Customer Service Success

Most businesses spend more time and energy trying to find new customers than they spend retaining the customers they have. The logic behind customer retention is simple - it costs far less money to keep current customers happy than to spend much more money to recruit new customers. Loyal customers tell their friends about your business and will spend more money than new customers.

But other companies and organizations truly "get" that impeccable, superior customer service is what will win raving fans for the future. Greg Smith (pictured), our guest writer, uses a hotel as an example in his right-on customer service article.

I have written earlier about my experience with the Peabody Hotel in Orlando where employees enter their work area through a portal that states in big letters over the door, "You are now entering the halls of service excellence." And, every employee passes through that door every time they come to work at The Peabody. (In anticipation of your next question, the answer is "yes." The service was outstanding in almost every instance.) Hotels have been early adopters of customer service excellence because guests and word-of-mouth are their life blood.

So, reminders and artifacts are important in encouraging customer service excellence from front-line staff. Learn about the importance of training and employee selection and much more to perfect your employee customer service excellence.

Empowering Employees to Deliver Customer Service Excellence

• Top 10 Principles of Employee Empowerment.
• Employee Empowerment.
• Inspirational Quotes for Business: Empowerment.

_{Image © Gregory P. Smith}