Elevate Your Company Blog

Smile! I know that may sound simple but you may not know that a simple smile can make a very big impact.

We’ve all heard the saying that “You never get a second chance to make a great first impression.” But how long do you think it takes for someone to form a first impression of you? An hour? A minute? Maybe just a few seconds?

Think about the last time you were invited to a business meeting. How did you feel? If you’re like a lot of people, your immediate thought might be that the meeting is going to be a waste of time, you may complain to your colleagues and expect to be bored.

The third commitment to customer service is execution, or what we do. 

The second commitment to customer service is communication, or what we say. It’s estimated that over half of all IT projects fail at some point. Many think this is because of poor planning, inadequate technology, minimal funding or lack of resources. These factors could be the case in a small segment of failures but in my experience, most IT projects fail due to a lack of soft skills; and more specifically the lack of communication skills among highly technical people. To execute affectively and achieve the highest level of customer satisfaction, IT professionals must master the art of communication.

We all know that customer satisfaction, or the customer experience, is really important to the success of all businesses. It doesn’t matter if it’s business-to-business, or B2B, or business-to-customer, or B2C. Companies with poor customer satisfaction are guaranteed one thing: they’re going out of business...

Our experience tells us that when it comes to delivering rock star customer service, there are three main commitments you should follow that will not only lead to your success, but also to very satisfied customers.

Steve Jobs was right. He said that “A small team of A players can run circles around a giant team of B and C players.” Put simply, an A player is someone in the top 10% of the available talent pool. They communicate effectively, are honest, transparent and eager to learn, and they just don’t quit. B players make up the next 25% of the talent pool. Then there’s the C players – they’re everyone else.

Think about this: Apple is a company that, as of today, is valued at around $490 billion. Now I’m not saying that Apple got to that level of success just by hiring A players. But if we only look at the people who work for Apple and we know Apple only hires A players, we can attribute some of – perhaps even a lot of – the company’s success to who they hire.