Anyone in business these days understands the importance of offering great customer service. If you are in the print industry and offer many types of services, customer service is even more important. Great service is not easy to find these days — especially in our culture of everything being needed “yesterday” and “I can get it from ABC Company for less”. Your ability to provide that little something extra can make you stand out from the crowd.
It’s been said that good customer service is responding to a customer’s need when it arises. Great customer service is responding to a customer’s need before it arises. How do we do that? Anticipating what someone needs is not an easy task. Customer service may mean something different for each person that walks through your door. What can you do?
- Know your customer! Not just their name. Get personal.
- Make sure you smile with your voice as well as your face.
- Look up whenever someone walks in the door and acknowledge them with a cheerful greeting. Customers are not an interruption to your day. They make your day!
- Check in and follow up with your customers. Did they receive everything they needed? Remember to say thank you for their business and their time!
- Acknowledge that time may be (and usually is) of the essence. Yes, your customers need it now! Make it happen! Offer to deliver something instead of having the customer come in to pick it up.
- Make it right! Did you leave something out or printed something on the wrong paper? Fix it right away and you will have a fan for life.
- In this age of technology, send a hand written note! It will be noticed and remembered.
One customer that receives world class customer service is the best form of advertising you can have. It takes a lot of effort to have that smile come across each and every time, each and every day; but the payoff makes it all worthwhile. Dedicated and happy customers will result in your success.
So what was the secret in the fortune cookie? “A man without a smiling face must not open shop.”
