Everyone likes to experience great customer service, especially those who work in the service industry. I know I quickly lose patience trying to resolve problems with the phone or cable company when it takes months to sort out a billing error or other complaint. If I treated my customers that way, it wouldn’t be long before my business went belly up.

But this post isn’t just for people on the front lines dealing with customers on a daily basis. And it’s not just for business people either. Colleagues that we work with every day, whether in a school or museum, factory or office, are just as important as customers who pay the bills. If internal colleagues don’t pull together and work effectively as a team, how will an organization ever achieve its goals?

Perhaps our most important ‘customers’ are family members. As the saying goes, “I don’t care how poor a man is; if he has family, he’s rich.” As busy business people we sometimes need to be reminded to nurture relationships with children, parents and extended family members.

The following was inspired by “Life’s Little Instruction Book” by H. Jackson Brown, Jr. The book is a collection of fatherly advice written for his son Adam as he leaves for his first year of college. Brown wanted to pass on “a few observations and words of counsel” to help Adam lead a successful and purposeful life.

I chose some of my favourite pearls of wisdom from Jackson’s book and compiled a list of 25 ways to surprise and delight your customers in 2012:

1. Admit your mistakes
2. Swing for the fence
3. Learn to disagree without being disagreeable
4. Be open to new ideas
5. Be a leader. Remember, the lead sled dog is the only one with a decent view
6. In business and in family relationships, remember that the most important thing is trust
7. Remember names and take an interest in knowing about the people behind them
8. Become the most positive and enthusiastic person you know
9. Remember that a successful partnership depends on two things: Finding the right partner; and Being the right partner
10. Practice empathy. Try to walk in other people’s moccasins
11. Do business with those who do business with you
12. Laugh a lot. A good sense of humour cures almost all of life’s ills
13. Be the most fun in your customer’s day
14. Promise big. Deliver bigger.
15. Give your customers your enthusiastic best
16. Do more than is expected
17. Regardless of the situation, remember that nothing is ever lost by courtesy
18. Don’t work for recognition, but do work worthy of recognition
19. What you have to do, do wholeheartedly
20. Let your word be your bond
21. Be passionate
22. Be committed
23. Don’t forget that your attitude is just as important as the facts
24. Work diligently
25. When facing a difficult task, act as though it is impossible to fail. If you’re going after Moby Dick, take along the tartar sauce.

YOUR TURN
How important is customer service to you? What suggestions do you have to deliver exceptional customer service? Where do you find inspiration to go above and beyond the call of duty when dealing with internal, external and family ‘customers? ‘

Posted in Client service |