WOW Word-Of-the-Week #395: Creative
February 29, 2012 by Susan Clarke
Creative – the ability to use your imagination.
Do you feel creative at work? Are you encouraged to share your ideas? Do you have a creative outlet in your personal life?
This is the sixth in the series of WOW’s from my book, “The FUN-Damental Secrets of Service: How to have FUN and make your customers feel good about spending their money!” The C in SERVICe stands for Creative. And when it comes to service, it means being able to see beyond the surface and the obvious. To look past what the customer says in order to find what the customer NEEDS.
Ask any salesperson whose income depends on his or her ability to get around objections and blocks. They know that what looks and sounds like a NO can often be a MAYBE in disguise. A MAYBE that some creative thinking can easily turn into a YES!
Wildly Creative
Creative also means being able to change your presentation to fit the needs of your customers, guests, members, or clients. If you are a manager, I can’t tell you how important it is to role play. One of your jobs is to help your staff create their own personalized presentations. That way they will sound more sincere and real, instead of canned or phony, and who are uncomfortable using someone else’s words.
When it comes to servers increasing check averages, always refer to it as “helping your customers, guests, members, or clients,” and not “Suggestive Selling.” If you want to be successful making suggestions I personally found that you should always:
1. Be Specific
2. Offer Two Choices
Making Suggestions–It has been proven that servers can influence customers, guests, clients or members easier with a nod and/or a smile. And a whopping 78.3 percent of the time they will go along with the servers suggestion if they feel a sense of trust. And this brings me to my:
FUN-damental Service Secret #4
“Give The Customer Not What He WANTS,
But What He Really NEEDS.”
This week think about how creative you are. Do you enjoy being creative and using your imagination? Do you feel more creative at work or at home? Do you ask questions to find out exactly what your customers, guests, members, or clients really need?