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No Surprises, More Trust: Why Transparency Matters

Your customers may appreciate the surprise of a complementary upgrade or an unexpected thank-you note. A surprise fee at checkout? Or a warranty with unexpected exceptions? Not so much! As a small business owner, you build trust when you help people understand what they’re buying, what it costs, and what…
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Make Every Employee a CEO: A Customer Experience Officer

We all know that CEO typically stands for Chief Executive Officer—that is, the big boss. But in your business, CEO can stand for something else that is equally as valuable: Customer Experience Officer. And you don’t need to hand every employee a corner office to give them that CEO mindset.…
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Your Employees Know the Policy, But Do They Know the Reason?

Greet every customer promptly. Ask open-ended questions. Follow up with prospective customers. These are all perfectly reasonable customer service standards. You may have some version of them in your own employee handbook or training materials, or even have them printed on poster hanging in the breakroom. But there’s an important…
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When Friendliness Falls Short

Imagine a customer calls your business with a question. Your employee answers promptly, speaks pleasantly, and seems genuinely interested in helping. They don’t know the answer right away, but that’s okay. They promise to look into it and call the customer back. The customer hangs up feeling pretty good about…
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Your Scoreboard Isn’t a Strategy

There is something satisfying about keeping score. When you conduct a mystery shop, survey your customers, or track customer service metrics, the results give you something tangible. Maybe 78% of customers were greeted promptly. Perhaps your satisfaction score rose five points. Or maybe the results went the other way, and…
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You Know What Your Customers Want. But Are You Delivering?

What do your customers want from you? Chances are, you already know. Employees who are friendly, helpful and knowledgeable. They want doing business with you to be convenient. And when they need help, they don’t want to wait forever or get bounced from one employee to another. Recent research from…
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Experience Isn’t Expensive. Replacing It Is.

If you read the business news recently, you may have seen the story of Tony Barzar, a 60-year-old Costco cashier earning nearly $33 an hour. After decades with the company, his retirement savings have grown to more than $1 million. At first glance, it sounds like an unusual story about…
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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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The One Word Your Customers Want to Hear Most

Think back to the last time you visited a business where you were a regular. Maybe it was a restaurant, your bank, or your local auto shop. The employee looked up, smiled, and greeted you by name. Chances are, that greeting made an impression. Dale Carnegie famously wrote that “a…
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