Give your customer a cookie

Posted by Kevin Stirtz on January 7, 2010

0 comments | 1091 reads

At my favorite coffee shop, they do a lot of things right for their customers. A recent example is how they handled a service recovery situation.

I had placed a lunch order and it didn’t get prepared and served right away like usual. Someone forgot to process the order. After I asked about it, the employee apologized and took care of it very quickly. And, she included a chocolate chip cookie in my order at no charge.

This might seem like no big deal. And it’s not. It was a simple, honest error with a nice recovery. No harm no foul. And that’s how it should be. Service recoveries should not be turned into an earth-shaking event. Apologize, fix it, offer a little extra and move on.

The other thing they did well was they paid attention. They chose a chocolate chip cookie to give me as an extra because they know I like them. They know this because they pay attention. (Apparently, I buy them often). Simple, easy and entirely effective.

Do you know what cookies your customers like? How could you fit them into a typical service recovery?

Kevin Stirtz

Kevin Stirtz is a web marketing consultant. He uses SEO, social media and local search strategies and tools to help businesses attract and keep more customers. He is a Certified Inbound Marketing Professional and has written two books about marketing and customer loyalty. Kevin lives in the Twin Cities metro area of Minneapolis and St. Paul, MN.

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