Know Your Customer, Build Your Reputation

The reputation a company has is built upon consistent delivery during the customer experience. That statement holds true for both positive and negative experiences. What is your reputation? Are you maintaining a good one or repairing a bad one?

Online retail is almost exclusively built on trust and reputation. Seller reviews and post-sale customer service experiences are the key components most online buyers are looking for. What most people don't realize, is these reviews are also a great resource to find ways to improve the way you do business. Look at competitors negative reviews, and make their weakness your strength. These reviews are also a great way to identify in store opportunities. You may encounter why a certain product is doing so well online by reading the great things people are saying, and use that as additional product knowledge.

Reputation also goes into your success in attracting the very best talent available to help build your brand. Being known as a great company to work for, can quickly go sour if the people involved don't display the same professionalism and brand passion that built that reputation.

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Always "Sweat" the Small Stuff

As we are all searching for the next best way to cut costs, I ran across an old article about an approach Delta Airlines took in the mid-90's. They asked their employees! On an employee suggestion, they removed the lettuce leaf that was served in their food trays as garnish to an astounding $1.4 million in annual savings! http://gtalumni.org/Publications/magazine/win93/delta.html I recently worked for a company that was so incredibly operationally inefficient that I was amazed they were still in business. Three months later, they weren't! From having way too much lighting in the stock areas, to a time-wasting price change procedure, to unnecessary shipping costs($4ship fee for a $.99 item), to incredible wastes of paper (I actually counted a minimum of 45 sheets per day wasted...in one store). This store had so many little things that could have completely changed the cost of business, it is a shame they didn't listen to their employees. Employees may not have t

The Power Of Social Networks-Myspace vs. Facebook

AOL started it. With very popular chat rooms and a skeletal, but functional, social network. Myspace , Facebook , Twitter , Bebo , Friendster , LinkedIN and several others have since emerged. All offering something unique to make their platform the biggest and most successful. As I learn more about blog writing/internet marketing (yes, they go hand-in-hand), it is clear that these sites drive the "personality" that the online society has taken. To be successful online, it is clear that a strong and steady participation and presence on these sites is critical. This blog generates reports that allow me to view the sources of my daily traffic. So far, Facebook, Myspace, and LinkedIn, are responsible for a LARGE portion of my visitors. I am pretty much a "nobody" writing on a topic that interests me. I realize how amazing it is that because of the internet, people from around the world are reading what I am writing!! I wonder how powerful these sites would be

Is Customer Service Dead?

This is a question I keep hearing as I work on this blog. It seems that no matter where you go, that companies pride themselves on putting the customer first, but that doesn't really seem to be the truth. I have found nightmare stories from telephone customer service operators, to in store employees. But I have also read some amazing stories of how an employee went well beyond their job description to make a customer happy. When I got into retail in the early 90's, customer service was king. Empowerment for employees to that end, was almost unlimited. Recognition for the individuals going above and beyond was common. It was a time when companies realized it was their people and their people's ideas and successes that drove the company's success. Southwest Airlines exploded by taking a radical approach to customer service. At the same time they also took a radical approach in the treatment of their people, doing such things as "costume day". Work was f

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