Why is Customer Service so Important

Why is excellent customer service so important in today's world of buying and selling goods and services? The simple answer is, without it you may fail.

Today most consumers are spending less, which means you as a business owner have to find more and more creative ways to lead the consumer to your business, peak their interest with your message and persuade them to buy from you.
 
One of the most effective ways to set your business apart is excellent customer service. What is amazing to me is how easy it is to provide excellent customer service and create an experience that your competitors just don't offer. How do I know it is not difficult, just look around at the businesses you frequent and take a close look at their customer service practices and you will soon recognize that it is hard to find a business that offers excellent customer service.

There are companies out there that do a fantastic job with their customer service like Southwest Airlines or Costco or Hilton Hotels. Yes, they make their share of mistakes but excellent customer service is one of the most important ingredients to their success. Again, there are a number of businesses that offer excellent customer service but a vast majority fail at this critical part of their business.

It really does not take much to offer ECS (excellent customer service) because consumers have very low expectations since they are so used to bad customer service. One simple concept related to customer service that can make a huge difference in a lot of businesses is just answering the phone live. You would be amazed at how many companies do not answer their phone live. Of course I am not talking about large companies with thousands and thousands of customers and thousands and thousands of employees but I am talking about small businesses. They are the majority.

Here is a great example of how important it is to answer your phone live. I had just moved into a new home and I needed to hire a business to come and install an automatic garage door opener so I grabbed the yellow pages and started calling from page one. I called 12 garage door companies before I got a live person to answer and guess what I did with number 13 that answered live? I hired them with almost no questions asked and it turned out they were a great company with great customer service. I could have guessed that since they had answered their phone live. If you have a company where it is possible to let an answering machine take your calls I would suggest throwing the machine away and figure out a way to answer your phone live.

A few other simple things I recommend to offering excellent customer service would be....do what you say you are going to do, show up when you say you are going to show up, charge what you say you are going to charge.

These may seem simple but it is hard to find businesses who practice these simple things so if you do them you will set yourself apart, which is what it takes in today's economy to influence consumers to buy your product or service.

One last thing about customer service that will make the biggest difference is having an excited, positive, enthusiastic and fun attitude about your product or service. If you don't love it and show your love of it to your customers why will they want to love it and more importantly, buy it.