Noticing Customers Needs

Make the customer important

I was in Barnes and Noble on Saturday with my daughter and granddaughter. It was really busy, which I like because I love bookshops and I want them to keep in business. I chose two fairly heavy books and was on my way to the checkout. The lines were REALLY long. I said to my daughter, “I’ll come back later we don’t have time to wait.”

The guy at the front of the store who was handling the ‘nook’ table overheard and said, “You can go to the coffee store and pay for them there. There’s no line!” So I went there.

On the way to the car, my daughter said, “That was really good service.”

And it was.

The minimum is just not enough

It was different from the average service we’d had at other stores we’d been in that morning. Average service is when you are not really noticed. You get the service, but there is little eye contact, and definitely no pro-active, “you can go to the coffee store and pay for them there!”

How do you teach that kind of service? Tell people that it makes their lives better when you provide good service. The guy in Barnes and Noble was interested, curious and ALIVE. He wasn’t just standing there like a blob waiting for a customer to come and ask him for help. He was LOOKING for ways to be of service. He had a light in his eye and a smile on his face. And that’s the way to live a MEANINGFUL LIFE!