How to save the world

The world is in rough shape right now. We’re still licking our economic wounds when suddenly – BAM – there’s more oil blasting into the Gulf of Mexico than we can possibly manage… and it just keeps flowing and flowing. The world’s attention is focused on those two catastrophes because they are simply gigantic and not easily stopped.

As business owners, we can feel powerless when faced with what seems to be insurmountable issues that even large governments and trillions of dollars cannot correct. But nothing can be further from the truth! If there is anyone who can effect change, it’s the small business owner and his or her customers.

Small business owners represent millions of people and billions of dollars of influence and their customers represent even more. We can all step out and create change. So, if the two biggest issues right now are financial and ecological, where can we start?

Financial
Let’s start with some ethical, customer-service-focused, good old fashioned sales hustle. Let’s get out there and make sales, ethically selling our high value products and services to the people who need them. And, as consumers, let’s buy from others even if the price is slightly higher than we want to pay. Getting money into the economy is going to be the best thing for it and getting a bunch of money into the economy is going to skyrocket our personal, professional, and national economies toward better conditions.

On that note, here is a great article about good and bad profit – there is a difference! – and the few simple things you can do to make sure you are earning good profit.

Ecological
Individually, we’re not going to be able to cap the oil spill or reverse the trends happening there. But collectively, we can make progress elsewhere in the ecosystem to influence an overall change for the better. That starts with going green in our business. When we go green and ask our vendors to go green and buy green products and services, we’re making a significant contribution (in dollars and commitment) toward a better environment.

And here is a great article about green marketing; about turning your business from a regular business into a green business that can promote itself as an eco-friendly alternative.

Jessica Routier, IAC-EZ

Customer service: Expense or Investment?

When I was a kid, my parents needed a washer and dryer and they saw a set advertised so they bought it. It turned out not to be very good and they had a terrible time trying to get the company to service the products. But my parents had little recourse, besides haranguing the manufacturers. I was just thinking about their experience the other day and then comparing it to my own: Recently, I spent a lot of money on a new furnace for my home. The furnace is generally pretty good but there was a service issue that should have been fixed right away and wasn’t. I called and called and called. When the company finally responded, they sent several “specialists” out, none of whom could fix the problem, and every visit was scheduled for one day but the specialist came a day or two late. Unlike my parents, though, I don’t have to just “tough out” the situation and hope for that my constant phone calls would help. Instead, I can go online to my personal or professional network of thousands and I can make one single tweet or wall post or blog. And? The problem gets solved right away. 

Customer service has shifted yet again. Customer service used to not exist at all. Then, it was its own department – just a guy with a phone. Then it became trendy to call the sales staff “customer service” (even though they did mostly selling and almost no back-end support service). Today, lots of businesses claim to have great customer service but  really don’t.

The reason, as suggested in this excellent (but slightly older) post by Freshbooks, there is no clear and obvious ROI in customer service. Rather, the Sales department has clear metrics – sold products or not – but “happy customers” is ethereal at best. So, because companies can’t easily quantify the customer service experience, the customer service department (or skillset) is often the first thing to go. 

Unfortunately, that’s a mistake. A business may not easily be able to quantify customer service with obvious and conventional metrics, but the results of customer service are clear. If you ask me, I think customer service metrics can be found in the following places:

• Customer retention
• Long term profitability
• Ratio of positive-to-negative statements on social networking sites

How can your business make an investment into customer service? Here are a few ideas:

• If you can’t afford to hire someone new, train your staff to watch for negative customer service signs and – this is huge – empower them to address those signs immediately.
• Run frequent searches on various social networking sites for references to your company. For example, use HootSuite or Tweetdeck to keep a search running for the name of your company (along with various misspellings) to see what people are saying.
• Google the name of your company plus the words “hate” or “sucks” and see what comes up. While you may not be able to address every concern of a vocal minority, it’s a good way to see where some potential common problems are.

 Jessicca Routier, IAC-EZ