JAY ROBB: – Hamilton Spectator

It's not my fault but it is my problem.

This is a Disney World mantra that you should adopt if you're serious about customer service.

When a customer comes to you with a complaint, you don't duck, dodge or do nothing. You don't transfer their call, forward their email or tell them to talk to someone else. You don't pass the buck or say your hands are tied and nothing can be done.

Instead, you clean up the mess, even if it's not of your making. You own the problem and stay with your customer until she gets a solution or resolution.

"Obsessive customer service is one of the best ways to trump the competition," says Terry O'Reilly, author of "This I Know: Marketing Lessons from Under the Influence," co-founder of Pirate Radio and Television and a CBC radio host. "Your competitor's lack of obsessive customer service is your opportunity. Delivering consistent, superlative, standout customer service is one of the best ways to cause your competitors to find you really, completely irritating."

Yes, customer service will cost you money. But it will make you far more money than you invest, says O'Reilly.

"Memorable, outstanding, go-the-extra-mile, I-can't-believe-you-just-did-that-for-me customer service is as rare as a winning lottery ticket. But if played daily, it is a winning lottery ticket for the company. The return on investment is tenfold."

That's because great customer service fuels word of mouth, which O'Reilly calls the most powerful advertising of all. Happy customers rave, dissatisfied customers rant and social media gives both a huge audience.

One way to earn rave reviews is to go the extra inch.

"Smart businesses search for ways to deliver the smallest touches to make an experience memorable. The smaller the detail, the more intrigued and impressed I am," says O'Reilly.

Along with being a game of inches, marketing starts by answering a fundamental question: What business are you really in?

"Don't answer that question too quickly. Most people get it wrong. Yet it's the most important marketing question you can ask yourself. Until you answer it correctly, your marketing will always lack focus," says O'Reilly. "If you truly know what business you're in, you will be selling the right thing and solving the right problems."

What you're selling and what we're buying can be two very different things. You sell products and services, but we buy solutions.

"Customers don't want your product," says O'Reilly. "They want the benefit of the product. People buy benefits. Not products. Not features. And they buy these solutions from companies they can relate to."

Molson isn't in the beer business, says O'Reilly. They're in the party business with beer as the social lubricant.

Michelin doesn't sell tires. They sell safety.

Starbucks is in the coffee theatre business. Nike is in the motivation business. Apple sells personal empowerment, while Coke sells happiness.

"You have to quietly observe what customers are really buying from you. They will tell you, but you have to listen carefully. The best marketers are the best listeners."

Having won hundreds of international advertising awards, O'Reilly is well worth listening to. His book should be required reading for entrepreneurs, small business owners and leaders of nonprofits who don't have monster marketing budgets and ad agencies on retainer.

Jay Robb, director of communications at Mohawk College, reviews business-focused books for The Hamilton Spectator. Follow on Twitter: @jayrobb

Originally posted here:

JAY ROBB: - Hamilton Spectator