The phrase “What am I, chopped liver?” is uttered when a person is made to feel that he or she is not special. It’s exactly how some customers feel as a result of neglect by companies. I’m seeing this scenario play out in a membership-based company that’s constantly offering special discount pricing to acquire new customers
When I asked other business professionals when it’s best to lose a customer or client, the reasons boiled down to the customer’s lack of respect and not being fully committed to the working relationship. Examples cited included: difficult interactions with or mistreating customer-contact employees being unresponsive and uncooperative paying late or not at all. The
For anyone focused on growing a company, it’s hard to turn down new business. But sometimes it’s necessary. My first experience with this situation took place nearly two decades ago, and I remember it clearly. After much debate and hand-wringing about submitting a proposal, I turned to a fellow consultant for feedback. I explained my
It’s been nearly seven years since I featured excerpts from Chris Bonney‘s white paper, The View from the Front, about adapting to the recession in my post, Help For Marketers Dealing with the “New Different.” Back then … What’s amazing to me is how little conditions have actually changed since Chris described them in 2009: “Consumers have
Signs of intelligent marketing at last! Lately I’ve seen more marketers respond to consumer sensitivity and backlash to promotional and informational overload – a major contributor to attention and intention deficit. Here are two examples. The first is an excerpt from Penny Sansevieri’s Book Marketing Alert newsletter*: I don’t know about you but I’m overwhelmed almost
As the face of your brand, employees are your organization’s key contributor to sustainable, competitive differentiation. Think of it this way: product and service innovation can be short-lived in a crowded and commoditized market, but the one thing technology cannot replace and competitors cannot copy is your employees’ relationship with customers. Here are several great quotes
Reviewing my blog’s top posts over the past few years, I was surprised with the popularity of my “favorite employee engagement quotes” posts. So I’ll continue to share the best quotes on workplace engagement compiled from both current and classic articles on the subject. Here are Quality Service Marketing’s top seven blog posts: Is Your
A brilliant marketing colleague of mine taught me the three most important questions that need to be considered based on the customer’s perspective. These apply to both product and service providers in B2B (business-to-business) and B2C (business-to-consumer) organizations. Who cares? To better understand who needs the company’s products/services, and how it matters to them. What
Marketing may do a great job of communicating brand value to consumers, yet it doesn’t necessarily do the same for communicating its own value within an organization. Far too often I hear marketing staff commiserate about how they struggle to get respect and buy-in for their programs, including from the areas they support such as
Customers – love ’em or sometimes hate ’em – if you’re in business, you can’t live without them. True customer-focus means understanding, respecting, and serving customers as the basis of your business rather than considering them a necessary evil. Following are several of my favorite quotes about customers and their importance. Think of them as