might cheat the company instead of the 99% who don’t.

*I have never thought of customers and their well-being in the same sentence. To me, the notion of customer well-being is thought provoking.

Well-being defined: a good or satisfactory condition of existence; a state characterized by health, happiness, and prosperity.

And some synonyms for well-being: Comfort, health, profit, prosperity, protection, safety, security, success, welfare, abundance, amenity, cheer, cheerfulness, contentment, convenience, coziness, enjoyment, exhilaration, facility, gratification, happiness, peacefulness, pleasure, relaxation, relief, rest, satisfaction, snugness, succor, sufficiency, warmth.

Looks like we’d have some very loyal customers if we can relate to their well-being.