Five Pillars of Excellent Customer Service Representation

by Julian Ignatowski, Sr.

Over the years, I've developed some key principles that I believe are the foundation for stellar customer service and have personally enjoyed teaching them to my college students, implementing them with my employees and putting them into practice with my own customers.  I will refer to these Five Pillars of Excellent Customer Service Representation time and time again, as I honestly and strongly believe that all five of these core concepts MUST be a part of the customer service process.  An absence of any of these will leave you short-changing your customers and, in return, only harm your bottom line.  I will use future posting opportunities to emphasize the education and implementation of these and even detail these pillars for you with real life examples. But for purposes of this introductory post, I will merely list them out for you.  Ladies and gentlemen, I'm proud to introduce you to (drum roll, please):

Pillar One:

Strive to understand the importance of making your customer "happy" and then make it happen.

Pillar Two:

Meet your customer's purchasing needs.

Pillar Three:

Retain your current customer base and grow it!

Pillar Four:

Encourage and promote new products & services to your customers!

Pillar Five:

Always be on the lookout for new ways to add value to your customer relationship.



If you're a business person, how have you scored on these five pillars?  Are you impressed with yourself?  Or, do you need to grow in this area? 

If you're a customer (and, everyone is), which one of these do you find missing in your day-in and day-out interactions with businesses?  Which companies please you the most?  Which give you the most displeasure?