Your Culture Is Only as Strong as Your Customer Experience

Every business owner wants to build a strong company culture. You hire people who share your values, talk about putting customers first, and maybe even have a mission statement framed on the wall. And don’t mistake our pointing this out as criticism: these things matter. But your customers don’t really…
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Turning Transactions into Relationships

Not long ago, a member of The Brandt Group shared a story that perfectly illustrates the kind of customer experience we should all be striving for. He had stopped into a local nature store—one of those specialty shops that sells bird feeders, seed blends, and other products for backyard birding…
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The Journey Matters

As a business owner or manager, you know well that customer loyalty isn’t guaranteed merely by selling products or even by solving problems: it’s about making each interaction count for all its worth. Consider that even if your team resolves every customer request or issue that comes their way, the…
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Undercover: Mystery Shopping for The Brandt Group

Mystery shopping is a unique and intriguing side gig, as it provides an average consumer the opportunity to don the guise of an undercover agent. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to visit a variety of dinning and shopping establishments to experience the products they have to…
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Strategies for Staying Open

As if the labor shortage weren’t already aggravated by the so-called Great Resignation and the droves of baby-boomers retiring, you can add a giant spike of employees calling out sick recently. Fueled by the Omicron surge and likely combined with other seasonal maladies, many businesses are struggling to field enough…
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Principles for Great Management

Last blog, we discussed the qualities of great leadership, the personality traits someone has to either possess or develop to be effective at managing others. Today, let’s add some principles to these qualities. For inspiration, we’ll refer to an article at RunningRestaurants.com, which is geared towards restaurant management. As always,…
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Leadership Qualities

As a business owner or general manager, one of your most important tasks is delegation. On its face, delegation sounds like the opposite, like you’re trying to avoid a chore because you don’t enjoy doing it and would rather someone else deal with it instead. However, great leaders understand their…
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Mystery Shopping for Survival

Earlier this year, back before the start of the lockdowns and the social distancing, we posted an article about the importance of Mystery Shopping for Compliance. In it, we described how critical it is for businesses to ensure their employees are obeying the laws governing the sale of age-restricted products…
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Mystery Shopping Under Lockdown

Amid social-distancing recommendations, stay-at-home pleas, and shelter-in-place orders, businesses everywhere are trying to find ways to remain open—even if in a limited capacity—to serve their communities and keep their staff members employed. Restaurants are closing their dining rooms but switching to pick-up and delivery, retailers are shuttering their showrooms but…
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