In a way, your customers are like your family; without their loyalty and trust, the road ahead for your business would be rocky indeed. That’s why you should treat customers the way you would want your mother and father, spouse and children, and other loved ones to be treated.
Many organizations designate certain customers as VIPs, a status that entitles them to special perks and attention. I would argue that every customer should be a VIP; but when I say VIP, I don’t mean “very important person.” I mean “very individual person.” Just as everyone in your family has his or her unique personality, so is each of your customers an individual, with individual wants and needs. If you’re a parent, you probably want each of your children to grow up feeling as if he or she is the most important person in the world. Why not try to make each of your customers feel this way as well?
Think about how you’d want your mom and dad to be treated when they need service. Would you want them to be served at a restaurant by an incompetent waiter with a rotten attitude? Would you want them to be frustrated because the bank teller “helping” them can’t answer their questions or give them accurate information? Would you want them to be kept on hold for ten minutes and be forced to listen to bad music or obnoxious ads? Would you want them to be treated by a complacent nurse or doctor? Those are the kinds of questions you and everyone else in your company should be asking yourselves every day. You might think Customer A is a jerk. Customer B might make your blood boil. You might want to throw a package at Customer C instead of gift wrapping it. (Just as we sometimes feel frustrated or infuriated by people in our own families, it’s normal to sometimes get aggravated by our customers.) None of it matters. Make each of them feel special anyway—not because it’s noble, but because your career and your company will benefit from it.
Once, when Priscilla and I were staying at the City Loft Hotel in Beaufort, South Carolina, I got up early and went to the little coffee shop connected to the hotel. I was greeted cheerfully by a young woman with a very apt name: Joy. “Good morning, how can I serve you?” asked Joy. I told her I would like a blueberry muffin and a cup of coffee. “Can I heat that for you?” she inquired.
“Your muffin,” said Joy. “They’re better when they’re heated.”
Now, most servers would throw your muffin in a bag and slam it on the counter, especially before six a.m., when people tend to be grumpy. As country music singer-songwriter Brad Paisley sings in a song called “The World”: “To the waiter at the restaurant / You’re just another tip.” Curious to know what made Joy different, I asked her why she bothered offering to heat the muffin for me. “I always think about what my mother would want if she was the customer,” she said.
Bingo! If you think like Joy, you’re way ahead of the service game. I had breakfast in that little place every morning for the rest of my trip, because Joy was a joy to see. And I have no doubt that other customers also make it a point to return to the City Loft Hotel and that coffee shop.
The rest of that Brad Paisley song has other examples you don’t want to emulate, like the bank teller who treats you as just another account and the beauty shop to whom you’re just another head of hair. Instead, you want your customers to feel what Paisley tells the girl he’s singing to: “You are the world.”
In a way, all the Customer Rules involve making your clientele feel like “the world” by treating them the way you want your loved ones treated. So here I want to focus on two specific parts of the customer experience, the beginning and the end. I learned how crucial those two moments are from my wife and her mother, who once told me how much they appreciate being treated well when they first walk in the door and then again when they leave the premises. It makes sense that first and last impressions have a tremendous influence on a customer’s lasting impression. A cheery hello and a sincere good-bye can leave a customer with a memory of a positive experience, regardless of what happens in between.
The employees at my branch of the SunTrust Bank are expert at making customers feel special when they enter and when they depart. Lela Johnson, the branch manager, sets the tone by example. Whenever I walk into the bank, she steps out of her office to say hello and ask how Priscilla is doing. And if she sees me on my way out, she always takes the time to say good-bye. That hospitality does not increase the interest the bank pays me on my deposits, but it does increase my interest in doing business with SunTrust.
So I encourage people in all businesses, not just stores or hotels or restaurants, but any outfit—whether it’s a law firm or a financial services provider or a corporate headquarters—to place a friendly, outgoing employee at or near the entrance. Don’t keep customers waiting; in this high-speed era they want to be served quickly. And here’s an added benefit if you work in a retail outlet: It has been proven that when an employee looks customers in the eye and speaks to them, shoplifting goes down dramatically. That alone might cover the cost of having an employee at the door.
And don’t forget to conclude the interaction in a way that encourages a return visit. Whether or not your customer or client made a purchase, or closed a deal, or signed on the dotted line, make sure to walk him to the door and thank him for coming. Show that you’re grateful she stopped by and let her know that you hope she’ll return again and again.
By the same token, if you’re a manager and you want your employees or direct reports to treat your customers the way they would their loved ones, you need to make sure you treat them the way you would your customers. Think of this as the Golden Rule of customer service: Do unto your employees as you would have them do unto your customers. Customers don’t want just a good product; they also want to feel valued, they want to be respected as individuals, and they want authentic human connection. Well, that’s what your employees want, too. And if you give it to them, they’ll pass it along to those they serve.
This simple, straightforward principle applies to every employee in your organization, including all those who work behind the scenes and never see a customer. These are the people who make sure everything works properly and all the materials you need to run your business are well maintained and easy to find. They keep the facilities clean. They’re responsible for forecasting, and purchasing supplies, and keeping the communication technology humming and up-to-date. They load and unload the trucks and stock the storerooms and shelves. Whatever they do, those employees matter, because all of their tasks affect the level of service the customer receives. Think of them as the backstage crew at a theater; without them the actors onstage cannot do their jobs.
I use the acronym ARE to describe what employees want from management: appreciation, recognition, and encouragement. ARE is like a cost-free, infinitely renewable fuel. It never runs out, no matter how much of it you use, and the more of it you give to your employees, the more they will have in reserve to give to your customers. If you master the habit of showering your employees with ARE, you will see rapid improvement in both employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction. So make sure every manager in your organization dispenses ARE generously. If your managers don’t know how to do this, teach them; if they prove unteachable, recast them in another role or get rid of them. Any manager who can’t give out ARE is bad for business.
Early in my career, I was considered a good manager because I knew how to get things done. But I did not know how to treat the people under me, and that shortcoming was not only holding me back, it was holding my employees back from delivering the excellent service our customers expected and deserved. Fortunately, I woke up to this deficiency and learned about the importance of giving them more ARE. In short order, it trickled down to our customers.
When people are made to feel that they matter, they develop self-confidence and self-esteem, and that translates to good performance. Employees who are not treated as if they matter perform as if their jobs don’t matter, either. This is human nature, just as people who don’t feel loved find it hard to give love. So if you want your customers to feel they’re important, make sure your employees feel important, too. I saw a sterling example of this not long ago, when Priscilla and I had lunch at the Pentagon with General Lloyd Austin, the army’s vice chief of staff. When we finished lunch, General Austin excused himself to walk over to the dining room server and thank him for his attentive service. Then he went into the kitchen to thank the cooks for preparing such a nice lunch. If a four-star general has time to deliver ARE to people who can do nothing to advance his own career, I’m sure that you do, too. Learn what makes your employees feel significant and valued and then give it to them.
Wouldn’t you want your mom to be treated this way?