Guide to Great Customer Service

In any retail business, providing excellent customer service is crucial to success. This is especially important when you operate a pet store, because people have very strong emotional attachments to their animal companions, requiring a heightened sense of knowledge, compassion and patience on the parts of proprietors.

You not only must genuinely love animals to be an effective pet business operator; you must also be a people person in order to establish an ongoing positive rapport with your customers.

Here are tips for creating and maintaining a loyal client base.

Get educated. Find out as much as you can about the kinds of animals for whom you will be providing products and services. That way, you can establish a distinct niche that will set you apart from other similar business owners.

It’s also very important to know your products, so that you can determine which are the most suitable for different types of pets and their specific needs.

Customer service means being consistently polite and courteous. This may seem like a no-brainer, but it cannot be over-emphasized. Always greet your customers in a friendly manner, be a good listener and be sure to thank the customers for visiting your store as they are leaving, even if they don’t buy anything. If you provide a pleasant experience, they more often than not will be back, or at least recommend your store to others.

If clients happen to bring their pets, which more often than not will be dogs, be friendly toward and show interest in the pet. (Be sure to ask the owners’ permission before attempting to pet them.) Plus, have some treats on hand for the pet. (Once again, always ask the owners’ permission, as some pets may have health or dietary issues that don’t allow certain foods.)

Make an effort to remember the names of customers and their pets. Overall, treat each customer as if they are the most important person in the world.

Follow up. Maintaining ongoing communications with your customers on a regular basis will keep them coming back. One good practice is through an email newsletter. It doesn’t have to be very long; it could just be a page. You could include news about store specials, new products and/or offers of loyal customer discounts. Either way, this keeps you in the forefront of your customers’ minds on a regular basis.

Become a diplomat. As with any retail business, there are times when you will have to deal with difficult customers.

Here are some effective customer service dos and don’ts that I have put into practice during my many years of dealing with the public, that really do help to diffuse the most tense scenarios:

• Do not become defensive or argue with the customer.
• Do not take it personally.
• Do merely let an angry or disgruntled customer vent, without interrupting them.
• Do calmly detach, yet maintain a compassionate facial expression and composed body language.
• Do apologize for a customer’s dissatisfaction, even if you did nothing wrong.
• Do offer specific ways to remedy the situation, such as a discount or no-cost replacement of a product the customer didn’t like.
• When all is said and done, kill ‘em with kindness!

From my own experience, not only do these practices usually work to pacify the most cantankerous of customers, people many times will ultimately feel contrite about their outbursts and apologize to you! Best of all, they are more likely to become loyal repeat customers.

Be nice to your employees. While this is a point that many business owners and operators often overlook, providing great customer service is also contingent upon how you treat your employees. Whether you have one employee or 100, this is vitally important because happy employees are effective, motivated employees. Furthermore, they will be much more inclined to offer stellar customer service, plus remain loyal to you.

Granted, there are some employees who can be very difficult, no matter what you do. But you can potentially avoid this by hiring the right staff from the get-go.

An Example of Excellent Customer Service

I recently began shopping at a regional, family-owned chain store called Pets Plus, because my cat was diagnosed with urinary tract issues, and I heard this store has a large selection of holistic cat foods.

When I entered, I was immediately greeted by the manager, who introduced himself by name and asked how he could help me. He inquired about my cat, his health issues, his age and gender. The manager then walked me through the store, pointing out what foods might be best (he specifically suggested brands with cranberry, for maintenance of urinary tract health), while advising which ones to avoid.

He further recommended that I change my cat’s litter to a natural, wheat-based brand, explaining why this would also help. (As much as my cat and I love his vet, even she didn’t think to mention this.)

I next inquired about purchasing a window perch for my cat, but the models the store carried were pricey. When I balked at this, the manager immediately offered me a 15 percent discount. I naturally bought one.

As the cashier was ringing my purchases, the manager asked for my e-mail address for a mailing list for loyal customers. I also noticed that he treated the young employees in a warm, almost fatherly fashion, despite that he was rather young himself.

You can bet I am now a loyal repeat customer. If you follow these practices, you are guaranteed the same!