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The Secrets to Creating Customer Satisfaction

Written by: Harry Frisch

Article Overview: As many a manager and business owner knows, maintaining consistently high customer satisfaction ratings can be a monumental task in any arena, and presents its greatest challenge in the sales arena. For that reason, in this article, the sales arena will be our main point of focus; but with very little imagination, I think you will see that: herein lies the secrets to dramatically increasing customer satisfaction ratings across the boards.

The Secrets to Creating Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction is the single most important factor in the successful pursuit of customer referrals and customer loyalty. Every experienced business owner and senior executive worth his salt knows the value of repeat business and referrals to the long-term growth of his business. And yet, it remains one of the most perplexing mysteries in modern business, why there never seems to be a high enough rating when it comes to customer satisfaction.

As many a manager and business owner knows, maintaining consistently high customer satisfaction ratings can be a monumental task in any arena, and presents its greatest challenge in the sales arena. For that reason, in this article, the sales arena will be our main point of focus; but with very little imagination, I think you will see that: herein lies the secrets to dramatically increasing customer satisfaction ratings across the boards.

Why, despite all of the strong intentions of the business owner and management, and even the well-intentioned salespeople, does the overall customer satisfaction rating in the world of sales come out so low? The answer to this mystery lies in the understanding of a single concept!

Customer satisfaction rises and falls upon the concept of “high-quality service”. But, high-quality service is much easier said than consistently delivered to the customer. So, what are the key ingredients which assure consistent delivery of high-quality service?

To the degree a salesman, backed up by his whole sales organization,

• understands the importance of servicing the customer;

• has the intention to service the customer as a high priority; and

• has good command of the skills required to properly service the customer, there will be a consistent delivery of high-quality service.

As thoroughly covered in the book designed specifically to elevate customer satisfaction, HOW TO SELL – Clear and Simple, the keys to achieving this level of high-quality-service are:

• excellent communication skills;

• high level of care;

• high ability to truly understand the customer's viewpoint (goals, needs, wants, limitations, etc.); and

• good enough command of the selling skills to smoothly and effectively move a prospect through The Five Crucial Steps of a Sale; And last but not least, for the achievement of high-quality service, is

• good customer follow-through, at which point the salesman continues to ensure that his customer is completely satisfied with all aspects of the sales experience.

Short-term gains are available to a salesman and his organization with or without high ratings in the area of customer satisfaction. But for those who are seeking long-term stability and growth, you will find that the road to your goals will need to be in close sync with and correlate highly with the achievement of customer satisfaction.

(c) 2004, 2005, 2006, Harry Frisch, STI Publishing. All Rights Reserved.

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Related Forum Posts
Re: Two Useful Books To Help You Focus On The CLIENT - Hi David, To add to your thread, I'd like to recommend Jonathan Tisch's "Chocolates On The Pillow Aren't Enough: Reinventing The Customer Experience". Tisch's book includes content on "Welcoming Customers", "The New Art of Customization", "The Challenges of Customer Diversity" and "Offering Something Extra to Your Customers" to name a few.
Re: Some attractive terms in advertisement - [quote="lane_hug":sqdmyojl]Some terms can make the advertisement look more attractive, like unlimited, free, life time guarantee, and more. These should be definitely incorporated to ensure fast sales.[/quote:sqdmyojl] You've got to be careful with such terms, though. Take as an example the poor Korean dry cleaners who had the words "Satisfaction guaranteed" on their storefront window. They lost (supposedly) a pair of slacks from some loony judge, who proceeded to sue them for MILLIONS of dollars (over a $100 pair of slacks) because they did not provide him with satisfaction. [If the sign had said "Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back" perhaps none of it would have happened...] These days more and more people are apt to sue at the drop of a hat, and if you promise them something even though common sense says you wouldn't have meant what you said (for example Pepsi got in trouble because their commercial for Pepsi points, at the time the movie True Lies came out, featured a Harrier jet as in the movie. A few looney businessmen bought up all the points the could to get that jet, although they were told it had just been dramatic license, and ended up suing Pepsi for misleading advertising. The suit was dismissed, but the fact that the guy was able to find lawyers who'd even take the case on is scary. To cut a long story short, be careful what terms you use, and think to yourself what you'd have to do if people took them literally.
Re: Can you outsource your product launch? - Yes that what I am talking about. Creating a buzz for your online product launch basically. Is this part of what you do?
Re: Social Media & Digg, Google, MySpace, and YouTube - Hi Kathy, What I meant about it being worth it was in the sense that I described. Creating multiple accounts for various sites and posting and ranking your own stuff. It's very time consuming to say the least. I'm just wondering if there's anyone out there that has done this and thinks it's beneficial.
Re: Paypal process $315 million in payments per day. - I agree with you David, their Customer relations suck. This mean other payment systems like 2CO and WORLDPAY should work on their customers relations to take more slice of the market.


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