Are there ways that you can spruce things up around your store or office this summer?

 Put a fresh coat of paint on those walls or paint it a different, more vibrant color.

 Take down any outdated or faded posters, pictures, flyers.

 Please don't put hand written signs in your windows such as "Be back in 15 minutes" or any such thing. You can buy these signs inexpensively at any office supply store. I know you're always in a hurry, but your image depends on this!

 I hope your voice-mail or recorded message about hours, etc. at least sounds professional. I have personally re-done many of my client's own recordings to make it sound inviting and welcoming (I used to do voice-overs for radio commercials). Ask a friend or a family member to do this for you if they have a good speaking voice.

 Can you put an inexpensive flowering pot outside your front door?

 Does your office or store smell nice?

 Try a fresh bouquet of flowers at front desk or entrance. These can be purchased for a song at grocery store and you only need to replace them once a week.

All of this may seem trivial to you, but believe me, your customer notices and little computer in their head takes notes.

www.downanddirtymarketing.com Copyright 2002 Re-use permission Karen@HippMarketing.com

Over past month, I have had great service at a couple of places that I want to share with you.

While writing my ebook, I was in need of an ebook cover. I had no idea where to go, so I started on Internet. Most places appeared very expensive and confusing. I eventually hired a company to design cover, and immediately received a personal note thanking me for buying services (great start) and that my draft cover would be ready in about 3 days. 7 days went by, no cover, 10 days went by, no cover. Repeated emails were not returned. I had to call my credit card company to try to retrieve my money.

As you can imagine, I was gun shy to try this on Internet again, but I found a site that I thought looked pretty good and paid my money. These people are wonderful. I received very prompt service and they even went over and above to make changes for me. Never once did I feel as if I was a "burden." If you are looking for an ebook cover or ezine (magazine) cover and more, go to www.3dcovers.com. I guarantee that you will be treated as if you were king of world!

My mother recently had knee surgery. She had been to several doctors to check them out and was not having great success. Then she found a doctor that was about 50 miles out of town. She went to see him and felt immediately comfortable. She said she never felt "rushed" and he patiently answered every question. Now this particular doctor is extremely successful and you would think he would give you about 10 minutes at best. Yet he treated her as if she was only patient he had all day. Needless to say, she made an appointment for surgery before she left office.

But wait! There's more! The day before surgery, a private van came to pick her up at home, even though she lives 50 miles away! You are free to have a guest with you and your guest can stay with you in your private room overnight. Even though this procedure is done in hospital, you actually get a huge menu to choose your meals from that is prepared specifically for you. My Mom said she felt she died and went to heaven. She didn't want to leave!

Now do you understand why this doctor is so wildly successful? Granted, these services go above norm, but money that was spent on these services is reaped a hundred fold in customers (and cold hard cash).

If you want to jump your sales now (and get repeat customers for future) take a serious look at your customer service. You don't have to spend as much money as Doc above, but get creative and see what you can do! It's far too competitive out there to just let this slide. And remember:

Survey's show that #1 reason people return to a store is because of customer service received.

Believe it baby!

www.downanddirtymarketing.com Copyright 2002. Re-use permissiom Karen@Hippmarketing.com