Tuesday, March 21, 2006 @5:05 AM
I am an easy-going customer. It is really easy to get business from me. I am that sort of customer who will just walk in a shop and check out the stuff that I need without giving too much trouble to the sales representative. I do not usually ask the sales rep to lay out all models with different color, design or size available for each model, then spend a long time asking many questions excluding another long decision-making time. If the sales rep is lucky, the customer would check out an item after all this hassle. I know many customers are like this. I guess they are classified as “fussy” customers by the sales rep.
When comparing with these so-called fussy customers, I think I’m really easy-going. Probably I’m just not utilizing my customer rights. I just dislike bothering people although I know I’m entitled to.
However, I think in actuality, I am much fussier than those fussy customers. When I walk in a shop, I like to browse through the stuff ALONE. There are some sales reps who love to come up to the customers and offer help. This is certainly considered as good customer service. Yet I do not enjoy being “stalked” while browsing at the shop. I’d feel pressurized. I have had numerous such encounters. You know what I did? I just walked out of the shop. Oh well, too bad for the shop of losing a potential business from me. Yes, it is good that the sales reps offer assistance to the customers. I think they are doing the right thing to make them obvious and telling the customers that they are standing by ready to serve. To me, that is already sufficient. You don’t have to follow the customer around. I would just take that message as, “Hurry up. Buy something.” Probably they didn’t mean it that way. Nevertheless giving the customer some space and time to think about what they want to purchase is part of a business psychology. Well, at least to weird customers like me.
I am also someone who does not go for the best quality goods provider if their customer service sucks. For example, if a particular restaurant has the best food in town, yet the waiters/waitresses are arrogant and unfriendly, I am very likely to not dine in there. No doubt if the business is products-oriented, the company should definitely prioritize the quality of their goods on top of the rest. But they should not neglect about their service and service manners too. They all come in a package for the business. I’m not saying the sales reps should be sucking up the customers. Those “Hi, how are you?” “How are you today?” lines that come out automatically the moment the reps (goods or service oriented business) see a customer and putting on a fake smile are not appealing to me at all.
Let me share with you some of my experiences. I usually make orders for my work over the phone. There’s once I called up and gave some catalogue numbers to the rep. Apparently I was confused with the quantity associated with the item that I wanted to purchase, therefore I had to ask her for her advice. The rep became very impatient. Although I still made my purchase with her in the end, I was somehow quite reluctant to make any more purchase with this company despite they are the sole agent for some products that our laboratory is using. Two weeks ago, I made another purchase with this company. I hesitated for a while before picking up the phone. What if it were the impatient rep picking up the phone again? Anyhow, I made the call and surprise surprise, I changed my mind now. The boss of this company should be thankful to this rep whom I spoke to over the phone. This new lady was extremely friendly. I had to ask her to describe two products that looked similar to me from their webpage. She patiently walked me through the descriptions. I had to make another special request to another two products too. She wasn’t sure about them and spent some time checking out for me. After hanging up the phone, I felt good and am happy to give my business with them next time.
There’s this restaurant my family loves to dine in back home. It is not a fancy restaurant and to be honest, the food is not the best we have ever had. Yet my family and I do like to go there every now and then. The boss and the waiters/waitresses are friendly in general. Funny it is, the hospitality of a restaurant can simply make the food more delicious or change our taste buds.
Yesterday I was emailing to a new company for some questions about a potential purchase. The sales rep impressed me again through her emails. I can tell she’s trying to form some friendly bond with her customers, or potential customers. How does she do it? Here is the little trick:-
Sales rep’s reply: Kind regards and have a nice week! Finally the sun is here and hopefully soon the Spring!!!
My reply: You have a wonderful week ahead too! Yay for the sun and hopefully it can be a little warmer to walk outside without the melting slippery ice.
Sales rep’s reply: :o) Sounds great to be able to go outside without freezing or worrying the streets being slippery!! :o)
Can you feel the friendliness? Hmm…she could be pretentious. But I couldn’t feel it. I just feel that she’s just genuinely nice. And it doesn’t mean that you have to pretend to be so friendly to attract customers. All I am trying to say is, if you put some “heart” and passionfor your job, especially as a sales rep, your customers will feel the subtle difference. This subtle difference is what that keeps the customers coming back to you and not rendering their purchase to your other competitors. This is what I refer as professionalism of a sales rep.
Customers may not be right all the time. Yet they are smart enough to tell and judge from the service they receive.
