Fifty Powerful Ideas You Can Use to Keep Your Customers

Black Enterprise, Feb, 1996 by Rhonda Reynolds

Keeping

customers

happy

Excellent service will help you hang on to customers

Talk about deja vu. As I read 50 Powerful Ideas You Can Use To Keep Your Customers, I felt as if I'd read it before. An I did, in 50 Ways to Win New Customers, written in 1993 by the same author, Paul Timm.

Timm is a customer-service guru who has published 24 books on the topic. He drills in the dire consequences of forgetting the old adage, "The customer is always right." But I felt somewhat gypped: Even when an idea hadn't been picked up from the previous book, it felt recycled.

A quick read at 121 pages, it's full of advice on how to attract customers. "Underpromise, Overdeliver" is one of his better tips. In other words, promise 10 a.m. delivery, but have your products arrive at 9 a.m. Timm also explains how to deal with difficult or disappointed customers. At $7.99, the book can be easily added to your business library. Pick it up whenever you need a reminder on handling customers. Have new employees read it too. As the author says, "Customer service is the competitive battleground for the 1990s and beyond. In fact, it will always be the decisive battleground."