Let's say your company has a great approach to customer service—you offer quality products or services, your front-line staff are friendly and knowledgeable and you respond quickly and effectively to any concern. As good as this scenario sounds, your customers might still consider you so-so if the competition is even better.

In a post at Inc.com's Marketing Blog, Michele Miller compares the experience of shopping at two health-food stores, each of which she visits at least once a week. When she's at Store A, employees offer what anyone would consider good customer service. "As they ring me up," she says, "we might chat for a moment about the weather or something from the morning newspaper. They'll throw a couple of samples into my bag and send me off with, 'Have a nice day.'" Sounds great, right?

But Store A has a problem called Store B, where "the clerks ask me how I liked that new protein powder I bought last week," she says, "or how my husband reacted to the smell of that macadamia nut lotion they saw me testing." This is when Miller notices that every time she goes to Store A the staff act like they've never seen her before.

"Guess which store just opened a fourth location to meet customer demand?" asks Miller, underscoring the health-food-based Marketing Inspiration. "It doesn't take the memory of an elephant to remember your customers or clients, just a little more awareness of the universe around you—and your patrons."

Source: Inc.com. Click here for the full post.

More Inspiration:
Elaine Fogel: What If Businesses Advertised Like Politicians?
Paul Williams: Create What You Need vs. Grow What You Have
Ted Mininni: Are 'Complete' Products Being 'Totaled'?

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