Peter George, Marketing Coach

Most reports indicate that holiday gift spending is down. And here in Rhode Island, it appears to be more so than in other areas of the country. So I was a bit surprised when my wife and I were in a local gift store on a Saturday evening at 5:55 pm. We were looking for a specific gift, and we thought that we would also pick up a few others while we were there.

At that time, the owner came over told us that the store was closing in five mintes, and if we wanted to buy anything, then we would have to do it immediately. I couldn’t believe it. We were being rushed out of the store. Yeah, I realize that the owner may have had somewhere to be on that Saturday night, but … 1) I don’t care, and 2) there were other employees in the store who could have stayed and let us finish shopping.

Conversely, I was in the local Nordstom last year, close to closing time, and I asked a sales associate when the store would be closing. She answered, “When you are finished with your shopping, sir.” Imagine, a large store such as Nordstrom can keep its store functioning long enough for people to finish shopping, but a 1,500 square foot store has to boot out the only two people in the store.

As the title of this post states, “It Must Be Nice.” It must be nice to be making so much money at a time when other retailers are finding it difficult to reach projections. It must be nice to be assured that so many customers are coming back that you can make some of them feel uncomfortable. It must be nice to think that negative word-of-mouth is not going to harm your future sales. It must be nice to be that numb when it comes to reality.

I am willing to bet that the store owner is going to complain about sales after the holiday season is over … if she isn’t doing so already.

I just opened a letter from Delta Air Lines SkyMiles managing director, Jeff Robertson. Its purpose is summed up in the first line: “Where have you been? Your SkyMiles account has been quiet, but we want you back.”

From there it immediately moves to telling me how I can keep my existing SkyMiles active, including paying to do so. Read the rest of this entry »

I was recently speaking to the CEO of a well-known company in another New England state. We were discussing the theories of creating, maintaining, and building a customer-centric company. Then at one point he said, “You know, all this stuff about running a company on the wants of the customer is a fad — just like the dot-com fad, just like the CRM fade. The only way for a company to make a reasonable profit is to continue to develop new customers. Then you can run the business as you see fit.”

I half expected to see a poster in his office that read, “This would be a great business if it wasn’t for the customers.”

It amazes me how a company can spend so much money on attracting customers and spend little effort, time, or money on keeping them. But this goes on everyday … even at my dry cleaners.

I had been using the same dry cleaners for 16 years. They are not the lowest priced cleaners in the area, but they did consistent work and they were convenient. I was told that I was one of the top customers. This wasn’t a surprise; I took just about everything there — my suits, dress slacks, shirts, casual slacks, and sport shirts.

Every once in a while, they goofed. It was never anything real big, so I let them go. Of course I would mention the problems, and whomever was behind the counter would acknowledge the mistakes. And that’s were the situations would end. Read the rest of this entry »

TouchPoints, the Rhode Island-based customer experience management firm, announced today that it has presented its first ACE Award to Intuit, Inc. of Mountain View, California. Read the rest of this entry »

For more than 15 years, I owned a publishing firm. I learned two valuable lessons during that time. One is that publishing is about deadlines; you have them coming at you from all directions. The other is that you cannot be perfect.

When I began the company, I had no experience whatsoever in publishing. But for some reason, I knew I could make a go of it, and I am glad to say that I did. But much of my success — or more so my sanity — came from the wise words of my mentor. Read the rest of this entry »

For several years, my wife and I met clients-turned-close-friends at an absolutley wonderful restaurant in Minneapolis. Called Manny’s Steakhouse, it is consistently ranked by Zagat as one of the top five steakhouses in the country. Bob and Nancy, the other couple, love a nice bottle of wine. They understand the effects that regions, soils, vintages, etc. have on the taste of wines.

In 1998, the four of us made our usual reservation at Manny’s and later arrived for our always splendid dinner. Bob ordered a bottle of wine, and in a minute, our waiter Ralph returned told Bob that the bottle he ordered was out of stock. However, Ralph explained, Read the rest of this entry »

This is a bit ironic, and thankfully in a very pleasant way.

We are working with Trophy Awards Manufacturing, Inc. of Wilder, Kentucky to develop our new ACE Award. This is the first time we have worked with this company.

Early in the process, I asked Vickie, my representative, if it was possible for the art department to e-mail a schematic of the award so we could redesign our ACE Award logo to match the slopes of the award. Vickie responded by saying that she would ship an award to us and that it would be in that afternoon’s deliveries. She did not ask for a deposit or a credit card number to which she could charge the shipping fee. All she asked was that we return it when we are finished with it.

How could you ask for more from a supplier? The company knows very little about us, and yet one of its employees took it upon herself to take the steps that would make us more than happy.

Now that is an Amazing Customer Experience, and I believe they deserve an ACE Award!

Recently, I had the opportunity to interview Jonathan Tisch, CEO of Loews Hotels and author of “Chocolates on the Pillow Aren’t Enough: Reinventing the Customer Experience.” Published earlier this year, his book has been named as a finalist for the Quill Awards’ Best Business Book of the Year.

Peter:
Hello, Mr. Tisch. Read the rest of this entry »

A number of years ago, I was preparing to go to Minneapolis to attend a shareholder meeting. A week or so before my flight, I purchased a new suit at a well-known men’s retailer in our area. With the assistance of the salesman, I found a great looking suit, tried it on, and had the tailor mark it for adjustments. It was scheduled for pick up on the day before I was to fly out. Read the rest of this entry »