Andy and I were talking about customer service and customer retention yesterday, especially as it relates to local business types, and he said something that grabbed me.

“Businesses must quit treating customers like terrorists.”

Now that’s a strong statement, but let’s unpack it for your locally-owned small business.

Terrorists are folks with whom we should never negotiate. We have a policy of “no negotiation,” and we should stick with it – because the potential for recourse is too scary. Negotiating with terrorists could lead to chaos, anarchy or being overtaken by the manipulations of the enemy. Terrorists are enemies that harass and threaten our safety and security.

Do you look at your customers as enemies who harass you, threaten you or risk your safety and security? I hope not. But if you really squint, you might realize that deep down maybe you sometimes do view them this way.

Do you treat your small business customers with generosity, patience, respect? Or do you answer their questions briskly with distraction? Do you give them your full attention at every point of interaction – or are you bothered by their interruption? When you mess up – or they are confused about how to use or engage with your products or services the best way, are you wary of helping them fix their problem? Are you afraid that you will open a can of worms if you do the right thing? Does your safety and security feel threatened by the potential of fixing customer problems?

There are a million other scenarios that I could suggest along this realm, but let me stop with those, and instead point you to a better way.

Customers are NOT terrorists.

Let me challenge you to change your attitude and perspective towards your customers today. No matter how positively you feel towards your customers, there is always room to improve and kick it up another notch, so to speak. Here are some ways you can change your attitude toward your customers – and in turn, drastically improve your customer loyalty, customer retention – and yes, grow your business simply and aggressively.

1. View your customers and their problems as your primary marketing opportunity each and every day.
2. Remember that remarkable customer service experiences lead to many remarks by the customer to their many friends (often 100s of friends on social networks).
3. Consider the lifetime value of the customer in relation to fixing the small problem or time spent giving personal service, explanation or help today.
4. Remember that word of mouth marketing is the best marketing you can never buy (or if you make folks unhappy – the worst marketing you can never buy your way out of).
5. Remember that going through a trial with your customer will make them more loyal and mean more steady and secure income for you for a long time to come.

Try This Idea.

Dedicate a portion of your small business marketing budget and time to fix problems in a way that far exceeds “making it right” and that makes your customer exceedingly happy about you and your business.

What do you think? How can you grow your small business by taking advantage of problems today?

Editor’s Note: I fleshed out this idea and six others related to customer service and customer retention for the upcoming print issue of Greater Jackson Business magazine to hit newsstands in the next few days. Be sure to check it out.

Photo Credit: jm3

If you do social media right for your small business, your customers will become more loyal. If you do social media wrong, you will lose customers. But how do you know which category you fit into for certain?

We’ve been seeing a lot of situations where business owners are blasting their Facebook connections too frequently on Facebook with a pushy sales message, and it’s turning off customers. How do we know? Facebook provides outstanding Insights for Page administrators now, and one of the metrics you can monitor is the number of fans who have chosen to hide your posts from their News Feed. This means that you didn’t LOSE the fan, per se, except that you really did because they have hidden you from their view by removing you from their News Feed. This is bad…very bad.

Unsubscribes indicate that you were saying worthless stuff or being too annoying or in their face with your small business Facebook messages. Your business was basically spamming it’s Facebook connections. Think whatever you like about them, but their opinion matters and on Facebook they can do something about it – they click the “hide” button, and you’re outta there. Never to market directly to them again via their News Feed. Not cool.

So, what I recommend is taking  a closer look at your Facebook Insights.

1. Go to the Insights, click on your Page name on the left hand side of the screen (it may default to your Page if you only administer one Page).

2. Then, right under your Page name on the left hand side two words will appear: Users and Interactions.

3. Click on “Interactions” and the top graph they show will be for “Daily Story Feedback.”

4. This graph shows the number of “likes,” “comments” and “unsubscribes” for each day.

5. If you see a spike in “unsubscribes” on a certain day, look to see what you posted on that day or around that day. And don’t do it anymore. If you see a steady stream of “unsubscribes,” that also is an unhealthy sign because you might need to re-think your Facebook strategy and messages overall.

However, if you only get a rare unsubscribe, congratulations, that is an indicator that you’re doing Facebook well, and is a sign of Facebook health – that can only lead to increased customer loyalty since they hear from you more often and in a more valuable and meaningful way.

If you do Facebook the right way, lukewarm customers will become fans. And existing fans become super fans as they follow – evangelists that spread the word and point new customers to your business through social media in droves. The personal relationship, access and frequent top-of-mind provided by Facebook and social media usage in general secures customer loyalty like nothing else can. Check those Facebook Insights and measure your own Facebook marketing health.

What are your Facebook Insights telling you? What other Insights do you find important for your business? Share with us in the comments section below.

Andy and I are privileged in our work to conduct a lot of one-time consultations with small businesses who need a push in the right direction and an action list to help them take their small business marketing to the next level and create a more remarkable and consistent customer experience.

We also have the privilege to work very closely, literally in the trenches, to develop, implement and then teach a small number of business owners how to execute marketing strategies and tactics as well as customer experiences that will grow their businesses for the long term. In these relationships, we seek to be game changers – revolutionaries – who encourage “drastic and far-reaching changes in ways of thinking and behaving” when it comes to small business marketing and small business customer experiences. (If you’ve been hanging around here a while, you’ll recognize that quote as the dictionary definition of “revolution” and the reason behind the name of this blog.)

Looking for a customer experience revolution for your small business? Here are TEN posts from the deep archives of this blog that I thought were worth a second (or third) look when it comes to helping you create a profitable customer experience. These posts are FULL of great ideas and tips for small business customer service and experience improvements. Your customer experience, after all, is the most critical element to the short and long-term success of your business. It is the linchpin to your success. Click on the tip to read a full blog post on the topic (and don’t forget to leave behind your comments and ideas on each topic!).

1. Make sure your front-line sales team knows how to do their job – and the importance of it.

2. Make keeping customers (customer retention) and getting new customer referrals from your happy customers a primary focus.

3. Don’t assume anything about your customers. They probably do NOT know what to do with your stuff.

4. It really does pay to understand your customer. Customer feedback is critical (a bonus post for this tip!).

5. Use great photography in your small business marketing.

6. Use lighting as a cheap and easy way to improve your customer experience and to market your business 24 hours a day.

7. Pay attention to the auditory aspect of your customer experience. It matters.

8. Make shopping with you more convenient for the time-crunched shopper – which is all of us.

9. Don’t forget that marketing doesn’t stop when the customer walks in the door – it’s really just beginning.

10.   Last but not least, here are a few more great ideas for improving your customer experience. A revolutionary customer experience is possible for your small business!

Want more? If you’ve been trying to figure out how to achieve that in your business or are looking for a small business revolution, community or non-profit organization, please get in touch with us – we’d love to hear from you.

Photo Credit: advencap

For all businesses and organizations, regardless of size, the experience that the customer has with your business from start to finish – from the moment they meet you via marketing or word of mouth until the moment they cease to be your customer – must be flawlessly consistent.

When small businesses pull off this hat trick of “consistency” especially well, they reap generous rewards on the bottom line. Consistency in a desired customer experience that makes your customers feel like insiders is a sure meal ticket to success – the magic formula that all businesses are looking for – and few achieve. A desired customer experience is one that is remarkably different (for a true understanding of “remarkable” – read some Seth Godin books), convenient, and most of all creates a simple, easy-to-understand and experience…well, experience.

What does consistency look like in small business?

Merriam-Webster.com defines “consistency” as “a condition of adhering together” and as an “agreement or harmony of parts or features to one another or a whole.” But this is the part I really like… Merriam-Webster says “specifically: ability to be asserted together without contradiction.”

That’s really the bottom line. Examine your business today and look for anything that might contradict the specific and remarkable customer experience that you want for your customers to get from your small business. Marketing is only one piece of that puzzle, but it is critical that everything from your social media messages (including the tone and frequency of your posts) to your visual advertising to your visual merchandising and in-store way-finding to your employees’ dress, attitudes, personalities, expertise and ability to serve the customer… to the shopping bags, the after-the-sale service and follow-up to the on-going e-mail marketing, customer loyalty and retention efforts to yes, most of all, the experience that you put forward through your 24/7 presence on-line through your web site and blog – it all must be CONSISTENT. It must go together without contradiction.

Customer experience

Are your employees confusing your customers? Does your marketing message contradict your in-store experience? Is your in-store experience confusing – do all of your sensory experiences not play together to make a “harmony of parts or features to one another or a whole” in your small business?

Then, when you’ve created a system of customer experience that is consistent – you must replicate that system of customer experience every single day. It is this repetition that will grow your business.

Set your sacred cows aside today and look at your business in an effort to banish inconsistencies and create systems and experiences that grow a consistent customer for your business. A great customer experience is not an optional exercise.

What are you doing today to improve your consistent customer experience?

Sometimes a project comes along that just warms the soul. Not long ago, Andy and I helped the new owner of a historic soda fountain as he sought to share the nostalgia and heritage of this landmark with a new generation – using New Media and Social Media tools. Recently, when meeting with the new owner, I found myself saying something that I say a lot:

“Customers are more loyal when they feel like an insider, and prospects are more likely to convert when they have ‘insider’ information.”

Similarly, several times a week, without fail, folks ask us about our lives… Usually the question goes something like this: “It seems like you are on the road ALL THE TIME… HOW do you do it?” Or, “How do you have time to do all of this?”

Really, the bottom line is that folks want insider information – they want a peak behind the scenes. And your customers want the same from you. As strange as it may seem, in this age of reality shows and YouTube (check out our channel), people really do care what happens behind the scenes at your business. I don’t think I’m that interesting, but who am I to tell you how to feel or what to be interested in? Or maybe, if you’re like me, it’s so refreshing to know that other people think or feel like I do. I believe “Insider Information” is a “needle-mover” when it comes to customer loyalty, word of mouth marketing and long-term success.

What are YOU doing to make your customers and prospects feel like “Insiders?” (Yep, go ahead, and leave a comment below. Seriously.)

In follow-up to the original version of this post, I got a note from friend and business owner Mandy Becker. I asked her permission to share her comments with you because I thought her feedback was so apt – it reinforces the message. Here’s what Mandy had to say:

I loved this!  I totally think the insider info think is critical!  The last three times I went to market, I wrote a blog about what it was like, what I was buying, etc. My customers loved it! They felt like they were part of the action! I have heard so many times, “Oh, I wish I owned a gift shop – what’s it really like? Do you love it?  What’s a typical day.” It is amazing how much people care about one another’s lives; I think we live vicariously through others in some way. Anyway – thank you!

P.S. I think I might even do a weekly blog post called “Insider Information.” Thanks for the idea – I hope it is okay if I use it?

How to make YOUR customers feel like insiders.

Where are the points in your customer experience that make a new customer feel awkward or out of the loop? Do some customers walk into your restaurant  or small business and know exactly what to do, what to expect, how to respond? Or do they struggle through certain points of the experience – or even getting in the door in the first place! Learn from your regulars – and find ways to make new customers feel equally comfortable. Sales and tips will increase accordingly.

Interview with Serial Entrepreneur & Publisher, Jack Criss

Jack Criss chatting with ResultsRevTV hostess, Marianna Hayes Chapman.

Yesterday, I interviewed 20-year publishing industry veteran and serial entrepreneur, Jack Criss. Criss is currently publisher of locally-owned and operated Greater Jackson Business magazine. Here are some of the questions we discussed and my paraphrases to his answers. For precise quotes, please watch the full interview on ResultsRevTV here (30 minute video).

Marianna: As a news insider, explain how small businesses can get their business covered in the media? What approach would you recommend?

Jack: Realize that the media love to be contacted and love to have their ego stroked. Recognize their work. For example, “Dear Jack, I read the article you wrote about the Two Lakes project – incredibly well written piece! I love what you’re doing with the new magazine… I have a story idea I think would fit well…” Address press releases or story ideas to specific people. Find their real name and correct spelling and send a personalized e-mail directly to that person’s e-mail address.  Be personal and find ways to connect with them unrelated to the need. Don’t mass send information to 50 journalists and address it to “Dear Sir/Madam” – those messages get trashed immediately.  If you don’t personalize a press release at least make sure it’s well written and correct and keep the information to one page as much as possible.

Marianna: How has technology played into having a successful business?

Jack: The demographic that the magazine is geared towards calls for a print magazine in addition to the website.  Jackson isn’t ready for a 100% online magazine yet, in my opinion. However, corrections can be made online within hours instead of waiting for the next edition to be printed.  We can supplement the print magazine stories, post video and photos not in the magazine and much more. Also, GJB is really a multi-media effort with the print magazine as the cornerstone providing readers and advertisers with a valuable and interesting long shelf life. But we supplement that with Facebook, a weekly radio show and vide on the web site.

Marianna: How have you overcome your fear of technology to keep up with the speed of news?

Jack: Facebook is often primarily used to communicate, network and make deals, in many cases more than e-mail. You have to get over your fear and get on Facebook.  Your competitors are on and you have to be too.

Marianna: How do you use Facebook to network while balancing your personal and professional life?

Jack: I’ve used it in incorporating my business and personal life. I’m just an ordinary guy who likes to run and has two daughters. I love being a father and a runner and a member of the community. I think being who I really am on Facebook helps me connect with others who share my interests and builds deeper relationships.

Marianna: How do you make time to do it all? Facebook, web site updates, sales, writing, events, networking and Twitter, too?

Jack: One way is that I’m leveraging the technology so that some things just happen automatically without me spending any time at all. For example, whenever a news article is posted to the web site, Facebook and Twitter are automatically updated with that information. You can leverage technology to make time to do it all without a big staff.   Facebook and Twitter all point to the magazine and help promote it.

Marianna: What do you do in your business to give back, even when cash is tight?

Jack: I can’t always give cash, but I can always give space in the magazine. Of course, certain “restrictions apply,” but non-profits that need advertising get free advertising in Greater Jackson Business – always. You’ve talked a lot about generosity in recent weeks, and this is how we do it at Greater Jackson Business – it’s important.

Marianna: What have you learned from failure?

Jack: Learn from your failures and be humble. You have to appreciate your customers more than ever.  Make friends with them and take time to develop a friendship. See them face to face on a daily or weekly basis as much as possible. Also, know when to say no and know when not to expand.

Jack talks much more on each point in the 30 minute ResultsRevTV broadcast…watch it now.

Marketing for our clients requires a little math. Why math? We need to figure out the cost and value of keeping a life time/long term customer, compared to the cost of getting a new one-time customer. Our type of marketing also requires building relationships with your customers. We believe that maintaining long term relationships with your customers is more valuable and more profitable than attracting new customers through traditional marketing methods.

Take this scenario for a restaurant marketing client: casual diner Bob eats here 2 times a month. His average tab is $45 dollars a visit, or $90 a month.  So this year, Bob is worth $90 x 12 months or $1080 a year. Let’s say Bob sticks around for only 18 months. This means Bob’s lifetime value for 18 months, is $1620. That’s a lot of cash!

So how do we market to Bob? Well, first of all, we have to understand that we need a relationship. But we also need to do things to reward him as he grows in his relationship with us. After all, it’s pretty rude to never say thank you to someone who does nice things for you.

What should the rewards look like? Well, when was the last time he came in with a group, and you offered the entire group free desserts on the house—just for fun? Never? Well, think about the food cost to do that compared the marketing expense to get another Bob to come for the first time and stay. It’s probably worth a ten dollar food cost for the entire table to get something special that they will talk about for several days to come – and probably on social media where hundreds of folks will hear their testimonial.

Sometimes spending a little of the commodity you have to keep a good customer is much better than spending unknown amounts to reap unknown rewards. Keeping customers happy and returning by building relationships (with or without free food) can be far more successful than procuring new customers through unmanageable and unverifiable means.

Don’t be like AT&T! What do I mean by that? Well, have you noticed that if you want to get a great deal from AT&T, you can’t be an existing customer? If you already have their service, and you’ve faithfully spent thousands a year on their service and their phones, you can’t get the cheapest deal on their phones!
Sounds backwards, doesn’t it? Take care of the customers you do have, so they’ll do the heavy lifting and bring their friends to your establishment.

And that will be some of the best marketing you’ll never have to do!

Photo Credit: Andy Chapman taken at Bravo! Restaurant in Jackson, Miss.

** Editors Note: After I wrote this article, I was in one of our clients local soda fountain, burger joint. I asked if I could mingle and talk to customers (one of my favorite parts of the work I do). I met a doctor who told me that he’d eaten there every Wednesday for 40 years. (They start making his order when they see him walk in, it’s the same thing every time…) To use today’s dollar value let’s calculate the dollar value of those meals. That’s 52 x 40 or 2080 meals.  For  an $8 meal, that’s $16,640 and counting, not including the friends he’s brought to visit, and the grandchildren etc. There’s some lifetime value. - Andy