Humor in the right places can defuse anger or confrontation. At a minimum, sometimes a smile can go a long way to winning them over. In its simplest form, just be nice. Kindness and courtesy are at the root of a positive customer service experience.

The guys at Willow Glen Bicycles in San Jose keep knocking my socks off with their service! Dick and his crew are the kindest, most generous and knowledgeable bike staff around. I’ve watched them take care of the most proficient cyclist with thousand-dollar bikes to kids on Schwinns. When I wheel in my 30+ year-old 10 speed, they never laugh or make me feel like an old lady riding an antique. I’ve been to other local bike shops, including the previous owners at this location, and never been treated so well.

Morton's, the upscale restaurant chain, claims to sell the "best steak anywhere." I won't argue with that. It is consistently excellent, as are the rest of their menu items. However, they have much more to offer than just an excellent meal. They are a fine example of Amazement in Action.

Alexander Kjerulf is the Chief Happiness Officer and author of  Happy Hour is 9 to 5. Here is an inspiring post from his web site.

According to Amy Wrzesniewski, an Associate Professor of Organizational Behavior at Yale School of Management, there are three ways you can approach your work.
 

• A job - You do it for the money.
• A career - You do it to advance and get ahead.
• A calling - You do it because it gives you a sense of fulfilment.
  

Want to take a guess how the young man in the video above sees his work?

So many times we look for our customers to be loyal to us. We want them to buy again and again. We try all kinds of fancy marketing, advertising and sales programs and hope that they will come back or continue to work with us. There is a simple, but powerful, strategy of keeping in touch.

Recently I was surprised to read about what the city of Seattle, WA calls their customer bill of rights. It was outstanding, and we can learn quite a bit from a city government that is focused on their customers, who happen to be their citizens and guests of the city.

Whether you’re B2B or B2C, or just you and me or I, being “of service” starts with your intent, and you can’t fake it. Here are a few ‘take-aways’ from a session with Franklin Covey’s “Helping Clients Succeed.”
 
“You cannot not communicate your intent.”
 
So … gotta be clear and conscious about your purpose in this conversation. Are you here to sell a solution or be ‘of service?’ Perhaps you have to ‘move off of the solution’ to be able to make a valuable contribution to your client’s success.

The top four reasons for choosing a service provider.
1. Relationship, compatibility and fit
2. In-depth knowledge of the client’s business
3. Chemistry of the team
4. Technical and product expertise

Looks like they have more than a little to do about your intent and being ‘of service.’ Interesting …
 
More about Franklin Covey here -
http://www.franklincovey.com/fc/index.jsp?

Is it a paradox? The great acceleration to a self service economy via mobile and the web and the growing need for more full service experts at the same time? Perhaps it’s just a new model of service that employs the latest technology and good old-fashioned face-to-face great service.

It is so much easier today to gather information, compare alternatives, understand the differences, and truly appreciate the value you offer via the web, and that enables me as the customer to better make informed decisions – and that’s a wow! As a service provider, have you got your multi-channel service delivery act together?

In an earlier post – Self-limiting Service Disabilities – I recapped my adventure scoping out wheelchair access and the service delivery I encountered. My web search led me to an expert provider that responded the same day by email, and as well by phone – with a face-to-face on-site meeting the next day. And yes we did the deal three days later after a little due diligence with the associated electrical work.

Lessons learned (and values re-enforced)
 
Respond quickly in kind, and then promptly by voice with a view to meet face-to-face. Be an expert, provide information, offer great value, be accessible, follow-up and care – the deal is there.

If you need help with that please visit High Performance Retail .

I’d love service to be better - and it’s my goal to transform the mediocre customer service we see in most companies today into “Exquisite Customer Care” - but in the meantime if you want better service - be a better customer! At the very least - meet the service giver half way. And who knows, maybe after having such a wonderful interaction with you, the service giver will be inspired to do better with the next person.

I love Jack Mitchell’s two “hug” books - Hug Your Customers and his latest - Hug Your Employees.

If you’re a ‘hugger’ you might enjoy this video on YouTube.

In their book Made To Stick, brothers Chip and Dan Heath make the case for six factors (in combination) making the difference between what’s memorable and what isn’t.

Their six factors are:

1. Simplicity (any idea over one is too many)

2. Unexpectedness (a surprise grabs our attention)

3. Concreteness (the more dimensions of details the more hooks our minds use to create a memory)
 
4. Credibility (even untrue stories don’t stick unless there’s a hint of truth, such as beware of what’s too good to be true in the urban legend that opens the book)
 
5. Incite Emotions in Listeners (we remember emotional experiences much more than anything else; we care more about individuals than groups; and we care about things that reflect our identities)
 
6. Combine Messages in Stories (information is more memorable and meaningful in a story form)

SOURCE: The book Made To Stick, and Donald Mitchell’s Amazon review of the book

Jeanne Bliss has written an excellent “change this” manifesto!
 
“Companies need to toss out everything they think about customer surveys and do a reality check of what they’ve actually done with the years of data they’ve compiled. They need to compare their effort spent capitulating and hand-waving about how bad the scores are with how much of an effort they’ve made actually doing something about what they heard from customers. And they need to get real…and evaluate if any substantive change has actually taken place as a result. Then they need to STOP and DO something different.”

Her manifesto is here -
http://www.customerbliss.com/press/ChangeThisManifesto.pdf
Enjoy!

If your car’s front end is out of alignment, then the entire car may shake. Not so different in business. If the front line doesn’t understand the value promise to the customer, the entire company can suffer. One of the crucial phases a company has to go through to create high levels of service is… alignment.

Create the context in which your employees care about providing sincere, honest, friendly, knowledgeable service, and wowing your customers.

Eric Fraterman has a story to share:

You are asking for examples of unusual and surprising service for a book. How about postal service? It may seem an oxymoron…

I am constantly amazed at how much opportunity is left on the table just due to the self-limiting perceptions of what individuals and their organizations can and cannot do to serve their customers. And clearly, the self-limiting service disabilities reflect the opportunity horizon, scope, values and vision of those who lead the organization. Here is a story of my recent adventure in wheelchair access for a residence.

While taking a walk over the weekend I discovered a mermaid down the beach a bit. Some extraordinarily talented person sculpted a ten-foot mermaid lying on her side, head resting back on her arm, staring out to sea (somewhat wistfully as if she had lovely memories there.) I wonder if the mermaid-maker had any idea at all of how much joy s/he had left behind on the beach that day. The mermaid reminded me that we all have a chance, every day, to leave a little joy behind. It’s not always as tangible or spectacular as a ten-foot long sand sculpture but it can be real and it can be lasting. A little joy can make someone’s day real special.

I’ve been involved in creating customer focused cultures for many years and have seen the incredible empowering impact it can have on your front line people and on tangible business results. There is no doubt that when customer service becomes strategic for your enterprise you can win – beyond your wildest imagination. But most organizations, most of the time, don’t get it. I’ve been involved in creating customer focused cultures for many years and have seen the incredible empowering impact it can have on your front line people and on tangible business results. There is no doubt that when customer service becomes strategic for your enterprise you can win – beyond your wildest imagination. But most organizations, most of the time, don’t get it.

1001 Ways to Wow Your Customers was created to invite and share “stories” of great customer service. “Stories” are the medium to best describe “what great performance looks like” and “feels like” and customer service stories can entertain, illuminate and inspire. We’ve moved from a space on “Blogspot” to a WordPress home at www.refresher.com and have now captured the work in the first volume as an eBook here - http://www.refresher.com/wowyourcustomers/ . It's available free with your subscription to The CEO Refresher.

Volume two is underway and we will record the stories and articles in this category on The Mindful Network. Send your stories to the contact email on this page - http://www.refresher.com/ceorefreshercontact.html
Thank you and enjoy!