Under-promise and over-deliver: exceed your customers' expectations by giving them more than what your business promises
by Murray Raphel
Michael Howard was recently chosen as the new leader of Britain's Conservative party. In I his first public statement as leader he said, "My approach is a simple one: Promise less, deliver more."
Howard's philosophy is the secret to his success in business as well as politics. Yet many business owners do just the opposite. Here are a few examples:
I once gave a contract to a local carpenter for some repairs on my house. He said he'd start work the following Monday. Two weeks later, I was still waiting. I left messages on his answering machine but he never called back.
Here's another one: After I saw a landscape gardener working on my neighbor's lawn, I asked if he would be interested in doing some work on my lawn. "Sure" he replied, enthusiastically, and gave me his card.
"When can you be here?" I asked.
"How's the day after tomorrow?" he replied.
That was the beginning of the summer. Now that the snow has started falling, I'm still waiting.
Here's one more example: I once brought a picture in to be framed at a local gallery. The owner said he would call me when it was finished.
"How long will that be?" I asked.
"Oh, only a day or two," he said.
A week later, he hadn't called. I had to call him.
What's happening here? It seems that people who make promises and don't deliver are becoming more and more prevalent in today's customer-service community. But I like the line from the poet Robert Service: "A promise made is a debt unpaid."
Keep Your Promises
Have you ever told someone that his framing would be ready on a certain day and, when he showed up, said, "Oh, I'm sorry, we just didn't get around to doing it--but we'll have it ready on (Friday)." Whenever you promise something, you must deliver.
When Vrest Orton first opened his Vermont Country Store in the tiny village of Weston, Vt. (population 400), he did a good tourist business. Wanting to expand, he decided to go into the mail-order business and offer his goods in a catalog. For advice, he called on Leon Leonwood Bean, founder of L.L. Bean in Freeport, Maine--which was doing quite well with its own catalog business.
Vrest asked Bean what he had to do to be successful in the me, order business, to which Beam replied: "Make sure the story isn't better than the store."
Make'Em Happy
Why do customers buy from you? I'll bet that one major reason is trust. They believe what you say is what you mean.
I once had a retailer friend who was obsessed with computers. Using them, he could tell you how many pairs of pink socks he sold on any given day between any given hours. His briefcase was always filled with voluminous printout sheets that he studied every night. He would pencil notes in the margins to reference for future buying decisions.
While this person's ads promised great customer service, he was usually too busy with his bookkeeping to remind his staff to take care of their customers. And the final result was bankruptcy.
Rollie LaMarche from Picture This Gallery in Alberta, Canada, understands how to under-promise and over-deliver. "We make it easy for our customers to do business with us," he said. "We have our own Web site to answers questions like, 'What kind of glass should I use for my picture?'"
When customers have complaints, many of them expect a response within a few days at best, LaMarche said. "We get back to them within 24 hours--or less."
LaMarche knows the two basic reasons why people buy things--they want to feel good and they are looking for solutions to specific problems. LaMarche makes sure he can provide both.
On average, people who enjoy shopping in a store will spend 20 percent more money than they will if they find the store disagreeable. And while there will always be retailers who believe they are doing fine without trying anything new to make their customers happy, they would do well to remember this quote by Albert Einstein: "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, each time expecting a different result."
There are rules to know, directions to follow and paths to take to make sure you always under-promise and over-deliver. Here are a few:
1 Be specific. Don't just tell a customer that his frame job will be ready on Monday, tell him it will be ready between 9 and 11 a.m. on Monday. Then, for emphasis, ask him if that time is convenient.
2 Provide reminders. When you make an appointment with your doctor, you usually receive a phone call the day before to remind you about it. So, when you send out invitations to the opening of a new exhibit, call your best customers a day or two in advance just to remind them about it. They'll appreciate the time you took to contact them.
3 Maintain your pricing. For example, if you ever advertise an item at a specific price, then find you've accidentally under-priced it, honor the advertised price anyway. Tell the customer you made a mistake but don't disappoint them with your error. A small loss in profit can be greatly overshadowed by the strengthening of your reputation as someone who keeps her word.
4 Remember the lifetime value of your customers. Be sure to treat each customer as a very important person. lf you exceed their customer-service expectations, they will keep coming back.
That Little Extra Something
Along with these simple rules, be sure to regularly offer your customers some added values. I once worked with a furniture dealer in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. Most of his furniture was delivered to his customers' homes.
I thought it would be a good idea if his drivers brought something a little extra with them when they made their deliveries. Maybe they could show up with a dozen roses for a customer's new dining room table or a magazine rack for a newly purchased chair.
You can use the same technique in your gallery. If a customer buys a painting from you and asks to have it delivered, send along a reproduction of a painting by the same artist on a tie or a puzzle--or you can send her a book on the artist. She won't forget it. Why? Because you under-promised and over-delivered.
After receiving a distinguished alumni award from the University of Wisconsin, business consultant Roxanne Emmerich told her audience that the No. 1 rule of business is this: "Always under promise and over deliver. It's the extra on the end that makes customers want to return to you and keep coming back. More important--it makes you feel better."
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