Customer Service Beyond Have a Nice Day

Is it just another cost to be deducted from the bottom line?  You can look at it that way or you can consider it a valuable traffic- building tool. Done right, it’s something that keeps the customer satisfied while also making your store a happier place to work.

Customer service is as American as the Fourth of July. The term, “The customer is always right” was invented in the USA. And though that dictum has been tempered to reflect a little more reality, you will find, if you travel the world, that hardly anyone does customer service like the American retailer. In many parts of the globe, it’s still a case of transactions being confrontational and the customer always being wrong.

Customer service means doing things outside the basics of exchanging money for goods and services. It can range from simply greeting each customer with a smile or giving out samples, to hosting a party complete with a band, lavish decorations, and food service, to which all your loyal customers are invited.

One relatively easy thing you can do is eradicate zombie-ism in your operations. Putting one of those automated, menu-driven answering systems on your phone rather than having a real person pick it up during store hours is a sign that zombies have taken over your store. Having your staff greet customers with zombie phrases like  “Did you find everything you were looking for?” (typically without making eye contact) may work the first time, but not the fortieth time the customer has visited. Same goes for “Have a nice day.” Train your staff in how to engage in a real interaction with a customer that could make that customer’s day.

Good customer relations also means not only expecting the occasional complaint, but actually welcoming it. Besides providing valuable feedback that may reveal a systemic problem, a complaint is an opportunity for you to go into action, getting the situation rectified immediately for that customer, and creating great customer relations.

Go out of your way to help the customer and even do something extra to take advantage of your competition’s weaknesses. If a customer buys some hearing aid batteries, offer to replace the old ones. Got a bakery? Supermarkets have to sell boxes of 12 donuts. You can throw an extra donut in the customer’s dozen and keep him coming back.