Giving Your Clients and Customers Special Treatment

Business Tip: Make Your Client the VIP of the Moment

Treatment of Clients is Very Vital in the Service
Industry

Negative experiences of how we are treated as
customers

Have you entered a store or a fast food and then the attendant
knew you were waiting there and did not even budge to attend to
what you need. How did you feel? Sometimes we need to call the
sales attendant so that they will serve us. But even when we
call them, they reluctantly approach you as if you were not
important. How did you feel? Now, let us look at ourselves.
Are we in some way the same as that business? Do we at times
neglect to attend to the client or customer in a way that they
don't feel important? Let us explore and examine this element
of customer and client servicing.

Sales become alive when you treat clients with VIP
treatment

If we were to reverse the above scenario with sales personnel
who treated their customers and clients with a VIP-like treatment,
imagine the delight that would be felt by the client. This
assures you of more repeat business. And not only that, your
referrals will multiply and the good word will do the work for
you.

Who do you prioritize?

Sometimes, because of our business and profit-orientation, we
tend to discriminate our clients. We put them in categories
like: these are the ones that are bringing in the profits more
and these are the ones that are not as profitable. We sometimes
forget that both categories of customers are not isolated from
one another. They are within the social milieu and within the
network of your business. If you discriminate one client and
she feels so bad that she shares her experience with the client
you treated better, imagine what damage that can do for your
business - especially if that client you treated better were
more compassionate of her than you. The client you treated
better may eventually decide that you are not the service
excellence business you really represent to her.

The lessons of treating people as subjects

The ideal thus is to practice our VIP-treatment business
strategy to all our clients and customers. And if in case, they
come all together to you, make a first come, first serve rule
so that they will not feel as if they were overlooked or made
to feel less important. This is a difficult job, but it can
be done. It only needs practice. And practice makes perfect.
I guess one golden rule is to treat the client and customer
as you yourself would like to be treated. There are exceptions
to this rule for certain, because of the distinct differences
and unique traits that go with each particular client or
customer, but in general, we as humans want to be treated as
subjects and not as objects.

For client-centered businesses and one-on-one
encounters

This is where the VIP of the moment strategy will be most
effective. In a one-on-one encounter with the client, usually
you can customize your service according to the needs of the
client. And when you are able to customize your service, that
is when the client feels that he or she is the VIP of the
moment. Many of those in sales feel that he should be the
center of the encounter - giving all the input, the sales
spiel, and making the sales presentation. We forget that the
center of gravity must rather be on the client. Focusing our
attention on the client makes us listen more and find out what
his needs are. It lessens our desire to be the know-it-all-type
of salesman. And we must have the discipline to not hurry up
and get the client call as short as possible because we have
other things to do. Yes, we indeed have others things to do,
and we are in a business world, but when we at times take time
with the client and share "small talk" with him or her and find
out how he or she is personally, then he or she will feel that
you are really treating him or her as a subject and not just for
his or her money. We are not perfect. Indeed, there are times
we think self-centeredly and are guilty of thinking only in
terms of the money we can get. Money is important. Indeed it
is. It is what fuels the business operations. But if we lose
clients because they feel as if they are not really serviced
well as people, then there would be no money to fuel our
business.

Focusing on the person

When meeting with a client, when our mind is focused on money,
usually the the encounter is "tense" and "nervous" and
"anxious". Especially when economic times are hard and people
are all burdened financially, since we are in the lead and in
control of the encounter, we will all the more make the client
feel tense, nervous and anxious by our own focusing on money
matters. The ideal is to focus on service and to do it well -
service excellence that has impact. If we are able to do this,
then our faith lies in a spirit and an ideal and not on money.
Money is limited, but the spirit of service excellence is
unlimited. And what is unlimited brings on unlimited richness
- both material and in values. If we practice generosity of
spirit with our clients, then for certain our client will do
the same and be generous with his or her compensation to your
service.

The Christian perspective

If we look at the Gospel and examine how Jesus treated the
sick, the lame, the blind, the sinners, the outcasts, the
widows, the orphaned, and the mute. Instead of discriminating,
he gave his full service to them and focused on solving their
problems and making life less burdensome for them. Imagine
the delight of the people who were cured. The ten lepers who
were cured were so happy that they forgot to thank Jesus. Only
one came back to thank Jesus. And that is why the good
reputation of Jesus spread. People spread the good news.
"He does all things well", they say. And people flocked to
Jesus that Jesus had sometimes to escape the crowds out of
sheer numbers. And remember when a crowd of 4,000 to 5,000
gathered before Him whom he now had the problem of feeding.
Just think of such a great increase in "clients"! We can learn
from this Christian perspective that treating everyone well
is important - even the least in our business hierarchy.