Customer relations or going the extra mile

Do you go the extra mile to satisfy your customers?

And what does that entail?

Example.

One customer (of 35000) gets a burglar that breaks in to their house and destroys the alarm unit that we have sold. Not good. Customer gets a call from us where we say that this has happened.

We then get someone to search the house to see that its safe we contact someone to put in a new window, Replace all the door locks, put up another alarm system with a lot more sensors (especially in the area that failed).

All this is done free of charge to the customer and they are actually,despite a bad situation, very happy and confident that we did indeed handle their safety and possessions (they where not there more than a couple of minutes before our guard came to the house). So from a potentially disaster in the name of bad publicity to a happy customer. That is good business and its going the extra mile.

Another example would be when i had a seller that really did this the wrong way.

It started out with giving the customers little things like a scratch cards this seemed fine to me, a couple of weeks later it had escalated to subscriptions on magazines that the customers liked. This seemed a little odd but in a way inventive (she paid out of her own pocket). I talked to the seller about this and why she felt this was important. The seller had the best intentions and only wanted to please the customer and no harm done. After a 1-2 weeks the seller comes to have a talk a bit red on the cheeks. This time she had started to flirt with the customer who had flirted back and in a gesture the seller had promised the customer a private dinner for 2 if they signed the contract (probably not the first to promise this in but..) the customer naturally signed the contract since he really wanted that dinner (even more than the product). So the seller had gone from being a professional seller to being a dating service. We discussed the matter and she decided to call the whole thing off.

Going the extra mile was something i learned in an early age.

We had a couple of regular costumers in our store and i remember an old lady who came in every week to shop fresh flowers from us. If i was there i always helped her carry those flowers home (she walked with a stick) and she really appreciated this sometimes i even got a tip from it. The more important fact was that no other shop would do this for her and so she was a loyal customer until she passed away. that would literary be going the extra mile for a customer.

 

Going the extra mile must come from you doing something the customer don’t take for granted and it should be done in a positive manner so you don’t end up being a pushover /doormat.

I have on a few occasions been positively surprised when a seller has gone the extra mile for me as a customer and you have hopefully had this happening to you aswell. It has happened so few times that one wonders what customer relations teach their sellers.

Make sure you are one of those memorable sellers that can take business to new heights by going the extra mile for your customers!

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• What Do You Call A Salesman You Can Trust (frontofficebox.com)
• Tying the Bow is just as important as the gift (customerthink.com)
• Customer Service…That extra something (themarlincompany.com)
• How to Wow your Customers/Clients (inkspeare.wordpress.com)