Photo Credits: yananine

You can see it everywhere these days: from the entry level car with the performance engine, premium sound system and power everything, to the neighborhood restaurant serving food fit for an upscale bistro, to the local grocer projecting itself as a destination for wine connoisseurs.

The path that Target beat years ago by offering quality and style at affordable prices is now being followed by all those who want to resonate with today’s demanding consumer.

Meeting expectations or doing things a little bit better is no longer enough to build a business.

Harry Beckwith says in his classic book “Selling the Invisible” that in order to stand out from the masses you must take a leap and surprise the customer. You must do what the successful companies we just mentioned have done: shatter expectations and create a new standard.

As small business owners in a competitive environment, we should be thinking regularly: how can we deliver amazing service? How can we “Targetize” our business to give it that premium feel at no extra cost to become our customer’s only choice?

One simple way to come up with ideas is to analyze your customer’s pain points and ask yourself what significant problem can you solve. For example, these are some angles you can explore:

• Reduce wait time: In today’s time-starved society, anything you can do to deliver your product or service faster will bring you business. For example, try answering the phone by the second ring, having more inventory, or making your service scalable by mapping out processes and making them easy to follow.
• Give your business a human face: People hate to listen to recordings and automated menu options. Make sure that your customers can interact with a knowledgeable human being.
• Follow up: People are tired of companies that bend over backwards to make a sale, only to forget about you once you have signed on the dotted line. Call your customers after the sale to see if everything’s OK. One caveat, though: don’t use this as an excuse to up sell them on something else, or it will backfire.
• Communicate honestly: We’ve learned to be cynical about top-down sales pitches and other self serving ways in which most large companies communicate. As small business owners and independent professionals we have the chance to establish a very different kind of relationship. Encourage openness, have a blog and acknowledge your readers’ comments, answer your own email, welcome feedback and let your customers feel part of your business. Honesty and openness go a long way.
• Be consistent: small businesses have a lot to learn from successful franchises. The reason why these businesses thrive is because they have mastered their processes in a way that they can be duplicated anywhere. Giving good service shouldn’t be an isolated occurrence. Make sure that you can perform at the same level every time a customer interacts with you.
• Make things easy: These days people have many options. Nobody will jump through hoops to do business with you. Is it easy to do business with you? Amazon’s sales increased dramatically after they launched their One Click payment option. Staples built a business around their Easy Button theme. As Mark Cuban, the outspoken owner of the Dallas Mavericks, says: “Make your product easier to buy than your competition, or you will find your customers buying from them, not you.”

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