Customer Service

Customer Service

Zingerman’s Approach to Building a Culture of Great Service

What makes Zingerman’s approach to giving great service unique? We realized early in the game that in order to deliver an exceptional customer service experience, day-in and day-out, it was important to focus on more than “just” customer service. We wanted to build a culture of great service throughout the organization—top to bottom, from every […]

Customer Service

Two Simple Ways to Take Your Customer Service from Good to Great

Talk to any business owner who has kept their doors open year after year and chances are they’ll credit their longevity, at least in part, to giving great customer service. Similarly, many customers who stay loyal to specific businesses and brands will often cite great customer service as a big (if not the biggest) reason […]

Customer Service

Measuring Customer Service: Why It’s Important and How to Get Started

If you’re in the business of serving customers, it’s no secret just how important giving great customer service is to the success of your business. But how do you know if you’re doing it well? As they say, what gets measured gets done. At Zingerman’s, we do a lot of work around customer service and […]

Customer Service

A Favorite Tool for Greeting Customers: Celebrate 10-4 Day with ZingTrain!

Ask any trainer at ZingTrain what their favorite service tools are, and it’s a safe bet that the 10-4 Rule will be at the top everyone list. It’s a simple, behavioral customer service tool that ensures that every single person who enters your orbit is acknowledged and greeted. Ask anyone who has attended a ZingTrain […]

Customer Service

What Does “Great Service” Mean in Your Business?

When clients ask us to help them develop customer service training for their businesses, we always start by helping them articulate and document what “great service” means to them. That’s because effective training starts by defining what the trainees will be expected to know or be able to do at the end of the training. […]

Customer Service

One Customer at a Time

At  Zingerman’s we’ve done a lot of work over the past few years to introduce effective measurements to assess the quality of our service work. We do things like mystery shopping, customer callbacks, and track complaints, order accuracy and late deliveries. All have helped us compile data that we use to guage the effectiveness of […]

Customer Service

Striving for Third Place

Becoming what‘s known as a “third place” is a status that every community-oriented business should want to achieve. I first heard the idea of the third place in reading Ray Oldenburg’s book, The Great Good Place, originally published in 1989. Here is the key concept: As Oldenburg explains, the “first place is the home; the […]

Customer Service

EVEN MORE Low-Cost Service Tips for High-Stress Times

As we all know (and as I’ve covered in the last two articles in this series: Low-Cost Service Tips in High-Stress Times, and MORE Low-Cost Service Tips), great service is about getting the big and small things right. In this third installment of basic but useful service strategies that we put into practice at Zingerman’s, […]

Customer Service

MORE Low-Cost Service Tips

Great service is about getting the big and small things right—and in this tough economy, keeping customers happy has even greater significance. Therefore, here is the second installment of basic but useful service strategies that we put into practice at Zingerman’s. Some of these can be implemented one at a time, starting tomorrow morning if […]

Customer Service

Low-Cost Service Tips for High-Stress Times

In part one of a three-part series, we learn about rules for greeting guests (and, yes, there are rules) and boosting the service skills of long-term employees. In light of the tough economic times, great service is an even more compelling area for focus than usual. I doubt any of us can afford to risk […]

Customer Service

Loyal for Life

IN RECENT ISSUES, I’VE FOCUSED ON THE INFORMATION WE’VE GLEANED FROM THE ZINGERMAN’S EXPERIENCE INDICATOR (ZXI), or what others in the business world refer to as the Net Promoter Score. Part of me thinks I should switch to another topic but as the findings keep coming and continue to have a positive impact on our […]