The best small businesses will excel in many areas, but the most critical quality for long-term success is having exemplary customer service, according to Entrepreneur Magazine.
Corporate giants like Amazon have risen to the top based on their value of providing genuine satisfaction to their customers and continuing to evolve within an ever more competitive market. Jeff Bezos states that Amazon not only wants to meet customers’ expectations but that they actively try to solve problems they don’t even know they have yet.
Keeping a customer through excellent customer service is much cheaper than acquiring new customers through advertising or sales teams. Customers that are happy with a transaction also have around a 60-70 percent chance that they will buy something in the future. When a customer is treated poorly, however, they are more likely to return products, tell their friends and family about their negative experience, and even feel obligated to seek legal compensation.
On the other hand, one fan of a business can help convert many more people through word-of-mouth advertising, and when enough people agree that a company is good, it will attract strangers that are buying based purely on reputation.
Employees, aware of how owners treat their customers, are more likely to take pride in their work.
