Marketing ace and friend, Bob Gutermuth (founder of Dialog Marketing) shared this recent experience with a Houston pizzeria. Reports Bob, "We left our feedback via a comment card that the waitress asked us to fill out. The very next day I received the following email from the restaurant:"

Dear Bob,

We have been receiving customer feedback from our comment cards. Our top complaints are:

1. Too Loud - Due to our 22ft ceilings it tends to make the store seem loud. We are looking into different ways to muffle the sound.

2. Past service - We have done an entire rehire for all servers the past 2 weeks and have seen a drastic increase in customer satisfaction toward service.

3. High drink prices - We are changing prices on our drinks to the following:
Boylans Soda's from $3 to $2
Honest Tea from $3 to $2.50
VitaminWater from $3 to $2
1/3 Liter Spring Water and Sparkling Water from $3 to $2
1 Liter Spring Water and Sparkling Water from $7 to $6

4. Need a diet cola - As of today, we have added the Diet Cane Cola to our menu!

Thanks for everyone's input. Read more »

There’s an important difference between a client and an advocate. Advocates do more than simply buy from you. Advocates are engaged customers who demonstrate their vendor allegiance through such activities as spreading positive word of mouth, recruiting new prospects and helping their vendors improve. How can a firm nurture trust to help sustain these important advocate behaviors?

Truth is, we ‘train’ people how to treat us.

When a client refers you to another potential client, consider it the big deal it is! Most firms have gotten far too casual in both identifying and acknowledging referrals. That’s bad business for two reasons. When a referral goes unacknowledged, we reduce the likelihood the client will repeat the behavior in the future. But that’s just one transgression. The other is the violation of the customer’s ‘tit for tat’ rule of trust that says: When I do something nice for your business, let me know you know.

Of course, it’s not possible to know the source of every referral and/or acknowledge it every time, but having a referral identification process in place can go a long way! Consider these guidelines for rooting out advocates and thanking them:

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What, if this very minute, one of your best customers is on Google, comparing you against the competition and contemplating a switch. Will your brand pass muster and prevail or, instead, get kicked to the curb?

That's the daunting scenario playing out countless times a day for most brands. Sadly, many firms are ill-equipped to address this big, new loyalty threat and they bleed high-value customers because of it.

Here's a quick look at three search-and-switch remedies:

1. Ace Your Buyer's Worth-It Test

Your buyers are human calculators of sorts, constantly accessing your brand's worth against other choices. In a search-prone world, how do you consistently score a big 'yes' on your customer's worth-it assessment?

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It was the summer of 1977 and I was a just-graduated college student serving hot steaks to hungry customers at a Myrtle Beach steakhouse. While my customers were thinking about extra sour crème for their bake potatoes, my mind was on a MBA degree and whether by my alma mater, the University of South Carolina, would approve financial aid in time for the fast-approaching Fall semester.

By late July, with no word from school, I decided to drive the 138 miles to Columbia to get my answer.

Once on campus, I swung by the Registrar’s office and got a transcript of my grades. (Hey, I didn’t study all those hours for nothing!) Armed with my transcript, I walked the few blocks to the business school and, having no formal appointment, camped outside the office of Dr. Pierce Lyles, the business school’s Graduate Program Director.

My big moment came a half-hour later when, inside Dr. Lyles office, I nervously placed my transcript on the Director’s desk and said, “I desperately want my MBA. I don’t have any money. But I know you do. How can I get some of it?”

With far more calmness than I was displaying, Dr. Lyles, eyeballed my transcript, leaned back in his leather desk chair, looked me over carefully and then replied, “I will give you an assistantship for one semester. Your grades will determine whether or not it gets renewed.”

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"Think Units." That was the headline on the Plexiglas-framed desk-top poster that appeared in my office in-basket one Monday morning in the early ‘80s. I was working for a Fortune 100 firm, and the poster was a "friendly reminder" from the execs in the C-suite that every sale (and sales dollar) mattered.

The message struck a chord. I was a frazzled, newly promoted brand manager nervously contemplating what to do, exactly, to boost my brand's sales in a market downturn. It was my first encounter with a sour market brimming with cash-strapped, budget-pinched customers, and I was feeling the heat.

I made it my job to communicate, communicate, communicate the positive message.

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Why are gun stores always staffed with "grumpy old men?"

That's the question I heard jokingly tossed around early one Sunday morning on a local radio talk show. The cohosts' consensus (valid or not) was that most every Austin gun store had one "grumpy old man" working the gun counter and that the store's owner depended on him for his deep product knowledge, but the price of that knowledge was often prickly, curmudgeon tendencies that could rub customers the wrong way.

The dialogue entertainingly reminded me how customer-facing jobs come in all shapes and sizes and how the need for multiple skills sets drives staffing complexities in firms, small and large.

No doubt, customer-facing employees are critical to your firm's success and it's essential that your frontline brand makers be well equipped to serve.

What, exactly, are the different skills sets required on the front lines of today's firms? Are all customer-facing skills equally teachable? What are best practices for staffing your firm with the best possible talent?

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We've all heard it said a zillion times: "You can't successfully drive customer-centricity without c-suite buy-in." But what about boardroom buy-in? It's an area of support often overlooked (or considered off limits) in fighting the internal corporate tugs of war that typically accompany a firm's struggle for customer-centricity.

Since 2003, I have served as corporate board director for a New York Stock Exchange company. Take it from me: A lot more can happen for the customer with boardroom support than without it. Here're four suggestions for getting your customer strategies on the boardroom radar screen—and winning boardroom advocates for your hard-fought initiatives:

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Toilet Paper. How do you successfully build an engaging, loyalty-building brand story around that product?

Just ask the ace marketers at Proctor & Gamble and they'll likely tell you about the 20 free, deluxe Charmin restrooms opened in New York's Time Square for the 2007 holiday season. At the same location in 2006, the Charmin Holiday rest rooms served more than 420,000 people from 100 countries and all 50 states, so a 2007 encore was in order.

But free, family-friendly restrooms and ample toilet tissue were just one part of the unique, memorable brand story crafted by the Charmin team. First, friendly folks dressed as dancing toilets greeted passersby on the street, inviting them to visit the Charmin Holiday Restrooms nearby. Visitors then took escalators up and wove through a rope line while a legion of smiling hosts wearing Charmin apparel greeted them and upbeat holiday music played in the background. Inside the stalls (serviced by staff after every use), Ultra Strong and Ultra Soft tissue were available and afterwards, guests were asked to vote for their favorite.

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My loyalty work has me thinking a lot these days about "customer credit" and how firms can best get the customer credit they're due for the hard fought value they deliver. Bottom line, it's tough out there. The market has a long memory and old perceptions die hard. Just ask the U.S. Postal Service and the credit they receive when responding to their customers' letters to God.

Letter #1
(Written by a mom near Houston and circulating on the Internet.)

"Our 14 year old dog, Abbey, died last month. The day after she died, my 4 year old daughter Meredith was crying and talking about how much she missed Abbey. She asked if we could write a letter to God so that when Abbey got to heaven, God would recognize her. I told her that I thought we could, so she dictated these words:

Dear God,
Will you please take care of my dog? She died yesterday and is with you in heaven. I miss her very much. I am happy that you let me have her as my dog even though she got sick. I hope you will play with her. She likes to play with balls and to swim. I am sending a picture of her so when you see her you will know that she is my dog. I really miss her.
Love, Meredith

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A speaking engagement recently took me to Iceland and some of the most captivating, natural beauty I've ever seen. While visiting the "Golden Circle" sights around Reykjavik, my amazing host Glyfi Skarphedinsson, pointed to volcanic rock, dubbed "Christianity Lava", and shared this memorable story:

Around the year 1000, Iceland was in a religious transition. Some wanted the worship of Nordic gods to continue as the country's official religion while others supported the move to Christianity. During this time, two Icelanders were fervently debating which religion made more sense. The "Nordic gods" advocate pointed to a distant, erupting volcano and declared to his Christian-leaning countryman, "That lava flow is headed directly toward your land. What's that say about your god and his power to protect you?" Undaunted, the Christianity advocate cried, "You foolish man! Your entire land IS a lava field, and has been for many, many years. What's that say about your gods' superiority?"

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