Every time you write a blog post for your online home business, you create a piece of content on the web aimed at building customer relationships. Think of yourself as the loopy part of hook and loop tape. Offer a soft, grabby connector for your customer’s searching hooky part.

How to Be Fuzzy, Soft and Engaging

1. Focus on them, not your product. If someone signs up for free information from you, your first message should be all about thanking them. Don’t hit them upside the head with a Buy This Now message. That’s like proposing marriage over a first coffee together.
2. Let them get to know you. Are your photo and name on your blog? People are hard-wired to connect with faces. Provide some of your story on your About Me page. Why? An About Me page is the most read page of a blog—because they want to know who you are! Reveal a little of yourself in your posts so they can identify with you. We all like like-minded people.
3. Over-deliver. After giving good information your customer can use today to start solving their problem, invite their participation with you somehow. Ask for their opinion, provide a poll question they can answer, or tell them to push a button for a video that further illustrates a point you made.

How to Be Sticky, Hooky and Engaging

You already started when you asked them to participate with you.

1. Train them to take action each time you connect with them. Give them something to click or do in every email or a blog post, and make it rewarding for them. They’ll stay on your site a bit longer. When prospects take action, they become participants who then become customers.
2. Introduce an unexpected viewpoint. Challenge accepted norms by looking at an old problem from a different angle. It can wake them up a bit, give them an insight they never thought of before.
3. Offer your information in other formats. Most customers read. Others retain information best when they hear it spoken aloud. Sometimes video better conveys how to do a new or confusing technique.
4. Wave your freak flag. Let them see how you’re different from your competition, what makes your offer unique. Every business needs a unique selling point, even lemonade stands. Don’t hide yours or be plain vanilla while building customer relationships.

Remember, you run your online business for greater income and fun. You can stick even more customers to you when you boost online visibility

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Karen_Wehrle
http://EzineArticles.com/?Building-Business-Relationships—Make-Customers-Stick-Like-Velcro&id=4452329

Early in my consulting career I started telling people the consulting business is a relationship business. I was right, just a little short sighted.

Actually all business is a relationship business.

All work is a relationship business.

All leadership is a relationship business.

And while our focus in this article is on business or professional relationships, I believe you could say, at some level, life is a relationship business.

Regardless of how you would say it, it is hard to overlook the importance of relationships in all of our professional endeavors.

Having stronger relationships creates less stress, promotes higher productivity, improves speed and efficiency and helps our work in almost every measurable way.

Like most anything of great value, strong relationships don`t just show up on their own. If you want relationships at all, let alone better ones, you must do something. You must do your part, take responsibility and do the things that will build relationships for mutual benefit.

While there are many things you can do to nurture relationships, the seven that follow are things you can do – right now. And, when done consistently, authentically and with sincerity, each will help you nurture and grow the professional relationships you desire.

Make it a priority. If relationships are important to you, you must make them a priority. I know you are busy. I know you have plenty to do. I know that unless there is a major problem or conflict, relationships won`t logically show up as an urgent item on your to-do list. (If you have conflicts or an issue, you need a different article!) If relationships really are important to you, put your focus and your calendar where your mouth is. Spend time doing the things that will build relationships, rather than neglecting them. Neglecting relationships lead to weed-filled garden results. What`s that, you ask? A big mess!

Care. If you want to nurture relationships, you have to sincerely care about people, their thoughts and feelings, and their well being. It is often said (and I`ve seen the quote attributed to different people) “People don`t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.” Your professional expertise and knowledge matters, of course, but keep it in perspective. When you do, let people know you care. And if you really don`t care, you need to think long and hard about why that is true.

Make connections. Connections come in many forms. On one hand we need to connect with people on things that matter to them. This, of course, starts with caring. We also can make connections for people with other people. Once you know their interests and needs, you can introduce them to others, connect them to resources and/or connect them to anything else that would help them.

Be trusting. Want more trusting relationships? Trust others. Look for opportunities to show your trust, knowing that people tend to live up to the trust placed in them. Will you occasionally be disappointed? Sure. But will you build relationships further and faster in every other situation (and perhaps even in the relationship where you are disappointed)? Absolutely.

Expect the best. Much like trust, you can expect the best of other people. People can tell when you are being cynical or have low expectations. People can also feel it when they know you believe in them and have confidence that they can succeed. Ask yourself – how often do I truly expect the best for others? And, when I do, do I let them know?

Listen. It seems so simple, yet it is most often overlooked. Think about any person you know, and realize that they likely yearn to be really listened to. Do you ever feel that way? And how do you feel about another person when they really listen to you? If you are like every person I`ve ever met, when you are listened to it strengthens the relationship with that person. You can do that for others – anytime (including right now). LISTEN!

Take the lead. Inherent in all of these suggestions is one important element. If you want to nurture relationships in whatever way you choose, you can go first. Relationships won`t grow unless someone takes action. Be the one to go first. Make the first move. Offer the olive branch. Make the apology. Ask the first question. You get the idea. Take the lead.

These are just 7 of probably 107 (or more) strategies you can use to nurture your relationships and help them grow. I encourage you to take personal responsibility for the quality and health of your relationships, today. All of these tools can help you take that responsibility and take your relationships to a higher level now – and forever.

Remarkable leaders know the quality of their relationships directly impacts their leadership success. That is why many leaders build their relationship skills – and all other facets of leadership – by participating in The Remarkable Leadership Learning System – a one skill at a time, one month at a time approach to becoming a more confident and successful leader. Get $748.25 worth of leadership development materials including two months of that unique system as part of Kevin Eikenberry’s Most Remarkable Free Leadership Gift Ever today at http://MostRemarkableFreeLeadershipGiftEver.com. Kevin is a bestselling author, speaker, trainer, consultant and the Chief Potential Officer of The Kevin Eikenberry Group (http://www.KevinEikenberry.com).

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kevin_Eikenberry
http://EzineArticles.com/?Seven-Ways-to-Nurture-Business-Relationships&id=4315175

The reason revenue stability is relevant to the topic of sheltering business relationships and personal asset protection is because when you shelter a relationship, your goal is to protect it from a bankruptcy court.

The word “relationship,” in this case, and with respect to the bankruptcy court, refers to assets that can be tangible or not so tangible. Suppose that you have spent 20 years building a safety supply business (you sell hats, goggles, fire extinguishers, gloves, etc), and during that time you have established relationships with the very best vendors in the business. You know the best vendors to purchase safety products from and the right person to talk to at those vendor businesses to get the best deals.

You have established personal relationships with all the right people in these businesses. And suppose that you have never created any purchasing contracts, so nothing is in writing. Suppose that if you had to start all over developing these excellent relationships, it would probably take you 10 or 15 years to do it all over again.

And suppose that if you had to start all over, you would immediately lose 20% from the bottom line because you would not be able to get all those great discounts. If your bottom line is 3 million then those relationships are worth $600,000 per year, and that could be huge. It is huge, percentage-wise, for any business.

And these numbers are realistic. In fact, vendor relationships can be so important that losing them could lead to the complete failure of a business.

The key here is that these relationships are worth money. These are assets to the business (and to you personally), and since these relationships are an asset, the bankruptcy court can take them away. And this is especially true if you have a file cabinet full of purchasing contracts or customer contracts. If this is the case, it is possible that these contracts could be seized by a bankruptcy court and sold to another safety supply company. However, these relationships are more difficult to convert into money. In any case, knowledgeable business persons understand the inherent value of business relationships.

To learn more about Business Turnarounds, Commercial Debt Reduction, or Business Management and other related topics, order Andre’s books directly from Amazon.com, or get details here: Andre Larabie

Andre Larabie is a published writer and successful business coach. Get a free excerpt from his book on commercial debt reduction at: http://www.AndreLarabie.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Andre_Larabie,_Ph.D.
http://EzineArticles.com/?Why-it-is-Important-to-Shelter-Business-Relationships&id=4265721

It is no secret that good relationships are the key to success in business. But in our increasingly online and virtual world, where relationships are more often than not conducted on Facebook and Twitter, it can be easy to forget the power inherent in a well-conducted business lunch.

Author Robin Jay does a great job of reminding us what an important business and relationship tool a professional lunch can be in this sincere and illuminating book. Though the idea of eating in front of someone you don’t know can be anxiety-inducing for some, Jay makes a convincing argument that the potential rewards more than outweigh the possible risks.

This book covers every detail of the business lunch transaction and the appropriate way to proceed when taking clients to lunch, from someone who clearly knows what she is talking about. Pointers include picking up clients for a first lunch (to make it easier on them and to avoid any confusion at the restaurant), how to discreetly pay for the lunch (including the smooth trick of paying in advance so that you can impress your guest by having taken care of everything), and a helpful list of things and topics to avoid (alcohol and politics).

Though the purpose of the business lunch is clearly to improve your success and your bottom line, the author never comes off as caring only about making money off of the people she takes to lunch. To the contrary, it is clear that her success in her field came about because she truly came to like and care about the people with whom she was developing business relationships, and her willingness to be a listening ear and a friend, through foul weather and through fair. If you are looking for a way to rejuvenate your client base and to close more deals, this is definitely a book you should read and take to heart. (Get your copy here!)

Article Source:  Sarah Beek

We’ve all had friends in our circle who were known as “Mary & John”, and when “John” split “Mary” was alone. Mary was the “odd” number at the dinner party and we were all concerned about her.  Well, today it seems that the union of Customer & Service have had a breakup.  Service has split and Customer is on his/her own.

Today, let me tell you a story that many of you will find humorous but is all too common.  I can tell you this without fear of our local editor getting sued because it’s about me, but business owners make sure that you don’t fit the profile of company “X”.

Four weeks ago I decided that I needed another green recycling can from my trash pickup company.  We’ll call them Brown Keg Trash Pickup, an anonymous company in the interest of avoiding litigation. I called their Customer Service number, and as an environmentally conscious citizen requested my extra recycle can.  The cheerful voice on the other end of the line chirped, “Of course, we’ll have one delivered in 48 hours.”  After giving her all the pertinent location information, I hung up the phone with the satisfied feeling of a good citizen.

I arrived home about 5 p.m. the next day and  I was happy to see another green can at the mouth of my driveway.  When I looked again, I noticed that I had another green can – but it was without a lid.  I quickly dialed my cheerful telephone voice at Brown Keg Company thanking her graciously for the rapid service and then told her about the missing lid.  Just as cheerfully as the first time, she told me to leave it at the end of my driveway after my usual trash pickup and they would replace the entire unit since they didn’t have extra lids.  I agreed, and after hanging up the phone I pondered their plight of having lidless cans but no extra lids.  I conjured up all sorts of scenarios that explained where all the lids to the lidless cans went, and sympathized with their predicament.

Well, 3 days went by and there sat my poor, green, lidless can at my driveway’s mouth and a replacement never arrived.  Feeling empathy for this green plastic waif, I returned it to the side of it’s brother that had a lid.  I called my cheerful Customer Service voice again, and reiterated the plight of my poor lidless can and after a chuckle she assured me a complete unit would be forthcoming.  I found it necessary to make use of my lidless friend, and put it out the next pickup day filled to the brim.  Fortunately, it wasn’t windy and all the contents remained inside it.  That was 2 weeks ago, and life being what it is other  more important tasks have occupied me until this morning when facing another pickup day I thought of my lidless friend.

Once more I picked up the phone and called my trash pickup company, and this time I listened to a litany of choices of buttons I could punch and chose my cheerful Customer Service button again.  I was transferred, listened to a brief melody when there was a “click” and I expected my cheerful voice to chirp “hello”.  The next thing I heard was another click, silence, and then the dreaded dial tone that means you’ve been disconnected.  Not being one of the “fainthearted”, I simply redialed my number.  Again there was the litany of button choices, my choice and the music, and just when I began to feel that all was right with the world I heard – “click”, “dial tone” and nothing.

This was not the morning for the phone to be playing games with me, so I made one more determined effort and REDIALED!  “NASA, we have lift-off !”  I once more heard the litany of button choices, but this time I outfoxed that monotonous voice and punched “0”.  I asked for the Manager of Customer Service, I was given her name and was transferred.  What greeted my eager ear was, “You’ve reached the voice mail of ……., please leave your name and number and she’ll return your call.”

So here we sit – my lidless, green can and I facing another pick-up day.  This eager-to-serve plastic green waif must bravely face another dutiful day half-clothed.

You must admit that is an amusing story, and one that far too many of us have lived through, but what a sad commentary it is about our business community.  Doesn’t it make you wonder if our language has changed so drastically that what we interpret “Customer Service” to mean – is not what today’s business owners mean.  It makes me wonder when the marriage of Customer and Service broke-up, leaving us all the lonely ones.

Entrepreneurs and business owners take note!  If you’re going to have a number for your customers to access your Customer Service, please follow these rules.

• Have the phone manned by an employee that can hear thunder and see lightening.
• Give that employee training in helping the caller and not shuffling the problem to another desk.
• Have an overseer, who can also hear thunder and see lightening, check that all incoming complaints were handled appropriately.

After learning how to find your customers and what they want; after getting them committed to doing business with YOU; and after wooing them to keep them as your customers – WHY WOULD YOU LET “SERVICE” DIVORCE “CUSTOMER?”

If your customers aren’t getting the service they require from you – your competitor will be only too happy to help them!

I finally found a reason why my wife should do all the laundry:

I can no longer distinguish between my wife’s and my daughter’s clothes.

If it is pink, red, or girly in any way, there’s a high likelihood that I will sort it into the wrong pile. This results in a kind smile from my wife. It’s the same smile she gives to babies and puppies that are cute but helpless. It also results in a head-cocked, eye-rolling, “how-dumb-are-you?” look from my daughter. She’s eight. Going on sixteen.

In my defense, my daughter is taller than nearly every other eight-year-old on the planet. Some of her clothes say “12″ or even “14″ inside, which I always assumed should somewhat correspond to the age – not the attitude – of the wearer.

My wife is a few years older than eight, and her clothes have a whole different numbering system (another mystery to solve at another time). But, honestly, side by side, it’s sometimes really, really hard to tell them apart. Ok, so my wife doesn’t have a t-shirt that says “I (heart) Justin Bieber”, but she and my daughter do have some matching pajamas that look the same size to me. Gotta read the labels to know which is which. I really wish I understood those numbering systems better.

I am quite lucky. My wife actually does do the majority of the laundry. She actually kind of enjoys it. It’s one of the few old-school gender roles that we honor in our house. She does the laundry. I mow the lawn and kill all the spiders.

So when I do fluff and fold a basket or two, I now have to pay extra attention. Because somewhere along the way, my daughter grew. It was so much easier when she was little. Pink + tiny = daughter’s pile. Now I have to check the label on almost everything, except that Justin Bieber t-shirt.

In other words, things change. People change. Customers change. Their needs shift, grow, and change constantly. When we have a few, distinct customers, it’s relatively easy to tell them apart and provide them customized products or personal service. As our customer base grows, and our customer’s needs change, we have to pay closer attention.

What does that take? Before you run out and buy a new CRM software package or hire a bunch of new salespeople, stop for a minute and just think about your customers (or your staff, or your family, or your community organization). Ask yourself these questions:

1. How have our customers changed since we first met them?
2. What do they need from us now?
3. Will they have any new needs in the foreseeable future?
4. What are the simplest and most direct ways we can meet these needs?

These questions don’t require a two-day retreat in the woods to figure out. You could come up with some great answers in a sixty minute staff meeting or your personal reflection time.

While this may be the first time you’ve thought about these questions (like this is the first time I’ve thought about my laundry dilemma), it definitely shouldn’t be the last. These are questions that we should be asking ourselves at least once each year, or even each quarter.

I doubt I’ll ever completely escape laundry duty, so I’m going to have to pay even more attention as time goes by. The way my daughter is growing , she will someday be the same size as my wife, maybe as early as next week.

Article Source:  Customer Satisfaction

Many often wonder about whether social media is scalable, especially in light of the benefits social media delivers in terms of connections between businesses and their customers. In fact, as I noted here at the Huffington Post, social media is a return to what the neighborhood restaurant or “Mom and Pop” business has always done to succeed: maintain and strengthen relationships with customers.

If you are embarking on the use of social media as a trend or because you think it is the new media platform that can replicate what you used to do it is worth remembering that even 300 million televisions in American homes can’t fully bring a brand to life. If your focus is all about scale, reach, impressions and size, then you may be missing the benefits of the emerging era of real, interactive Web connections that enable businesses to have meaningful and valued relationships with its customers and other stakeholders. Proceeding down the old route may be just as likely to inflame customers as you are to induce them.

However, if you are thinking about social media from a customer centric perspective and looking at it as a means to transform your business of today with the intimacy of the Mom and Pop shop of the old days, then you may be thinking about how to also reach this state across a large scale operation. Just as a TV – or two or three – in every home doesn’t guarantee brand intimacy, neither does a computer – or two or three — in every house and all your office desks, lap, or hand for that matter.

So as long as we remember that intimacy, sincerity and customer relationships come first when we talk about social media, lets take a look at how size matters.

When the telephone was first invented and deployed, it was only for the few. Many could not imagine its use, or ubiquity – let alone business applicability, or even reliance. Today the telephone (wired and wireless) have become ubiquitous, full-featured – voice mail, conference calls, call forwarding etc – and virtually every business employee has one or two.

At Dell, we are scaling our social media capabilities across the business much like telephones became just a part of how you do business and connect with people you need to be in touch with to do a better job. Here are some of the principles we are following:

• Listening is a critical first step for any solid relationship. Through listening, identify the topics people are talking about. Those solid listening skills are best deployed in making sure the topics of conversation across the Web are routed to the people in your organization who should be aware of them.
• Think of the telephone operator who connected calls throughout your business or across town – before we put a phone on everyone’s desk and enabled direct dialing. Those telephone operators made sure to connect the conversations on the Web to the relevant part of your business.
• Getting plugged in and connected takes relevant customer clusters and puts them in touch with relevant parts of your business. This turns what was a massive, real-time, moving conversation, into a number of meaningful, substantive, manageable opportunities where business experts can listen learn and engage real time, bringing value and customer insight to what they do.
• What seemed more like a party line or a bad connection becomes individually connected calls.
• We adhere to a governance model that embeds social media across the enterprise – product and engineering teams, customer and tech support, sales, marketing, HR and more.
• What could be intimate, but may not scale, is the operator being expected to answer everyone.

By scaling social media with these tenets in mind, we can listen and communicate through “people-to-people” interactions that are relevant and personalized. As Chris Brogan advises, “People want the warm touch” and we expect to get even better at recognizing and embracing returning visitors to Dell.com, offering them personalized recommendations based on their previous behavior, connecting with them on Twitter and thanking our customers on a more consistent basis.

Applying these lessons to any business or brand of any size proves intimacy has value and brings a brand to life. Social media allows companies who follow these principles to learn and engage daily to build a better, bigger business and strong relationships with customers.

Article Source:  Social Media & Building Relationships

It seems natural customer loyalty would follow good service. If you get what you want and you are treated right, why would you not return to a business? But sometimes it’s useful to have more than an intuitive argument. So I have done a bit of research and I have found two statistics that tell me there is a clear link connecting customer service and customer loyalty.

They also suggest some substantial benefits from improving customer service.

The first is a well-known number. It comes to us from the American Society of Quality Control (as best I can determine). According to an oft-cited study, 68 percent of customers who never return to a business choose to not come back because of they were treated.

In other words, poor service is the reason 68 percent of customers choose to take their business elsewhere.

That’s a striking number. It means that two out of every three customers are leaving because our employees do not treat them well. It had nothing to do with price, product quality, location, convenience, or other factors. It has everything to do with how willing and able employees are to serve their customers.

The other statistic I found is just as interesting. It’s from a study reported by Arthur Middleton Hughes. He talks about a company that grouped a selection of customers in two groups. One received the same service they always had. The other received a new, higher level of service. The increased level of service cost about $83 per customer. After six months, the customers who received better service spent 57 percent more than their peers who had the same old service. The revenue increase came to over $4,000 per customer.

Wow!

Both these are compelling, to say the least. One says we can keep a lot more customers coming back simply by treating them better. The other says they’ll likely spend more money with us if we offer them a higher level of service.

Hmmm. More customers coming back and spending more when they do come back. Not a bad idea.

If you combine these numbers, you have the potential for big revenue gains as a direct result of customer service improvement. But no matter what the actual numbers are, there is a strong case for improving customer service as a way to improve loyalty, retention, revenue, and profits.

This article was written by:

Kevin Stirtz – who has written 629 posts on AmazingServiceGuy.com.

Kevin Stirtz is the Amazing Service Guy, a speaker and trainer who helps organizations of all kinds deliver Amazing Customer Service. His recent book: “More Loyal Customers” has won 5 star reviews at Amazon.com. Kevin lives in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis & St. Paul). More at: author’s website.