5 ways to keep your customers happy and loyal…

…(and, by the way, increase your revenue).
I think that pretty much everyone knows that the best source of new revenue is your existing customers. That doesn’t just mean selling them new products and services. It also means getting new customers because your current customers love to talk about how great it is to do business with you. There are obviously many components to customer satisfaction; however these five can really set you apart from your competition, since many companies fall short in these areas…

1. Set delivery dates that you know you can meet – then meet (or exceed) them.
2. Call your customer consistently and often with status updates or just to check in.

3. If you make a mistake that impacts the deliverable or the timeline, call your customer to let them know so they can plan ahead.
4. Always be up front and honest about bad news. Take your licks then move on to resolution.
5. Follow up within a reasonable time after delivery (personally – not just email) to make sure your customer really got the value what they expected
You know that there’s work to be done here if you find yourself spending more time answering phone calls from your customers who are complaining than making phone calls to find out how they are doing.
Creating and supporting a culture of great customer service obviously becomes more challenging as you grow. As you begin to delegate customer service to your growing staff, you need to pay attention to how you hire, train, manage and hold them accountable for providing the same great level of service that brought you success in the first place. Too many businesses end up scrambling to resolve customer service issues after the fact. This becomes very costly in terms of time, expense, lost opportunities for new business and, of course, stress and lost sleep. The earlier that you address this in a systematic way, the better off you will be.