Small business is the life blood of this country. Little companies are strewn all over our great land. They personalize our landscape and train our youth. Our teenagers learn respect, cleanliness, and how to treat customers. This is how our next generation establishes life lessons that will span into their adulthood. The passion to serve customers and make people happy, thrives in our little market places, and our small hardware stores. Being a fry cook at one of the local Drive In’s doesn’t mean you are a failure, you are learning the basics for many jobs to come. Not to mention some cooking techniques that you won’t get anywhere else and will come handy at home as well.
The point is, those little trends span into many places after the kids are gone. So teach them well.
Five Things to remember
• Treat your customers nicely. Respect goes a long way with anyone. Not every customer gets up on the right side of the bed, and knowing this will help when you meet Mr. or Mrs. Grouchy. Take them and help them with your best smile ever. Guide them through whatever section they need. Most of the time you can defuse a troubled customer just by caring for their needs and they will never forget. A lot of them lose their anger as you help and they become a bit ashamed of their own attitude.
• Keep your prices affordable. Having the highest prices in town only insures one thing will happen— end of the year sale and closing. So, find a percentage you can make a living on, keep restocking inventory, and retain the customers.
• Become socially active with your online store and your Facebook page. Use your Facebook page for advertising and making sales. Work with your customer’s curiosity and keep things new online, as well as in the store. A lot of folks don’t have an hour to browse for what they are after. Just like online, they want to get to the isle, get what they need, and move on with the day. So tickle their inquisitiveness, keep things quick, and help them find what they need.
• Be holiday fantastic! As the next holiday approaches, do something fun with it; whether it’s online, on the store front, or just dressing the part. Make every day fun where you work.
•Train your employee’s to be happy to see the customers. No matter what their home life is, they need to be handsomely dressed, clean shaven, hair designed and ready to greet the public. (Customers help make income.) Meaning, without the customers, your store closes. Even those ever growing, know it all teenagers. They need to know customer service from top to bottom and when they are approached, they should be able to answer questions or at the very least, help the customer locate someone that knows.
The front line
Most products come with a description of their item and how it works. That is what customer service is for. How many times have you left a store because the service was awful? How many times have you been able to find what you need faster than the customer service rep. could– because they didn’t care? Exactly the point and you know that they should have been trained better.
Preach this
Mary Kay Ash preached over and over to her consultants, “Imagine your customer has a sign on the front of her that says, ‘Make me feel important’.” That is how you take care of each and every one…. Always. Not everyone will buy into that, but if you do, you will never fail.
She had one more cool idea
She used a list everyday of her Mary Kay career. Choose six things that cannot be forgotten to be done the next day. As you complete them, mark them off. At the end of the day, whatever is left, place it on the list for the next day. Never more than six items, for six is the easiest to get done. If you follow that, with customer service that is beyond reproach, your recipe for success is under way.
Of course
Technology cannot be forgotten. Keep with the trends and stay on top of that. It can only help your business to save time and money.
There are so many idea’s
There are thousands of idea’s on the market to help you be successful with your business. Stay with the basic’s and grow, but keep those ideas alive. Never lose the beginning of your success and pass it on. As long as those stay alive in your business, your business will stay alive. The best of luck to you!
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