You’ve got an idea – great.
You put together some money – great.
You get a team together – great.
You get to work on your idea with your team – great.
Things take off – great.
The money starts pouring in – great.
A new car, a new house, new friends – great.
And then something happens.
Maybe a disagreement with one of your key team members causes them to leave. Maybe a slight oversight in the books. Maybe a blunder by a partner.
It could be any number of things and suddenly, it’s all gone.
Ideas are a dime a dozen.
What is harder to find are good ideas.
Great ideas are even rarer.
But ideas are just one part of a business. Robert Kiyosaki talks about a B-I Triangle, which breaks up a company into 8 areas, of which “product” is the smallest.
If I were to sum up a what about 70% of the triangle is, in one word, I would say SERVICE.
Think about your favorite restaurant, why do you go there? Is it for the food? Of course. Would you still go if the service was lousy? If they were disorganized or rude? No.
Assuming you have a decent product to offer clients, service becomes king.
People like to know they are, as All-State’s motto states, “you’re in good hands.”
What’s amazing is that most businesses fail at the service end, not with their actual product or idea.
They let the product do everything and forget to create a memorable experience that distinguishes them from their competition.
Ever since I decided to walk away from the corporate world 11 years ago I realized that my success depended on one thing – me.
My competitors had better locations, larger teams, large marketing budgets, as well as many other advantages.
What they didn’t have is my passion and desire.
Fast forward to today and I’m still here while many of my big competitors have closed up shop.
It wasn’t easy but I worked hard to differentiate myself from the bigger firms and it paid off.
I admit that when I started out I wasn’t quite as well informed or prepared as I would have liked to have been, so I made up for what I lacked by going the extra mile.
As my clients’ needs grew, I knew I had to, too. I stayed one step ahead of them by educating myself.
I started out studying business ideas, then I moved onto success principles and now am focusing my energies on to marketing techniques and finance.
Thanks to investing in myself, I have be able to pass along so many ideas to my clients and give them an extra-ordinary experience.
What’s the difference between ordinary and extra-ordinary?
First the ordinary:
- A Website
- Yellow Pages Ad
- Magazine Ad
- Telephone number
In today’s world a website is ordinary. In fact, if you don’t have a website you’re living in the dark ages.
No need for anything fancy.
A website needs to be two things above all: simple and useful.
You want to make it easy to navigate around your site. Assuming you’ve done that then the next thing you need to provide is valuable information that keeps them coming back to it and telling others about it.
How do you do that?
It doesn’t take a lot. People coming to your site want what you’ve got.
If you’re in the health business, then share tips on how to lose weight, what equipment to choose, gyms to attend, coaches to keep an eye out for, whatever.
And you do this is in as many ways as you can. Here are just a few simple, yet extra-ordinary things any business can implement to enhance their service to their clients.
- Blogs
- Toll-free number
- Create PDFs to act as consumer guides
- Interview people of interest
- Coupons
- Bonuses
- Create a private area for your special clients. (Something I just introduced myself)
Sound pretty ordinary, right? The problem is that most companies don’t do them, which makes the few that do, extra-ordinary.
Some companies do start a blog, but fizzle out. Most can’t be bothered to create a consumer guide. And even less interview people in the know of their industry. Why? Because they’re too busy selling or working on some new deal.
What about aftercare? What about appreciating the clients you already have? The key is doing both, not either.
Two things regarding websites that so many companies mess up.
Number one – companies confuse stylish with good.
Consumers today are better educated and want valuable information, not fluff.
Number two – not updating their site.
A good friend of mine is guilty of this; he doesn’t update his site regularly enough to reflect his company situation which misleads potential clients.
There are hundreds of ideas that are seemingly ordinary, but are extra-ordinary.
Why be ordinary when all it takes is a little effort to be extra-ordinary.
You don’t have to do extra-ordinary things, just do ordinary things extra-ordinarily well.
Go the extra mile! Your clients and bottom line will thank you.
Adrian Shepherd