Customer Service Helper

Are You Minding the Details?

In any business, this is very true: success lies in the details… but so does the devil. Details abound in every customer interaction, every business goal, each visit that customers make to one of the company’s facilities or stores, and each detail is an opportunity to succeed or miss the mark. But these details all need to be effectively “minded” to accomplish customer satisfaction.

“Minding” the details is just another way of saying that we need to think things through to successfully accomplish details. We should daily be asking ourselves questions like:

• “What exactly does this interaction involve?”
• “How does this piece fit the overall strategy?”
• “Where should we focus most of our efforts?”

To follow the path to success in the details comes when we “take it up a notch;” when we say “I know this isn’t required, but I think it would really make a customer happy,” or “someone who is pretty picky would probably notice this.”

Conversely, we can also get a good idea we are slipping and following the devil in the details when we start to say things like “no one will probably notice,” or “someone else will probably take care of it,” or “we’ve done it that way before, it should be fine.” That kind of thinking requires a stopping point, and a commitment to back up and take the time to make sure that each detail is adequately resolved.

Minding the details involves a strong commitment and desire to see even the smallest things done correctly and done well. If you aren’t minding the details, you’re apt to be overwhelmed by the detail devil. However, if you’re consistently asking how you can improve even the most over-looked areas of process and presentation, then you are proactively achieving success in the details, and your customers will notice.

Steve is an industry leading Customer Insight Strategist and the author of “Automatic Customer Satisfaction.” Visit his website for more free articles and resources at http://www.thinkcustomersatisfaction.com.