Become your Model Client.
Treat your chosen vendors like royalty and you will attract the best clients.
I have collected a handsome client base. All of them are model clients, who treat me with as much respect and admiration as I treat them.
Compare that with other small businesses, who can sometimes complain to me about their clients, often ad nauseum.
I have a theory about what makes the difference. It resides in that overworked cliché, what goes around comes around. It’s as simple as that.
Yes, you can bet your stocks and bonds it will come back to you. It’s not just an admirable ethic. It’s actually a business-starter and revenue-generator. The way you treat your vendors —all the people in your business and personal life who sell you stuff — is how you will be treated by your clients.
Learn to acknowledge all the people who serve you in any capacity. Recognize them, challenge them, and reward them. Take pride in their work as if it were your own. Show off the art you just bought from that woman on the island who started painting oils when she was 55, just after her husband died of a heart attack. Bring your brother into the framing shop to show off the lovely framing job you got.
Engage with your plumber, banker, postal clerk, grocery cashier, manicurist, your kids’ teacher. Talk to your veterinarian, massage therapist, naturopath, and carpet cleaner. No money needs to be involved in the exchange. You can derive sheer delight simply in the sharing, and you will find your own business will start to turn around.
If you think this is pie-in-the-sky nonsense, I dare you to prove me wrong.
Say thank you.
Start with the simple things. Who makes your coffee in the morning? Who answers your phone? Who makes your lunch? Who weighs your parcels for mailing? Who looks after your kids in the afternoon?
“But that’s their job! I pay them for those things. Why would they expect me to thank them?”
They wouldn’t. That’s the point. This is for you, not them. It will enrich your own life, and a side effect is that it enriches theirs, often by surprise. Tell your cafeteria staff, “You guys make the best bagels this side of Montreal.”
Get in the habit of doing this and you will be empowered by the energy that comes back to you.
My clients do this for me. They are always saying thank you.
Treat your vendors and suppliers like royalty.
Do you want your clients to treat you like royalty? Do the same for your own suppliers. Nurture them lovingly. If you’re a manufacturing company, this means nurturing relationships with the people who deliver parts to your receiving gate. But if you’re a sole proprietor like me, your suppliers are not coming to your headquarters with truckloads. Your suppliers are the hardware sales rep, the internet company service rep, the drycleaner, the cab driver, the librarian, the guy who pumps your gas, and the person who delivers your pizza.
Brighten their day and you’ve brightened your own. Call them by name and show your appreciation for what they do. Thank them. Comment about their work. Make conversation. Tip them fairly.
Share your knowledge and collaborate.
With my son, collaborating with school staff has been the difference in his education. At his current school, he is blessed with a committed, coherent administrative team, devoted teachers, as well as consultants and guidance counselors who are willing to learn and cooperate to deliver the best possible service they can. I continually tell them how much I appreciate it, how much my son has progressed, and how enthusiastic he is about excelling. This gives them immense pride and even more incentive to contribute to outstanding results. And it means when problems arise, they waste no time or effort making things right.
If you are a parent and your child is in school, you are a customer of the school board. Even though we do not directly hire or train them, we are their employer. As a community, we are collectively paying teachers’ salaries and benefits, and their job is to deliver a quality education that will last a lifetime.
This is an essential truth that will help you enhance your kids’ education. When you see yourself as the client, you will be better able to assess the service in terms of real value, and deal directly with teachers and school staff.
I appreciate a teachers’ work as much as I appreciate nurses’ work: they are among the most important members of our society, in a position of profound influence. When I consider how much I make and how important my role is in my community, I wholeheartedly reject the inane accusations so much in vogue that teachers are overpaid. We sit in bleachers and watch golfers, tennis players, hockey players and baseball players earn millions each year, yet we begrudge a teacher from earning $60,000. We visit our family doctor who earns $100,000 to $400,000 per year, and yet we complain that teachers take the summer off.
This angers me. Do they not earn their wages? I, for one, am not going to sit in a classroom with 30 students every day.
On the other hand, quality and professionalism is no more common among the teaching profession than it is in the vitamin or construction industry. You have average teachers, bad teachers, good teachers, and stellar teachers, just as you do among doctors and lawyers. The key is to take advantage of the good and try to survive through the bad. Getting involved in your kids’ school and becoming acquainted with the teachers is essential.
As the client, you don’t have to boss them around and throw your weight around and demand things. But you do need to demonstrate that you understand the politics of the relationship. Show gratitude for their work, and they will work with you to help improve things whenever necessary. I have experienced cooperation and sometimes dramatic improvement when I take this approach.
My clients have done this for me. They question things. They ask me to explain why I am doing something. I welcome the opportunity to educate and collaborate, and it turns into new business.
Give good feedback.
When I say feedback, I don’t mean complaints. That’s the way a lot of business owners look at it. I mean let the manager know the table wobbles, because no other customer is going to tell them. Tell the host what great service you got today. Tell the customer service manager that her information contradicts the information you got on the phone. Tell someone at head office that the statement they send you every month for $5.00 is probably costing them more than $5.00, and maybe they should consider quarterly or annual bills instead.
Tell your registered massage therapist that all her peers are charging $80 per hour while she is only charging $60. Tell the local travel agent what great service you got on the airplane and how hospitable that bed-and-breakfast was, but they screwed up your ticket price and charged you $50 more than what you paid the travel agent.
When you service your own clients, this kind of feedback is valuable. You can’t see everything, and unless you receive feedback, you can’t improve on it, either. Do the same for all your own suppliers, and it will come back to you.
