Your business is famous for a certain product or service. Perhaps it is what you’ve sold the longest, or has become the most popular.

Customers expect you to have that product whenever they interact with you.

What happens if you’re not ready? Customers will be disappointed.

This exact thing happened on my last trip to Kentucky Fried Chicken.

I ordered my meal, a drink, and a side of fries.

When I ordered my drink via the drive-in speaker box, they said, “Sorry, we’re out. Do you want something else instead?”

I agreed.

Then when I drove through the drive-in and up to the window, they said, “Sorry, it will be a 5-minute wait for the french fries. Do you want another side dish instead?”

Are you kidding me? It is lunch time and you don’t have fries ready?

Needless to say this experience was less than pleasant. My expectations were completely destroyed and I was left with disappointment before I even got my food.

This didn’t set a good stage for a satisfying meal.

Your business may be likewise disappointing customers. Do you have the products customers need in stock?

Are you able to deliver on the promises and expectations you have made with them?

If not, maybe you need to rethink your supply chain, or even cut out the distracting products that are getting in the way of your core products and services.

Many companies charge customers extra for help with installation, set-up, or other assistance in using the purchased product.

Doubtless more of your customers have trouble than would pay for this service up-front.

Why? Because people assume they know how to get everything working.

Buying installation assistance, help, or other services requires customers to admit they don’t know what they are doing.

This is a mental dilemma which may be difficult for your more proud customers.

So what is the solution?

Include all the help a customer needs with the purchase. It is a value add. It is a bonus.

Including the necessary help with a purchase is a competitive advantage for you.

You are saying, “Customer, I will help you.”

Costco is a great example of this principle.

With each electronic purchase, Costco has a free concierge service. This service will help you (over the phone) with any trouble you have with installation, setup, or use of the product.

You need to differentiate yourself from your competition. This is particularly true if you are selling a commodity product in a crowded marketplace.

Providing help to customers is a very personal thing and will not only help close the sale but will build an enduring relationship with them.

Every single one of your employees needs to be able to help customers.

On our recent trip to Disneyland, I found myself asking multiple employees throughout the day, “Where’s the nearest restroom?”

Every time I asked this question, they kindly described how to get to the nearest restroom and pointed me in the right direction.

Your employees need to know the answers to customers’ most common questions.

Whenever I go to Lowe’s home improvement store, the employees are extremely helpful in aiding me to find the parts I need. Whenever I stop to ask a Lowe’s employee where can I find a product, they stop what they are doing and walk with me across the store and show me.

Your employees should know where other departments and products are located, even if they aren’t directly responsible for them.

Naturally, each employee will not know everything in their head. However, they need to be prepared on multiple fronts.

If an employee doesn’t know the answer, they should have a clear escalation path to get the customer’s question or problem resolved.

If the answer isn’t known, the employee should know who to talk with in order to help the customer. Ideally, your staff would walk with or personally transfer the customer to the one who knows the answer.

Your employees may not know everything about your business, but they can give that impression to customers.

Follow the 80/20 rule.

Make sure your staff can answer the common and frequent customer questions. For example, know what is stock and where to find products. This will cover 80% of your customers’ needs.

As a backup, make sure your employees know who to talk to and provide a smooth transition for the customer to find the resolution they seek. This will handle the remaining 20% of your customers.

By preparing your staff and anticipating customer questions and concerns, you can be ready when they come and provide the outstanding service your customers expect.

Consistency is the key to a great customer experience. If you start slipping up or forgetting things, your customers can only assume other problems are afoot as well.

On a recent vacation, the hotel we stayed at was consistently inconsistent. Everyday that the housekeeping crew cleaned our room, something different was forgotten.

One day, the trash was left in the room. The next day, no towels were left for us. This patterned continued during the length of our stay.

This poor service undermined our experience and solidified our decision to never stay there again.

Why is consistency so important?

Consistency assures your current customers of the experience they will have the next time they do business with you. If you did a good job this time, the customer will be more likely to do repeat business with you.

Consistency helps retain those customers that would otherwise turn to a competitor.

Consistency makes it extremely easy for your current customers to tell their friends about your business.

Being consistently bad doesn’t do you any good. If you consistently meet customer expectations, they will be satisfied.

If you consistently exceed customer expectations, you will delight customers and they will turn into loyal, raving fans.

One of the 7 deadly wastes is that of rework or over-processing. You may want to look at processes in your company to see if rework waste is hampering your efficiency.

However, be sure you analyze not just your internal steps but also those imposed on your customers.

On a recent trip to my bank’s ATM I had to deposit some checks. I had pre-made my deposit envelope for both my business and personal deposits.

As I started using the ATM, I noticed they had changed their machine. They no longer wanted deposit envelopes. They wanted me to submit my checks one-by-one into the machine.

The ATM then scanned the check, read the amount, and processed the deposit. This is a great gain for tellers. No longer would a bank employee have to open the envelope and manually process the checks. Surely this reduces errors and frees up the tellers for other work.

However, this causes a serious crunch on customer throughput.

It took me four times my normal transaction time to make my deposits. During this time, the line of cars behind me steadily grew.

The bank’s efficiency gain came by shifting the burden to the customer.

When you change your process, think about how it will change customer behavior. Just because you are more efficient doesn’t mean that your customers will be.

If one customer is less efficient because of your change, odds are others’ experience will also be adversely impacted.

Convenience fees for accepting credit cards are evil. Almost as evil as rebates.

One of the joys of running a business is having customers that pay you. They arrive with any number of payment forms. If you want to get paid, you have to juggle accepting different payment types with costs of doing such.

Unfortunately, some businesses lure you in with a “pay by credit card” promise when, in fact, you have to pay extra for the “convenience” of this service.

Small Businesses

Large stores will accept credit cards for what would seem any amount, even less than a dollar. Why? Because the cashier is just an employee. These front line folks probably don’t even know what a merchant account is or how it works. They feel no pain like you (the business owner) do at the killer fees you have to pay to process a credit card transaction.

Don’t use the excuse that you are a small business to slap a “convenience fee” on a customer. I’ve seen my share of handwritten notes taped to cash registers indicating a 25 cent fee will be applied to orders under $5. You’ve probably seen these too.

If you have such a sign on your register, consider that it may be a violation of your terms of service with the credit card companies.

As a small business owner, I know that you have to pay the merchant account and processing handlers per transaction. When you run that low dollar purchase, your fees are a higher percentage of the total than a more expensive purchase.

Nevertheless, you walk a fine line between alienating customers and violating the credit card companies’ terms of service. Neither option seems like a good one.

Online

Credit card processing is the backbone of e-commerce. Unfortunately, some government and utilities insist on charging a “convenience fee” for paying online.

I know they are just passing along their fees to the customer. But the customers don’t know that. They are just hit with a 3-4% “fee” that greatly increases their out-of-pocket expenses.

Take a look at the savings you’ll get from accepting credit cards online and they will offset the overhead of paying for people to open envelopes and manually process payments received by mail.

Just Say No

If your offline business deals with lots of transactions around a low dollar amount, maybe you shouldn’t take credit cards to begin with.

My wife reminded me of Amy’s Ice Cream here in Austin. Not only do they have “legendary” ice cream but also have an ATM in the corner of their store for your “convenience!”

There is a fabulous Mexican restaurant, Julio’s, in town that only accepts cash. The food is so good that it doesn’t matter, they are always packed with people.

Naturally, a “no credit cards” policy may be a barrier to some customers. However, if your product is superb and your service is excellent, people will come back and bring their friends, cash in hand.

Do you charge your customers for being difficult to work with? Maybe you slap them with a convenience fee for using their credit card. Or perhaps you slap them with a late fee when they don’t pay on time.

However, do you ever charge them up front, at the point of sale for not behaving?

I’d hope not.

A sign outside the JCPenney’s photo studio claims that a $9.95 per person sitting fee will be charged if the subject doesn’t behave.

Why would I ever want to take my unpredictable children to get pictures there? I wouldn’t.

If you can’t change the customer…

Instead of charging customers that don’t behave, why don’t you specialize in helping customers behave and act like you want? Kiddie Kandids specializes in children’s photography. They don’t charge fees for rowdy people. In fact, they are experts at getting kids to sit still and smile.

Your Competition Loves Your Customers

Your competition is welcoming your disgruntled customers with open arms by accepting them just the way they are.

Contrast this sitting fee dilemma with a sign that hangs up at my favorite barbecue place here in Austin: Rudy’s. It reads that if you whine, you’ll get charged $10.

On the surface this appears to be the same problem and even rude. However, the atmosphere and culture at Rudy’s immediately tells customers that this sign is a joke. Come in and enjoy some food.

Your “policies” and signs may very well be the fodder that fuels your competition to make fun of you and laugh all the way to the bank.

Customers love surprises – but only when they are good surprises. Your job is to create those positive surprises that will excite and delight customers.

Keys to a Great Customer Surprise

For customer surprises to be successful, use these “giddy-with-excitement” surprise tips.

• Free – it isn’t a surprise if you have to pay extra for it
• Unexpected – surprises come out the blue without warning and without high expectations
• Exclusive – Is your surprise a special gift for the customer that non-customers don’t get?
• Relevant – your surprise should be a good match, companion, or accessory to the main purchase.

Let’s look at an example.

LEGO Surprise

Earlier this year I ordered some LEGO Star Wars sets from lego.com. When they arrived, I opened the first set and discovered they had included a special anniversary Darth Vader mini-figurine. I was giddy with excitement.

Free: Not only was this surprise free, but it came in the cheapest LEGO set I bought. Bonus.

Unexpected: There was no indication on the packaging that 1 out of 10 boxes has a surprise. This made the discovery all the more sweet. Promoting the odds of winning a “gift” can only lead to heartache for the majority that don’t win.

Exclusive: After doing some research, I discovered that LEGO is only putting these Darth Vaders in random sets this year. Lucky me!

Relevant: What could be more relevant to my Star Wars LEGO set than the iconic Darth Vader?

What about branded surprises?

You may be tempted to give away company swag: key chains, magnets, t-shirts, etc.. Don’t do it unless it matches the criteria to a good customer surprise.

Think about it: do you like to get these company labeled products? What do you do with them? Throw them away? Exactly.

Looking at the example above, you can see it had a subtle promotion built-in. LEGO had included a figurine that will remind you how much you love LEGO and want to buy more.

Surprise Them Today

What can you do to pleasantly surprise your customers today? Remember, since they aren’t expecting it, you can start small if needed. Try surprising customers in a good way (for once) and you’ll be amazed at how they return to do business with you again. If your surprise is good enough, they may even tell some friends.

Your potential customers will arrive at the point of sale and sometimes will not be able to pay. You need to be ready for these times so that the interaction between you and the customer can go smoothly.

On a recent trip to Target, the couple ahead of me at the checkout had their credit card denied.

They argued for a minute with each other, got frustrated, told the cashier “sorry”, and walked away without their products.

I asked the cashier if that happened a lot.

She said, “Yes, all the time. And people get mad at me like I had something to do with it.”

This is one example where your front line employees are getting frustrated by customers. What are you doing to help both parties in these situations?

You Need Procedures

When you leave it up to the employees to field an awkward situation like this, they get frustrated and the customers get inconsistent experiences. Having procedures in place will help ease tense situations.

When customers’ payment fails, your employees need to:

• Know what to say to the customer. (Reassurance, guidance, explanations)
• Give alternatives on how to purchase. Maybe try cash or check instead of the denied credit card.
• Instruct the customer on what to do next. “Sorry we can’t complete your purchase today, if you …”
• Know now to handle the incomplete purchase in your systems. Are there certain keystrokes or database fields that need to be updated to cancel an order?

Sometimes customers forget their money and sincerely want to and can pay for their purchase. Treat them with respect and have a plan for them too.

Even if you are a sole proprietor, having a checklist of actions will save you time and effort when you encounter similar situations in the future.

Today’s Interaction Determines Tomorrow’s Customer

Make it smooth because today’s lost customer could come back tomorrow with cash in-hand. Don’t let a little hiccup today stress out your customers or your employees.

I went to the Apple store the other day to check out the new Macbooks. My wife wanted me to pick up an accessory for her iPod while I was there (sure thing, honey!).

After I played with the new Macbook a little, I found the iPod accessory I needed, grabbed it off the shelf, and turned around, ready to purchase.

I was lost. I didn’t know where to go.

There are no traditional registers in the store. I saw other customers sitting and waiting. I’m not sure for what.

I didn’t know if I should speak to the Apple store people in the blue t-shirts or the orange ones.

There were no clear lines.

No clear way for me to buy my selection.

I got frustrated and returned the accessory to the shelf. I turned and walked out of the store.

We ended up picking up what we needed on a subsequent visit to Target.

So how did the Apple store lose my business?

I had the product in hand. I wanted to buy. I was even willing to wait if only I knew how and where.

The Apple store is so in love with design and being different that they broke the social norms of shopping. In so doing, they risk introducing confusion to shoppers and losing money.

So now, I view the Apple Store as a “try it before you buy it” place, meaning I most likely will buy it somewhere else.

Apple still makes their money even if it doesn’t all come through their retail stores. Nevertheless, chances are, you’re not Apple. You need to convert those prospects to customers because there probably isn’t a backup to catch their money in some other venue.

Think about how you service your customers. They want to spend their money with you. Are there barriers in their way to spending money with you? Remove them and watch the cash flow.