Understand Your Customers & Go the Extra Mile!
Years ago, when I was in Marketing for a major Canadian manufacturer, part of my job was to organize and manage company trade shows. The biggest show of the year was coming up and I needed some fresh ideas to draw customers into the booth.
To help me find creative idea’s I had four different promotional companies pitch ideas for the big show. All of them offered a unique perspective but the company that ultimately won the business presented a full service package that included a way to get customers into the booth, engage them by leading them through a contest and present them with a prize upon completion. As simple as it sounds the idea addressed a pain point and allowed us to naturally engage with our customers at the show.
I realized later that the account manager that won the business didn’t win it by chance. He won it by understanding what his customer needed. Before pitching anything, he made a special effort to meet and discuss our previous trade show successes and failures. He asked questions about our company, our culture, our objectives and what we liked and didn’t like about trade shows. He did his research and was able to come back prepared to address our major issues.
The story gets more interesting. The account manager met me the day before the trade show to present me with the 1200 promotional give away items that I would hand out at the booth the next day. When we opened the cartons (that were shipped the week before) we were shocked to find that every single item had a flaw that made them defective and unusable!
With potential disaster looming the account manager jumped in his car, got on the phone and drove six hours to the factory. He convinced them to re-manufacture the items and he personally quality checked the new product while he waited. With a full car load he started his journey back to the trade show at midnight and arrived one hour before the opening of the show the next morning.
Wow – Above and Beyond! He made a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. He averted potential disaster and he behaved as if my company was the only customer on earth. And all for a $2000 order! Worth it?
That single act of customer service and integrity turned into a decade of business loyalty.
Lessons Learned
- Take the time to research your customers business
- Clearly understand their objectives and their pain points
- Don’t try and sell them anything – provide a solution to their problem
- Provide exceptional customer service – go the extra mile
- When face with a problem jump in with two feet & take care of it personally
* A special thank you to Ken Dumond of Genumark for outstanding customer service and integrity.
