Obviously, in those situations, we lose the sale. But we’re not trying to maximize each and every transaction. Instead, we’re trying to build a lifelong relationship with each customer, one phone call at a time. A lot of people may think it’s strange that an Internet company is so focused on the telephone, when only about 5 percent of our sales happen through the telephone. In fact, most of our phone calls don’t even result in sales. But what we’ve found is that on average, every customer contacts us at least once sometime during his or her lifetime, and we just need to make sure that we use that opportunity to create a lasting memory. The majority of phone calls don’t result in an immediate order. Sometimes a customer may be calling because it’s her first time returning an item, and she just wants a little help stepping through the process. Other times, a customer may call because there’s a wedding coming up this weekend and he wants a little fashion advice. And sometimes, we get customers who call simply because they’re a little lonely and want someone to talk to. I’m reminded of a time when I was in Santa Monica, California, a few years ago at a Skechers sales conference. After a long night of bar-hopping, a small group of us headed up to someone’s hotel room to order some food. My friend from Skechers tried to order a pepperoni pizza from the room-service menu, but was disappointed to learn that the hotel we were staying at did not deliver hot food after 11:00 PM. We had missed the deadline by several hours. In our inebriated state, a few of us cajoled her into calling Zappos to try to order a pizza. She took us up on our dare, turned on the speakerphone, and explained to the (very) patient Zappos rep that she was staying in a Santa Monica hotel and really craving a pepperoni pizza, that room service was no longer delivering hot food, and that she wanted to know if there was anything Zappos could do to help. The Zappos rep was initially a bit confused by the req

If you speak well, and have great communication skills, you're half way there. However, someone with great communication skills may be a disaster at customer service.

Herbert True, a marketing specialist at Notre Dame University, found that ■ 44% of all salespeople quit trying to sell to a prospect after the first call ■ 24% quit after the second call ■ 14% quit after the third call ■ 12% quit trying to sell their prospect after the fourth call This means that 94% of all salespeople quit by the fourth call. But 60% of all sales are made after the fourth call. This revealing statistic shows that 94% of all salespeople don’t give themselves a chance at 60% of the prospective buyers.

Everyone wants to know why customer service has gone to hell in a handbasket. I want to know why customer behavior has gone to hell in a handbasket.

Anywhere customer service is expected to suck, you have a business opportunity.

CONFUSION 5: HOW TO DEAL WITH CUSTOMER DISSATISFACTION If you have hit each step to this point, customer dissatisfaction will be rare. But dissatisfactions will happen. Here’s what to do about them: 1. Always listen to what your Customers are saying. And never interrupt while they’re saying it! 2. After you’re sure you’ve heard all of your Customer’s complaint, make absolutely certain you understand what he or she said. You could ask, “Can I repeat what you’ve just told me, Mrs. Jones, to make absolutely certain I understand you?” 3. Secure your Customer’s acknowledgment that you have heard his or her complaint accurately. 4. Apologize for whatever your Customer thinks you did that dissatisfied him or her even if you didn’t do it! 5. After your Customer has acknowledged your apology, ask exactly what would make him or her happy. 6. Repeat what your Customer told you would make him or her happy, and get his or her acknowledgment that you heard it correctly. 7. If at all possible, give your Customer exactly what he or she asked for! But what if your Customer wants something completely unreasonable? If you’ve followed my recommendations to the letter, what your Customer asks will seldom seem unreasonable. That’s assuming you’ve got the right Customer. CONFUSION 6: WHO TO CALL A CUSTOMER At this stage, it’s important to ask some questions: Which types of Customers would you most like to do business with? Where do you see your real market opportunities? Who would you like to work with, provide service for, and position your business for? A Tactile Customer for whom people is most important? A Neutral Customer for whom the mechanics of how you do business is most important? An Experimental Customer for whom cutting-edge innovation is important? A Traditional Customer for whom low cost and certainty of delivery are absolutely essential? In short, it’s all up to you. No mystery. No magic. Just a systematic process for shaping your business’s future. But you must have the pa

If customers leave without a purchase, you have not failed. But if customers leave without a smile, you have.

Top 10 Ways to Instill Customer Service into Your Company 1. Make customer service a priority for the whole company, not just a department. A customer service attitude needs to come from the top. 2. Make WOW a verb that is part of your company’s everyday vocabulary. 3. Empower and trust your customer service reps. Trust that they want to provide great service… because they actually do. Escalations to a supervisor should be rare. 4. Realize that it’s okay to fire customers who are insatiable or abuse your employees. 5. Don’t measure call times, don’t force employees to upsell, and don’t use scripts. 6. Don’t hide your 1-800 number. It’s a message not just to your customers, but to your employees as well. 7. View each call as an investment in building a customer service brand, not as an expense you’re seeking to minimize. 8. Have the entire company celebrate great service. Tell stories of WOW experiences to everyone in the company. 9. Find and hire people who are already passionate about customer service. 10. Give great service to everyone: customers, employees, and vendors.

Never count on making a good sale. Have the purchase price be so attractive that even a mediocre sale gives good results.

it even hurts when you lose a customer that is just 0.1% of your revenue
every loss hurts

The salespeople who scored in the top 10 percent for optimism performed a whopping 88 percent better in sales than the reps in the top 10 percent for pessimism. Dr. Seligman found that the power of optimism held in other professions, too. He concluded that in general, optimistic salespeople performed an impressive 20 to 40 percent better than pessimistic salespeople.

CONFUSION 4: HOW TO KEEP YOUR CUSTOMER HAPPY Let’s say you’ve overcome the first three confusions — now how do you keep your Customer happy? Very simple…just keep your promise! And make sure your Customer knows you kept your promise every step along the way. In short, giving your Customers what they think they want is the key to keeping your Customers (or anyone else, for that matter) really happy. If your Customers need to interact with people (high touch, Tactile), make certain that they do. If they need to interact with things (high-tech, Neutral), make certain that they do. If they need to interact with ideas (in their head, Withdrawal), make certain that they do. And so forth. At E-Myth, we call this your Client Fulfillment System. It’s the step-by-step process by which you do the job you’ve contracted to do, and deliver the product you’ve promised. But what happens when your Customers are not happy? What happens when you’ve done everything I’ve mentioned here, and they are still dissatisfied?

CONFUSION 5: HOW TO DEAL WITH CUSTOMER DISSATISFACTION If you have hit each step to this point, customer dissatisfaction will be rare. But dissatisfactions will happen. Here’s what to do about them: 1. Always listen to what your Customers are saying. And never interrupt while they’re saying it! 2. After you’re sure you’ve heard all of your Customer’s complaint, make absolutely certain you understand what he or she said. You could ask, “Can I repeat what you’ve just told me, Mrs. Jones, to make absolutely certain I understand you?” 3. Secure your Customer’s acknowledgment that you have heard his or her complaint accurately. 4. Apologize for whatever your Customer thinks you did that dissatisfied him or her even if you didn’t do it! 5. After your Customer has acknowledged your apology, ask exactly what would make him or her happy. 6. Repeat what your Customer told you would make him or her happy, and get his or her acknowledgment that you heard it correctly. 7. If at all possible, give your Customer exactly what he or she asked for! But what if your Customer wants something completely unreasonable? If you’ve followed my recommendations to the letter, what your Customer asks will seldom seem unreasonable. That’s assuming you’ve got the right Customer.

Customers are always wonderfully dissatisfied, even when they report being happy and business is great. Even when they don’t yet know it, customers want something better, and a constant desire to delight customers drives us to invent on their behalf.