If you haven’t figured it out by now, I think customer service is a huge part of a successful business. Many businesses lose sight of this as soon as they start to make money. Customers are the most important thing you have, without them you have no business.

One thing that many business owners have a difficult time doing is putting themselves in their customer’s shoes. A business owner needs to learn to  think about situations from a different perspective, other than their own. That’s a really tough thing for many to learn.
Try to put yourself in your customers shoes, better …read more

Building good relationships is important for your small business. You should focus on building strong relationships with your customers, employees, with your vendors, and with others related to your business.

Why are all these relationships important?

Building a strong relationship with your customers is the most obvious, but some businesses still don’t get that. Your customers are your best marketing tool! Treat them well and they’ll sing your praises and come back for repeat business. Treat them poorly and it could mean the end of your business.
Building a strong relationship with your vendors is not as obvious, but just as important. When …read more

A recent Google search turned up a newsreleasewire.com entry from a “business relationship expert“. I’ve personally gone back and forth on the value of social networks to business but a major change has occurred. I recently attended a customer conference for users of our software and found tremendous interest in the use of social networking capabilities that my company is making available to clients.
This “interest” is from every age group and goes beyond “that would be nice” to comments from those who use the networks about how well they work and suggestions on how to interact with each other. The …read more