Customers Respond To "Quality in Perception" over "Quality in Fact"

Quality Lives in the Eye of the Beholder
By Adele Sommers

Regardless of how good you believe your offerings or project solutions are, your clients and customers will be responding to "quality in perception" even more than "quality in fact."

Quality in perception refers to things like courtesies, special considerations, a caring and personalized attitude, and a host of other subtleties that can lead us to believe that we are receiving something above and beyond what we're paying for.

Those things speak just as loudly, if not more loudly, to our customers and clients than the actual quality in fact we provide through our products, services, and project solutions.

Effective quality in perception can help compensate for any gaps in quality in fact that could otherwise irritate or inconvenience consumers. Through examples, this article explains how to recognize deficiencies in quality in perception, and what to do about them.

Example 1 - Driving Your Customers Away

Imagine a car repair service that repeatedly fails to diagnose a problem with a car and cannot fix it correctly after numerous attempts. The car is in the shop off and on for days; the customer, who is a single mom, misses time from work from having to shuttle the car back and forth. The car repair shop has no loaner vehicle, and it does not offer a pickup or drop-off service. The car owner cannot afford a rental car, nor does she have insurance coverage for this need.

In addition to not getting her car fixed, the customer is having her pay docked for missed time at work, plus she's been given a reprimand. To top it off, she cannot respond to an emergency call from her child's school when her child is injured on the playground and has to be taken to the hospital.

This example shows how one set of poor quality-in-fact circumstances can compound, as the ripple effects expand outward. Yet even with poor quality in fact (the inability to fix the car), the repair shop might have been able to salvage the customer relationship if it had increased its quality in perception, such as by offering sympathy along with a loaner vehicle.

Example 2 - Often, It's Not about Cost

Some time ago, I was a volunteer mediator in the Small Claims Court system. Over a period of months, I was fascinated with the proportion of cases involving alleged wrongdoing or incompetence. People were suing businesses such as termite services and auto body painters, and even former best friends and health care providers over a variety of grievances. The suits often sought fairly small amounts of compensation, which meant that the financial aspects were not the primary concern.

What repeatedly emerged in the mediation sessions was that each plaintiff felt that the vendor, service provider, health care provider, or ex-friend had not listened to his or her concerns. The plaintiffs frequently believed that their complaints about shortcomings in services, products, or communications had been dismissed.

Had the defendants in these cases earlier offered something as simple as an apology -- and had they made a sincere effort to communicate while taking timely remedial action -- I believe the resulting quality in perception could have prevented many of these lawsuits, even if the quality in fact still left something to be desired.

Example 3 - Honest Communication Matters

A group of consultants took on a major project (a Web site to collect and process data) that their clients truly believed would be easy. The group had not tackled anything like it before, but they, too, thought it would be possible to complete the project quickly. After all, it looked simple. How complicated could a Web site be?

Little did they realize it would be many times more complex than the client's basic home page. The project finally turned out to be nearly impossible for the consulting group to complete. The consultants finally got the system to work after many delays and dozens of mishaps. The clients, however, were very unhappy, even though the consultants ultimately fulfilled the project requirements (quality in fact).

Whose fault was it? The clients didn't understand what they were asking for. To top it off, they insisted on a short schedule that reflected their simplistic view of the effort. The consulting group, on the other hand, was not forthright about its own limitations.

The partners scurried to find people who claimed to be able to do the work. They kept quiet about their own difficulties and did not reveal their growing problems. The group's ongoing failure to communicate greatly reduced the clients' confidence, and drastically shortchanged their quality in perception.

In conclusion, quality in perception can profoundly affect your customers' and clients' experiences with your products, services, and project solutions. To make sure you're not overlooking opportunities to create quality in perception, consider:

1) Special courtesies that can set your offerings apart from your competitors'

2) Your ability to listen to and handle complaints quickly and diplomatically

3) Your willingness to be honest with clients about problems and shortcomings

Remember that quality in perception is not a substitute for quality in fact. But it can go a long way toward minimizing customer and client dissatisfaction, as well as powerfully reinforcing stellar quality when you ultimately deliver it.

Copyright 2006 Adele Sommers

Adele Sommers, Ph.D. is the creator of the "Straight Talk on Boosting Business Performance" success formula. To learn more about her tools and resources and sign up for other free tips like these, visit her site at http://LearnShareProsper.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Adele_Sommers

The Best Things In A Home Business Are Free!

I have been following Donald Lombardi's 'HomeBasedBusinessWizard' Blog for some time now and wanted to pass on his link. There is a wealth of knowledge to be gleaned from his site, so click on over and check it out. If you have a home business, it is a "Must Read". Here is an excerpt from a post recently.

The Best Things In A Home Business Are Free!

One of the biggest advantages for doing business on the internet is the low or no cost that is involved in starting and managing the business. Take the place where you do business which is the site, your online store. Most sites can be setup for free by a hosting company. You can either design it yourself or have someone design it for you, again for free.

Products for your business can be obtained for free from various affiliate programs. You do not have to pay for storage of the product because this is done for you by the affiliate. Once the prospect lands on the affiliate’s page they will sell, pack, and ship the merchandise for you. Again, for free. And you are paid a commission on the sale just for leading the prospect to the affiliate’s landing page through your promotions.

Now some promotions can also be free. For instance, you can write articles with links to your site, about the products, and have them published on hundreds of directories on the internet for free. The articles act as advertisement and through the links take the prospect to your site where you, in turn, through links or banners direct the prospect to the affiliate’s landing page where the sale is made. You can also get the prospect to your page through links with other web pages or through your position in search engines. All again for free! Read the whole article here.

Marketing Your Business With White Papers

Marketing Your Business With White Papers
By Rick Parrott

There are many different ways to market your business. One of the most effective is to use White Papers.

What is a white paper? A white paper is a story which educates your customer and shows how your product can solve their problems.

To be effective a white paper must provide information as well as a sales argument. Emphasis should be on the teaching aspect over the sales process.

To do this you should concentrate on writing your white paper in plain English, not in industry jargon. Don’t confuse your customers!

Here’s a simple structure to follow. Continued On RGG Site

7 Keys To Business Success

The 7 Keys to Business Success
© Copyright 2005 Greg Roworth

Do you run a business that seems to run you? It does not have to be this way. There are 7 keys that can improve your business results and help you achieve success with much less stress.

1 Take Charge

The first key is to realise that success will not just happen, it is up to you to make it happen. Successful people claim to be in control. They refuse to be victims. They accept responsibility for the results their business achieves and take the blame themselves if things go wrong. When we are in control we can choose what to do. We can’t always control the situation but there are two things we can control – our attitude and our skills. We can get stronger, we can get smarter, we can get better at all the skills we need to run our business. We can take charge of ourselves and our business and change the results we are achieving.

2 Know Where You Are Going

Without having specific goals, business owners often find working in the business becomes an endless drudgery. If being in business is not exciting, enjoyable and rewarding, then why be in it? It is exciting and rewarding for the few who are really successful. The difference is that they have a clear idea of where they are going and each day they can see their business making progress towards their clearly defined goals.

If our goals are not clearly defined it is easy to become like the mouse on the treadmill. We can expend a lot of effort going nowhere. All we can do is react to the pressures the business creates. The second key is to decide where you are going. When you know where you want your business to go, you can determine what needs to be done to get there. Doing these things creates excitement and enjoyment. Instead of struggling on with meagre rewards, we can make progress towards success in a steadily growing and entirely planned way.

3 Spread The Word

You will never succeed by keeping your business a secret. You need to spread the word to let people know about your unique products or services. With many small businesses, there is a tendency to be reactive. If sales slow down, you decide to advertise to address the situation. When work picks up, advertising is stopped. The result of this approach is haphazard advertising which produces haphazard results. Rather than haphazard advertising, a planned advertising and promotion strategy can be applied to address specific goals.

Instead of one broad objective of “getting more sales”, strategies can be developed in three areas. Firstly strategies should be developed to actively encourage word of mouth and a system for generating referred leads. Secondly, planned advertising approaches are needed to generate a steady flow of new enquiries. Thirdly, strategies can be developed to increase the value and frequency of purchases from existing customers. Marketing must not be left to chance. The third key is to spread the word, by developing planned, consistent and effective advertising and promotional systems and strategies.

4 Do What You Do So Well They’ll Come Back And Bring Their Friends

The difference between the truly successful business and the average business is that successful business’ leaders live, breathe and preach quality, where the average business’ leader only pays lip service to it. There are many companies that have built their reputation on the quality of the service they provide as much as the product they sell. Even if we haven’t been, I’m sure we all know the reputation Disneyland has for the quality of the experience of a visit there. The title of this key is a quote (paraphrased) from Walt Disney. This man lived and breathed this attitude and accepted nothing less from his employees. The outworking is that standards and procedures are established so that employees know what is expected of them in every situation, particularly in an interaction with a customer. Delighted customers come back with their friends.

5 Train Your People To Do It Better Than You

When we start a business based on our own unique skills, we have a difficult choice when we get too busy to cope with all the work our expertise has created. We need to spread the load by employing others to do some of the work. This is the critical point in the business’ development. If the business owner gets this right, the future of the business is assured, but if it goes wrong, the business is doomed.

Many business owners wish they could clone themselves. They are unable to find anyone who can work as well as they do. Usually there has been some resistance to this move, but eventually the need becomes obvious. Business growth is always stifled by the owner hanging on to the work they enjoy. Having made the choice to grow, the key to unlocking this potential is to train the new people to be better than yourself.

6 Keep The Score

The greatest danger in a growing business is for the owner to lose control. This fear causes many to choose to stay small because they do not want the worries of growing too big.

WHAT YOU MEASURE YOU CAN IMPROVE!

A business’ performance needs to be managed and controlled. So many business owners worry about getting the work done, but they don’t measure results, they don’t keep score. Keeping the score indicates how well the business is going towards achieving its goals. If performance is behind expectations, steps can be taken to improve. If the score was not kept, no one would ever know that performance was substandard, and the goals would quite likely never be reached.

7 Celebrate Your Victories

Regeneration of our physical and emotional resources comes when we celebrate victories. One of the problems we have in small business is that we think we are too busy to take time off to celebrate. Even if we just get away from the business and relax, we come back rejuvenated and are usually able to tackle our work with a renewed vigour. Imagine how inefficient it becomes, using a battery powered machine, if we keep on working harder and harder to get the work done and never stop to recharge the batteries. If we don’t stop at times to recharge our batteries we keep working hard but become totally ineffective.

When we plan our future and set goals it is easy to determine when to celebrate. Without goals to achieve, we can keep on working until it becomes a drudgery. Celebrations put excitement into what we do.

Conclusion

Implementing the 7 keys to unlock the profit potential in your business could be what you need to end the frustration you feel from trying to build your business but seeming to take one step forward and two steps back. These are the keys to freedom from the daily grind of business pressure, the keys to gaining the rewards you deserve from the efforts you put in. It is up to you to take hold of the keys and unlock the hidden profit and excitement that is the potential your business holds.

Greg Roworth is a business consultant and author of The 7 Keys to Unlock Your Business Profit Potential. Download the first two chapters free at Small Business Success or check out the free resources there.

Do You Have A Vision?

Get Beyond Your Tasks
Nan S. Russell

Ever hear the story of the two masons working side by side at a building site? They're doing the same work under pretty much the same conditions. Then, one day a stranger comes along, approaches one of the men and asks him, "What are you doing?" "I don't know and I don't care," replies the man, his voice brimming with irritation. All I do is slap this crummy mortar on these crummy bricks and pile them up in a crummy line. That's what I'm doing."

The stranger returns to the building site the next day. This time he approaches the second man, asking him the same question. "Tell me," he said, "what are you doing?" Smiling at the stranger, the man proudly replies, "Why, I'm helping to build the new cathedral."

I don't know about you, but in my twenty years in management I met plenty of people like the first mason. People doing what they were told to do, without a greater context or purpose. People focused on what they were doing, not why they were doing it. People who clearly didn't like their job, and clearly weren't winning at working.

When you define the purpose for your work, you create a vision behind the tasks, and that vision changes results. Think about it. What are you helping to build in your workplace? Why does your work matter? Before you say it doesn't, think again. You have an important role or you wouldn't be paid to do it. Of course, it's unlikely you'll find the purpose outlined in your job description. You see, defining your purpose is not about the tasks you do. It's about the reason for the tasks.

So if you're an employment specialist in Human Resources, your purpose is not to hire people. That's a task. The reason behind the task might be to increase your company's competitive edge with exceptional people. If you're a web designer, your job is not to build websites. That's a task. Your purpose is in the why of it. Maybe it's to build the corporate brand or make life easier for your customers. Look beyond your title.

In one of my jobs, my purpose was to help the company develop a winning culture; in another it was to help build trust in the corporate brand so new customers would give us a try. My job title would never have told you about either.

But here's a secret. People who are winning at working don't wait for someone else, like their boss, to define their work's purpose. They figure it out. They define it. They create a vision for themselves.

People who are winning at working can articulate how the work they do supports their organization's vision, values, goals and objectives. They're not satisfied doing tasks like the first mason. They're like the second. They want to understand and contribute to the whole. They want to know that what they do at work matters. Want to be winning at working? Define your work's purpose. And get beyond your tasks.

(c) 2005 Nan S. Russell. All rights reserved.

Sign up to receive Nan's free biweekly eColumn at www.winningatworking.com. Nan Russell has spent over twenty years in management, most recently with QVC as a Vice President. She has held leadership positions in Human Resource Development, Communication, Marketing and line Management. Nan has a B.A. from Stanford University and M.A. from the University of Michigan. Currently working on her first book, Winning at Working: 10 Lessons Shared, Nan is a writer, columnist, small business owner, and instructor.

Visit www.nanrussell.com or contact Nan at mailto:info@nanrussell.com.

Goals And Your Home Business

Goal Setting: The Secret To Home Business Success

The ability to set goals and effectively motivate yourself to achieve them are two essential skills that will help you achieve success in you home business.

To try and start a business without goals could be compared to throwing a baseball pitch, blindfolded in the dark. What would be your chance of getting your pitch on target? Never mind getting a strike-out. Unless you are very lucky it is unlikely that you will have any success without properly setting out goals.

If when you start your home business, in what ever field it maybe, if you have no goals and aim at nothing, is it not unlikely that you will hit nothing and achieve nothing?

To set effective goals there are a few things you need to know about yourself which will affect how you set your goals. You are affected by, the environment in which you live, your experience and knowledge, your attitude and dreams and visions for the future.

When you set your goals you need to decide what you want and when you want to achieve each goal. You should spend time writing down your goals and display them in a prominent position where you will see them daily to remind yourself to stay motivated and focused. Cross off your goals once they’ve been achieved, adding new ones to ensure your business keeps growing.

“Don’t set your Goals to low. If you don’t need much, you won’t become much”. - - Jim Rohn - -

I’m sure you will have come across the SMART analogy, with regards to goal setting. It contains the most important concepts to consider and adhere to when setting your goals.

Goals should be; Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time related.

For example it would be unwise to set a goal of making $10,000 in a week, it’s just not a realistic goal for the average person, unless you have a lot of experience and knowledge in your field or receive help from someone who has these attributes. When you failed to reach this goal your motivation would suffer and you might start doubting your decision to start your home business.

Before you start setting your goals I want you to write a list of all the things you want; whether it is a new car, watch, house, to send your kids through college or a successful home business, write them all down and say why you want them. When I did this I had a list the length of my arm and I’m still working through it 3 years on. By doing this it will help focus your mind and motivate yourself to succeed.

Now set your goals, they need to be SMART and you need to set both short term and long term goals, and also daily goals. One of the best techniques I use is to set 6 goals before I go to bed for the next day and prioritise them so I know clearly in my mind what I have to do the next day.

All successful people set goals and prioritise them in order of importance. Remember your time is your most important asset; you simply cannot afford to waste it.

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. -- Aristotle –

When you are in business for yourself, you are the primary motivating factor, if your truly want your home business to succeed you will do whatever it takes to make it happen.

By making goal setting a habit there is no reason why you cannot achieve excellence.

by Ian Canaway

About the Author: Ian Canaway will help you launch your very own money making website today that's 100% ready to take orders and pull in massive profits for you right now... Guaranteed! Visit: http://www.asuccesfullhomebusiness4u.com

Source: www.isnare.com

Goals And Business

The Importance of Business Goals

For you to get where you want to go, there are four key steps for you to take. They are not difficult, but they are vital.

Commonly known as the GROW model, the four stages are as follows:-

G stands for Goals

Being clear about where you want to get to is absolutely critical. You MUST know where you are intending to get to, by identifying your goals and being very precise about them.

Use SMART goals - this is a useful description which is great to remember.

S - is for Specific
Be really clear about what it is you want

M - is for Measurable
There must be some sort of number of other measurable description of your goal

A – is for Actionable
You have to have some verb in the goal – you have to DO something!

R – is for Realistic
Make your goal achievable, but don’t be frightened to make it BIG!!

T – is for Timebound
All of your great goals will fall by the wayside if you have no when about them – the ‘maybe I’ll start next week method’.

Poor Goal examples:-
To grow business revenue
To have happy employees

Great Goal examples
To build bottom line profit by 20% every year for the next three years
To have a 33% split between all revenue streams within 2 years

You might also want to consider what ‘Purpose’ in your life there is for this goal, the more it fits what you truly want out of life, the more motivated you will be. Thus SMART(P)

R stands for Reality

Be brutally honest about where you are starting from and what has held you back in the past.

Take a half hour to understand the assets and skills you bring to the business. Get really clear on your qualities - and shortfalls!

Be realistic and honest – a good way is to just list all the positive attributes you have, such as patience, perseverance and focus.

Dispel any ‘I can’ts’ right now. You can and will. Reality means just that and no untrue negative beliefs you hold about yourself.

O stands for Options

Here is where the fun starts, if you let it. Really let your imagination go – blank sheet of paper and 10 minutes of uninterrupted time. For organisations, this may take longer – it may involve as many of your people as possible – that’s OK! You write until you can’t think of any more ideas about how to make your goal come true.

After 10 minutes, or when you dry up – take a 10 minute break – and then think of ten more – you can do it!! In this phase, you are not judging, it is very important that you don’t think of any ‘can’ts’ or even thinking of any ‘how’s’ just let the ideas flow. There are loads more idea creating things you can choose.

W stands for ‘What’ and ‘When’

Check out the ideas from above and choose five ‘quick wins’ and five longer term projects.

Make a decision to do the five quick wins within one week, starting today (you might be surprised to find you do them all today!). Then when finished do five more till all are completed (mind you, once you get into the swing of it, you’ll start uncovering a lot more!).

For the longer term ideas to achieve your goals, a sense check is important first. Will action (remember the ‘A’ in SMART) on this idea, deliver the outcome you really want towards your goal – or is it a nice to do, or even off track. For either of these be ruthless and ditch the ones that are off track. Get five focused ideas in place ready for Action.

Create a timeline from your goal and working back from there, decided milestones on each of your five key ideas. Use say quarterly, monthly, or weekly reviews. Be decisive and flexible as the actions will go at different speeds. In some sort of visual planner, record where you will be with each one of your actions towards your goal at the regular reviews you have. Some people prefer to have weekly ‘action steps’ in each project – even daily.

The key is to be able to say., ‘This week (Tuesday is my best day), I will visit three new potential customers, as a step towards visiting 50 this year’. Put it in your diary, Outlook or whatever as if it is an appointment with yourself. Ring-fence that time as the most important thing you are going to do and it cannot be shifted. You will need to be disciplined – if you are, it will work.

The key here is to create actionable steps in bite-sized chunks which you believe you can do.

As someone once said (with apologies to elephant lovers), ‘You can only eat an elephant one bite at a time!’

. . . and finally

Remember that in life and business, you personally have the choices to make. No-one else. It is your responsibility how you act and challenge yourself. Take the responsibility and give it a go. Life is not a dress rehearsal – Grasp the opportunities you have today and every day.

Further reading on the GROW model (should be available from libraries)"Coaching for Performance: Growing People, Performance and Purpose", Sir John Witmore.

by Martin Haworth

Copyright 2005 Martin Haworth is a Business and Management Coach. He works worldwide, mainly by phone, with small business owners, executives and corporate leaders. He has hundreds of hints, tips and ideas at his website, www.coaching-businesses-to-success.com.

...helping you, to help your people, to help your business grow...

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