What we can learn from the Chicago Cubs

I am a huge Chicago Cubs fan.  I have been since I picked up a glove and bat when I was 5.  My mom is an equally devoted fan, as her mom was.  The Chicago Cubs are intertwined in the roots of our family tree, going back multiple generations.  I even named my puppy, Wrigley, after the ballpark where the Chicago Cubs play, Wrigley field.   

The devotion, as a fan to the Chicago Cubs has been questioned by some for many years.  The nickname “Loveable Losers” was attached to the Chicago Cubs.  As a fan you would hear about the curse of the goat and that it has been over a 100 years since a championship.  The losing became the identity of being a part of the Chicago Cubs, either as a fan or a player.

The fate of each season seemed to be pre-written every year.  There was one constant similarity during all the years of losing.  The ownership.  The ownership accepted the losing and I believe actually enjoyed the identity of a “Lovable Loser.”  Every year, the same philosophy and the same processes were in place that resulted in the same results.  Losing.  Over and over and over again.  For 108 years.  The culture of losing became the norm.  The pattern of losing continued not because of the curse of the goat or because of bad luck.  It continued because nothing changed. 

A new owner purchased the Chicago Cubs in 2009, Tom Ricketts.  Tom Ricketts, who grew up a Chicago Cubs fan, tolerated the losing for many years and experienced first-hand the “Lovable Loser” culture.  He confronted the culture of losing and at the highest level demanded change.  The change began when he trusted the baseball decisions to a known winner, Theo Epstein in 2011.  In his opening press conference, Theo Epstein who recently built a similar losing franchise to a winner, The Boston Red Sox, had this to say, "I don't believe in curses, (and) I guess I played a small part in proving they don't exist, from a baseball standpoint," Epstein said. "I do think we can be honest and upfront that certain organizations haven't gotten the job done. That's the approach we took in Boston. We identified certain things that we hadn't been doing well, that might have gotten in the way of a World Series, and eradicated them. That's what we'll do here."  Theo Epstein knew the reasons for years of losing was that the Chicago Cubs kept doing the same thing over and over again and expected different results.  He also said, "When I got to Boston they hadn't won in 86 years. We didn't run from that challenge. We embraced it," Epstein said. "We decided the way to attack it was to build the best baseball operation that we could, to try to establish a winning culture, to work as hard as possible and to bring in players who care more about each other and more about winning than the people around them thought or the external expectations, the external mindset. That's something that is going to be important to us here as well.” He knew that they had to change the culture of losing and he had to put in place new processes and people that produced positive results in a variety of baseball operational areas. 

Fast forward 5 years and the Chicago Cubs experienced their first World Series Championship since 1908.  The World Series championship never would have occurred without the changes that was made at the highest level.  The owner, Tom Ricketts and the President of Baseball Operations, Theo Epstein confronted the culture of losing by changing.  They were honest in their evaluation of themselves and made the necessary changes in hiring, training, drafting and managing of the Chicago Cubs.  These changes occurred throughout all levels of the organization.  We can learn from the story of the Chicago Cubs in our personal life and in our business life.  If the direction you are going in isn’t resulting in positive results, change.  Even if the changes can be painful.  Don’t wait 108 years like the Chicago Cubs to do so though.  Most of us don’t have that long.     

The Importance of “Holiday Cheerfulness” When It Isn’t the Holidays

As we are approaching the Holiday season, many people are undoubtedly looking forward to enjoying the wonderful foods such as turkey, stuffing, cranberries, ham, pies, cakes and a menagerie of cookies and candies.  I would wager a bet that the foods and treats are not the main reason we are looking forward to the Holiday season.  I would wager that the thought of spending time with friends and family and the fellowship we all receive from strangers are the main reasons to look forward to the Holidays.  The warmth of a friendly conversation or an understanding smile represents what I call, “Holiday Cheerfulness or a Holiday Spirit.”

I really enjoy the Holiday season because of the “Holiday Cheerfulness” that I warmly receive from most people.  It made me think that this same “Holiday Spirit” is exactly what we should expect from ourselves every day, not just on the Holidays.  The “Holiday Spirit” should be the standard at work, at home or even when you simply check out at a grocery store line.

As a call center, the “Holiday Cheerfulness” can be extremely important in helping our clients with their phone answering and dispatching needs.  A simple act of kindness in the voice of our Operators when our client’s customers call, can make or break the caller’s view of the company’s product or service we answer for.  A little “Holiday Spirit”, when it isn’t the Holidays, is what we strive to provide on each and every call we take for our clients.

Let us all embrace the “Holiday Spirit” on a daily basis.  Let that become the rule and not the exception that takes place for only 2 months of the year.  It truly is amazing what a simple act of kindness can do for you, your company and your family. 

Phone Coverage During Holiday Season Is Essential

As we are approaching the hectic Holiday season many businesses struggle to keep up with the demand on their staffing resources associated with phone coverage, when typically, most vacations and personal time off takes place.  Juggling your employee’s roles to temporarily fill in for your receptionist or after hours on call people can make a hectic Holiday season, unbearable.  This is where a Call Center like All City Communications can help.

All City Communications has helped many companies during the Holiday season with their calls, ensuring a call is never missed.  We answer as your business without the callers ever knowing that we are not in the office.  Our well trained and professional Operators are available to answer all calls 24 hours a day, 7 days a week including all Holidays.  We are always available and you can trust that when a caller is contacting your business, it will be answered clearly and quickly in a professional manner.

Instead of scrambling to find temporary help that may or may not be a fit for your business, allow All City to lend a hand with their experienced staff of qualified Operators.  Instead of spending valuable time interviewing potential employees for a temporary problem of staffing your phones during the Holidays, allow a Call Center like All City Communications handle your calls.  Instead of trying to handle all the afterhours and weekend calls yourself, while the demands of your time during the Holiday season are increased anyway, let All City Communications help.     

The Value of Personal Service

Personal Service.  A buzzword used so often – by support agents, customers and marketers alike – that it’s lost meaning for many of us.

Which is a darn shame, because personal service, when done right, is incredibly powerful.

It can be the difference between a customer forgetting about you the minute their transaction is over, and that same person returning to become a loyal customer for life.

But there’s a difference between saying that you deliver personal service (as so many companies do), and actually doing it.

Today, I’m going to share what personal service really is, why it’s so important for your business, and actionable tips you and your team can use to start making your support more personal.

The Value of Personal Service

A few years ago, a survey by Genesys asked more than 9,000 consumers about what mattered to them most when it came to doing business with companies.

What did the respondents mark as the improvement they’d like to see most among the companies they do business with?

40% of them – more than double the responses that the second place answer received – said “better human service”.

Personal Service is about making the person feel like they are doing business with a person, not a company.  It’s a simple concept, but incredibly valuable. Why?  Because when customers feel like they’re getting personal service, they become better customers.

The benefits of personal service extend beyond your customers and their immediate social circles, too.  As your business builds a reputation for great service, you’ll begin to draw more customers from around the market.

In fact, another study found that 72% of customers are “very” or “extremely” likely to do business with a company because of their reputation for strong customer service.  The benefits are clear. Now let’s talk about the approach.

How To Make Your Customer Service More Personal

Am I making the customer feel like they are doing business with a human or a business?

Just by keeping this question in the back of your mind, you’ll begin to subconsciously add personal touches to every support interaction.

To get you started, here are a few tips you can use to make your support more personal right away:

Use Names (Both Yours and Your Customer’s)

When Dale Carnegie said that “a person’s name is to that person, the sweetest, most important sound in any language,” he may not have had access to the latest medical research.

But as recent studies have shown, he was spot on.  As it turns out, our names are so important to us that hearing them light up an entirely different party of the brain than any other words.

Using your customer’s name makes them like you more, and on the flip side, using your own name makes the interaction feel more personal, too.

Who would you rather get an email from, “Mike” or “The Support Team”?

Show Your Face

Want to make a deeper connection with your customers when they read your emails?  Help them put a face to your name.

Using photos of faces doesn’t just increase conversion rates on your site; it help to humanize your business, build trust and make your customers feel as though they’re dealing with real people.

And real is key here. No cheesy stock photos of “business” people wearing headsets.

Try putting photos of your team on your site’s about or customer support pages, or even in the emails themselves.

Know Each Customer’s History With Your Business

Last week, I had to call DirecTV to fix an issue with my service.  After I told the support agent about my problem, she told me that she’d be happy to help. But right before she put me on hold, she casually noted:

“…and by the way, thank you so much for being a DirecTV customer since 2001. It means a lot to me that we’ve had your business for so long.”

That small touch made the interaction for me.

Simply by knowing a tiny detail about me as a customer, the agent made me feel like she (and the company) cared about my business, and made the interaction a lot more personal than a simple support transaction.

You can do the same thing

Personal Customer Service Is Worth It

Don’t let the buzzword status of “personal service” fool you; it really is an important, and valuable concept that can help you increase retention and grow your business.

Delivering personal support isn’t terribly hard, but it can pay off in a huge way.

Compete On Quality, Not Price

I learned from my father that price is a onetime decision but quality is a life time decision.  It made me think, what does quality mean in the answering service industry?  What does quality mean in our customer’s industry?

Quality in the answering service industry means an attentive telephone agent will answer every call live without a recorded greeting, within 3 rings, with the correct tone of voice and answer phrase.  An integral part of a quality answering service is dispatching.  A quality answering service, like All City, will dispatch the calls correctly to the correct on call person handling a specific call situation, either an urgent call or a general message by texting, emailing and calling.  If we didn’t perform at a high level then our price, no matter if it was the lowest in the industry, wouldn’t matter to most. 

Quality for other industries is just as important.  An important part of providing a quality service or product is communication and availability.  Even if our customer’s service or product were the lowest priced company in their industry, if there was poor communication or limited availability, the lowest price wouldn’t matter.  This is especially true today where social media can have a drastic effect on your company, both positively and negatively.

All City Communications will improve the quality of our customer’s product or service by enhancing the communication and availability for our client’s current customers and potential customers.  We answer every call live as your business, ensuring our client’s availability, whilealso providing enhanced communication.  A decision to turn to an answering service will help with two crucial areas of your business, availability and communication.  This is a big difference maker versus your competition.  Instead of competing on price alone, consider the small investment in an answering service.  The decision to enhance the quality of your service or product in your industry will have a greater long term positive impact on your business than simply cutting your price.  

Don’t be a transaction only business

Many of us purchase products and services by simply finding a website that offers that specific product or service.  There is no interaction with anybody in order to complete the purchase.  A decision is made solely on price and availability and the occasional review by someone you have never met.  The limited criteria many customers use to complete their transaction eliminates a major differentiating factor for all businesses, QUALITY!

If you allow your product or service to solely be valued by price, you will ultimately lose that business to someone offering the perceived same product or service, cheaper.  If you allow price and availability to be the only reasons that someone decides to use your product or service the only way to compete with other companies offering the same product or service is to lower your price.  Eventually you are doing the same work or offering the same product at a lesser value which ultimately lessens your value.

One simple way to enhance the transaction only culture that many companies fall in to is to increase your availability and perceived quality by having a person answering your phones live without a recorded greeting.  The impact of having that personal touch, guiding that caller to a solution is a difference maker.  We can answer as your business name without the caller knowing that we are not in your office.  Your caller will not have to navigate through a confusing automated phone system in order to get their question or concern answered on the product or service they are interested in.  Essentially, by simply having an answering service available to answer your calls live, you have added a very important differentiating factor that makes you more valuable that simply price and availability.          

4 Ways a Telephone Answering Service Helps Small Businesses

Running a small business as a contractor often means wearing multiple hats within the same day. In the morning you might be visiting job sites, then meeting with clients around lunchtime, then trying to handle your finances in the afternoon. That’s the life of a small business owner.

One thing you don’t need to be doing is dealing with phone calls all day. That’s where a telephone answering service can become your best ally. Keep reading to learn more about how a professional telephone answering service can help your business.

Focus on Business

As a contractor running a small business, you need to spend your time getting new clients and keeping your current ones happy. That often means making phone calls and sending out what could be a staggering number of e-mails.

It doesn’t mean answering the phone when credit card companies call with special offers or when prospective clients want to inquire about your business. Let a telephone answering service that understands the needs of small contractors handle that end for you.

Appearances Matters

As the owner of a small business, you don’t want to be the one answering the phone. If you have a small staff though, hiring a receptionist may not make a whole lot of financial sense.

Using a professional telephone answering service will give your small company the appearance of being a larger firm. If you do quality work there’s no reason consumers shouldn’t view you as the competent, professional contracting company you are.

On a Job Site?

When you’re out on a job site and nobody is in the office, all of your calls probably roll to voice mail. This looks unprofessional and it might make potential clients turn to your competitors. With an answering service at your disposal you won’t have to worry about that.

After Hours & Emergency Calls

Many potential customers work during the day and will call you in the eveing. With a professional answering service, they’ll still be able to reach a live person.  Emergency calls may not be the bulk of your business, but if a current client or a recent one has an emergency, you better believe they will be calling you. Responding quickly is often very important when you’re a contractor. Having a 24-hour telephone answering service means you dont have to worry about missing emergency calls —even if they are relatively rare.

Finding the Right Employee Can Be Time Consuming and Costly

Finding the right employee to do an excellent job answering the phones for your business but also an employee that fits into the culture of your business can be difficult, even for the most efficient of hiring managers and owners.  Not only can it be difficult but the process of finding that employee can be time consuming and costly.

 

No business wants to miss a call, especially in this highly competitive marketplace.  That is why the need to make sure you have an excellent receptionist answering your phone during the day or after hours is essential in all industries.  The time needed to find that employee to represent your company can be long.  Your time will be consumed by posting the job on various internet sites or your local newspaper and waiting for the candidates to come in.  Once you have a few interviews set up, you will need to make the time to interview each candidate to make sure they are a good fit in the job you are looking to fill but also for the culture in your company.  After many interviews, you will most likely narrow down the candidates to a few and then you will do the background checks and reference checks needed to ensure you have a good candidate.  This will take more time.  Most likely, after narrowing the candidates down you will bring them in for a second interview.  More time again will be needed.  Time may be somewhat of a luxury if you already have someone answering the phone but it isn’t if your current receptionist gave you their 2 week notice or if your current call volume can’t be handled by your immediate staff.  Your need of a receptionist most likely is an immediate need.   Once you have found the correct employee you will need to train your employee on the job.  Training takes more time.  After training, there is still no guarantee you picked the correct candidate.  After all, you only had so much time to thoroughly interview and investigate your new employee.    

All City Communications has a group of highly experienced, professional Operators available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to answer your phones.  The set up time is usually 48 hours and our staff can be available answering your phones just as if they were in your office.  We will answer as you would answer your phones and we can transfer callers to extensions or take messages and dispatch those calls via email or phone as an in house receptionist would do.  We already have that excellent employee available to answer your phones.  We have already invested the time in training our staff and ensuring our people are qualified in call handling.  Don’t waste your time and money by hiring a new employee to answer your phones.    

PLEASE READ. XYLITOL FOUND IN MANY SUGAR FREE PRODUCTS CAN KILL YOUR ANIMALS

I personally have had an experience recently with my wonderful 1 year old standard poodle puppy, Wrigley that I wanted to share.  Especially, if you are a dog owner.

Wrigley, our puppy, tends to get into mischief, as most puppies do.  On Saturday evening this past weekend, his mischief almost cost him his life.  My wife and I returned from a Memorial Day get together with leftovers.  The leftovers consisted of 3 banana bars and one low carb piece of cheesecake.  We had it on a plate and made sure we placed the plate on top of the coffee maker on the counter to hopefully not allow Wrigley to get to the food.  We were wrong, terribly wrong.

My wife found Wrigley licking the empty plate on the floor in the kitchen.  She asked me what was on the plate and I informed her I brought home one piece of cheesecake and three banana bars.  She mentioned to me that she hoped the cheesecake wasn’t made with that one sugar substitute that is dangerous for dogs.  My wife decided to text my sister-in-law who made the cheesecake and found out that a half a cup of Xylitol was used in the entire cheesecake.  Unfortunately after checking the internet, Xylitol is the sugar substitute my wife heard is harmful to dogs.  We never knew any real detail of the dangers of Xylitol.  After searching on the internet, Xylitol, found in many sugar free gums and sugar free foods can drop your dog’s blood sugar to dangerous levels which can cause extreme lethargy, breathing issues, seizures and even death.  In addition to the initial low blood sugar that Xylitol can cause, it is extremely harmful to your dog’s liver.  

We then immediately called an emergency veterinarian in our city and they advised that we attempt to make Wrigley throw up by using a peroxide mixture.  We tried, but unfortunately Wrigley only vomited the peroxide mixture, not any of the banana bars or the cheesecake.  The emergency veterinarian told us to call a poison control animal hotline which we immediately did.  After answering many questions on the amount of Xylitol Wrigley ate, they advised that we take him immediately in to the emergency veterinarian since they believe that Wrigley had a lethal amount of Xylitol. 

We loaded ourselves and our puppy Wrigley in the car and went to the Veterinarian.  My wife and I were extremely saddened by what just happened.  We couldn’t believe that a small piece of cheesecake made with Xylitol could harm our dog.  Why is something so harmful out there without any large warning labels?  My dogs are part of my family and if some dog food were found harmful to babies, who put everything in their mouth, would that still be allowed to be on the market?  My assumption is no.  

We arrived at the emergency Veterinarian’s office and after anxiously waiting to see the Vet we finally went back to the examining room.  Wrigley’s temperature was good and his breathing was good.  He was showing no signs of low blood sugar, which was positive.  The Veterinarian then informed us that he wasn’t out of the woods yet.  She contacted the poison control office that we called earlier and confirmed that Wrigley had a lethal amount of Xylitol.  It doesn’t take a large amount of Xylitol either.  Some dogs have died from eating two pieces of sugar free gum.  Wrigley is 65 lbs and he had ingested what was equivalent to two teaspoons.  The Veterinarian believed he had enough to cause liver damage but possibly not enough to cause liver failure.  She then took blood work to get a base line reading on his liver.  Xylitol damage on the liver doesn’t typically show up until 24 to 48 hours after ingestion so we needed to know a starting point on his liver function.  His initial liver test result came back with no damage but we will need to get Wrigley’s blood work done two more times during the next two days to measure the amount of damage to his liver.  The Veterinarian prescribed liver pills that will help Wrigley’s liver function more efficiently during the next 30 days to help reduce any liver damage.  The full amount of what damage was done to Wrigley’s liver will not be known for a couple of days.  Now we must wait.

Xylitol can kill.  A little amount can kill.  If you have animals or know somebody that has animals, please pass this story along.  I didn’t know about Xylitol poisoning and I don’t want anybody to be surprised as my wife and I were with Wrigley.  I can only hope the damage isn’t too serious going forward.  Maybe Wrigley was lucky.  We need a little luck these days.    

Do You Know The Difference Between Price, Total Cost And Value?

Once focused strictly on price, today's leading purchasing departments also focus on total cost and value.  An answering service, such as All City Communications provides an immense value to your business.  All City provides 24 hour phone coverage to your potential and current customers resulting in increased sales due to your ability to be available to your potential customers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.   We will ensure you will never miss a call from a prospective customer or current customer needing emergency services, to your competitor. 

Price – Price is simply the amount of money an organization pays to a supplier for a product or service. When price is the focus, purchasing departments work intensely to pay less than they had in the past for goods and services. If particular goods or services were not purchased in the past, purchasing departments will work intensely to pay lower prices than initially proposed by suppliers. When price-oriented purchasing departments report their performance, they only take into account the effect they had on prices paid.

Total Cost – While seeking lower prices is noble, it shouldn't be done without considering factors that could make costs go up. For example, let's say that you've begun buying a lower-priced component for a manufactured item. The price reduction has caused your company to spend $10,000 less per year for that component. However, the lower-priced component is of a lower quality than the previously purchased component. As a result of a higher defect rate, your company has incurred $20,000 per year in new costs for repairs, tech support, etc. That's obviously a bad outcome. A total cost focus assesses expenses that a price-only focus ignores. Total cost includes all expenses associated with the acquisition, receipt, storage, use, maintenance, and disposal of purchased products and services. When total cost-oriented procurement departments report their performance, they take into account all components of cost.

Value – Simplified, improving business performance means increasing revenues and/or reducing costs. Historically, the purchasing function has been associated exclusively with cost reduction. But modern purchasing departments can also help to increase revenues. For example, imagine that you implemented a program with a supplier that gave your company a unique advantage over competitors and, as a result, increased your company's market share and revenue. You may not have reduced the price or cost of the product purchased. But your work delivered a financial benefit to the company in the form of higher sales. "Value" is the word used to describe any type of financial benefit, whether it is a reduction in price, reduction in total cost, or an increase in revenue.

All City Communications Will Improve Your Customer Service

Customer service handles company issues in stores, over the phone and even by email. Customer service is important to an organization for a number of reasons. Foremost, it would be difficult for a company to survive without customer service, as there would be no one available to handle payments or answer questions from prospective customers.

Significance

Customer service is important to an organization because it is often the only contact a customer has with a company. Customers are vital to an organization. Some customers spend hundreds and even thousands of dollars per year with a company. Consequently, when they have a question or product issue, they expect a company's customer service department to resolve their issues.

Identification

Customer service is also important to an organization because it can help differentiate a company from it competitors, according to the article titled "The Importance of Customer Service" at Drew Stevens Consulting website. For example, it may be difficult to tell the difference between two small-town drug stores, especially if their prices are similar. Therefore, putting extra efforts into customer service may be thing that gives one drug store a competitive advantage.

Function

A company with excellent customer service is more likely to get repeat business from customers. Consequently, the company will benefit with greater sales and profits. Contrarily, companies with poor customer service may lose customers, which will have a negative impact on business. It costs a lot more money for a company to acquire a customer than to retain them, due to advertising costs and the expense of sales calls. Therefore, the efforts that go into maintaining quality customer service can really pay dividends over time.

Publicity

People that have a positive experience with a company's customer service department will likely tell two or three others about their experience, according to Consumer Affairs website. Therefore, quality customer service can be a source of promotion for organizations. Contrarily, a person who has a bad customer service experience will likely tell between nine and 20 people.

Prevention/Solution

Customer service is important to an organization because of potential complaints. Consumers can file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, Consumer Affairs or even a class action attorney if they are dissatisfied with a company's customer service. As long as a customer owns a product, they expect to be able to service it. Otherwise, they have certain rights to sue the company, as consumers are protected by the Federal Trade Commission.  All City Communications as an answering service will be able to listen to the needs of the caller immediately.  Don't settle for customers being stuck in your voice mail system or being told to leave a message on your machine.  We will sound like we are in your and we will answer every call live.  

Letting Potential Customers Leave A Voice Mail is Killing Your Business

With Web- and mobile-based communications taking over as the dominant means of contact for many customers, voicemail is on its way out. Quite simply, consumers have found better ways to stay in touch.

Recent statistics from Forbes magazine show that 80 percent of callers sent to voicemail do not leave messages because they don' think they'll even be heard.  Other surveys show different numbers. Speech technology vendor Nuance Communications recently conducted a survey with Research Now and discovered that 95 percent of those polled find text messaging more convenient than voicemail.

John Jacobs, a leading Communications expert, puts the voicemail abandonment rate at between 50 percent and 75 percent, depending on the type of business.  "Everyone is looking for instant gratification, and if you can't provide that...a lot of times they'll simply hang up," he says. "Companies are losing a lot of business opportunities because people are not leaving them messages. "

How much business are you losing?  If you have voice mail I am sure you have hang ups.  If you believe these numbers and I do, because I will personally hang up if I have an immediate need and I get a voice mail.  All City Communications will answer your calls live without a recorded greeting and also will give your business a friendly voice to be attentive to the needs of the caller before your competitor is.  What do you prefer?  Live answering when you have a need or a voice mail?  

Customer Retention is as Easy as...

Personal contact with customers is a crucial element in the success of any new business – and it’s one of the most common casualties of growth. As a company grows, the President tends to fade away into his or her office. That can lead to loss of leverage right at the point when a company is starting to take off and needs it most.

The danger is that the company can become just another faceless entity that the customer deals with every day. This danger increases in this era of reliance on computers to handle communications with customers. Think about instituting a policy of sending a personal thank-you note to each customer. It’s not that difficult to do if you stick with it. Just sit down one evening per week and work through your list of customer contacts from the previous week.

Savvy companies will track customer contacts in their contact-management databases, but you can get away with keeping a simple Excel spreadsheet of all thank you cards sent. Trust me, your customers will not forget it!

To really kick the personal touch into gear, spend one day per month doing nothing but making “courtesy” calls to your existing customers. Don’t have any plans to do real business – just call to say hello. Your clients will be pleased and astounded that you took the time just to check in. To ready your mind to play the role of friend rather than business associate, make the calls from home that day.

Really any little thing that you can do to make your customers feel that you remember them and care about them is priceless. I have a particular customer that mentioned to me one day that she was a tremendous Ray Charles fan. Months later when Ray passed away, I sent her a little note of condolence. I don’t think she will ever forget that gesture. She later told me that I was the only one who mentioned anything to her that day. She had been feeling like nobody knew or cared until she received my note.

What opportunities to make personal contact with clients are you missing each day Sure, it’s easy to use convenient excuses like “I just don’t have the time,” or “I’ll get to it next week.” Just remember how much more difficult and time-consuming it is to find a new client rather than to keep a current one.

In the end, taking time to keep in contact with your customers will pay a lifetime of dividends both personally and professionally.

Five Ways to Improve Your Interpersonal Communication Skills

1. Seek out opportunities to lead

Great leaders are great communicators, and what better way there is to enhance your interpersonal communication skills than to seek out opportunities to take up leadership roles?

Taking up a leadership opportunity does not mean going after titles; It rather means being proactive and taking the initiative. In a business setting, it may mean voluntarily bringing coworkers together to solve a problem or develop a concept. By forming teams, directing projects, solving problems or leading a product development focus group, you learn how to communicate with people, thereby enhancing your interpersonal communication skills.

2. Take a speech course

If you really want to improve your interpersonal communication skills, then taking a speech course may be an idea worth considering. A good speech course helps you build confidence and teaches you how to communicate coherently. This is by far one of the smartest ways to improve your interpersonal communication skills.

3. Write, write and write some more

Writing helps you to learn how to express yourself clearly. It makes you think before you speak. Because it requires that kind of control, it helps you to personally communicate to yourself. Internal communication precedes interpersonal communication. Therefore, consistently practicing the art of writing can help you improve your interpersonal communication skills.

4. Rehearse with a recording tool

To be able to communicate effectively, you need to understand the way you communicate. By recording yourself, you will have the opportunity to listen or even watch yourself talk so you can observe your body language, tone of voice, language command, confidence level and even what causes you to communicate effectively or poorly.  Once you make these observations of yourself, it will be easier to improve in some areas so you become an effective communicator.

5. Take an acting class

Acting offers you an opportunity to relate with different kinds of people. It can boost your confidence and language command. Because acting lets you communicate on stage in a manner that will be understood and appreciated by an audience, it can be an avenue to develop your interpersonal communication skills. Watch and learn from effective communicators

There are leaders in every sphere of human life and this includes interpersonal communication. One best way to improve your interpersonal communication skills is to watch and observe how effective communicators communicate. If you want to know whom to learn from, think of the people who leave a positive lasting impression on you anytime you interact with them; those who can motivate you toward a course; and leaders who inspire you – but not manipulate you – to take an action.

Why a Property Manager should have a Live Answering Service

My good friend recently relocated from one apartment to another.  It wasn’t to save money and it wasn’t motivated by needing to be closer to work.  He moved for one reason.  He never could contact a person, without leaving a voice mail, to have his issues addressed at his apartment.  The only way he has been able to have his issues fixed was for him to show up in person at the office, during normal business hours.  If he didn’t have time to show up in person, he would call and leave a voice mail and like usual, nothing would ever get fixed or corrected.  His frustration led to him finding a different apartment complex that gives him better service by having better response time and availability to his needs.   

He was explaining this to me this weekend when he told me why he moved.  This made me think to share this story with other Property Management companies.  A Property Management company should have a live voice answering their calls for emergencies.  Some emergency type calls include no heat calls, no air conditioning calls or water flooding.  Some of our current Property Management companies utilize our services for situations I just mentioned but our service also helps their on call people avoid answering every call by having our operators tell their callers, for example, their lock out is not considered an emergency and will have to wait for morning or that if there is a parking emergency, they should call the police themselves or if is regarding an invoice they should call back during business hours. 

We will answer all your calls live, as your company.  The callers will not know that we are not in your office.  We can take detailed messages and dispatch any emergency calls to your on call staff while filtering non-emergency calls to be sent via email in the morning.  We will provide 35 operators to answer any calls live from your callers without the added expense of hiring someone to be responsible for answering the phones after hours and weekends.  We will speak to your tenants and listen to their concerns immediately and based on your instructions, dispatch the call accordingly.  Don’t lose tenants because you have nobody available to answer your calls.  Utilize an answering service to enhance your availability to your tenants.      

Never Miss a Call and Why That Matters to You

I think we can all agree that availability to your customers and potential customers is a key component of business growth and success.  Whether you are in the funeral industry where being available to your families is paramount or in the service industry where many people will search for a specific service such as plumbing or heating in their area, it is extremely important to be available to answer the call.  As important as availability is to your business it is almost impossible to always be available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year including Holidays to your potential customers and current customers.

All City Communications provides a solution to that problem by being available to answer your calls by a dedicated group of customer care specialists 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.  We can answer as your business without the caller ever knowing that we are not in your office no matter what time the call comes in.  After speaking to the caller we have multiple options to dispatch the call to you.  These options include; texting, patching, calling and emailing.  Additionally, you will get a report of the call history and the dispatch result to help manage your employees and to keep record of the caller’s information.

Ensuring that you will never miss a call is essential to the success of your business.  All City Communications has professional, dedicated customer care specialist that will handle the needs of your callers and address their concerns immediately.  Do not let your competitors be more available to potential customers that you are.  Contact All City Communications and we will give you the competitive advantage.

5 Important Items to Consider When Choosing an Answering Service

1. Can I provide a script, or information on how to handle calls for my company? – Scripting is an essential part of a quality answering service.  Scripting requires operators at an answering service ask every question you need and helps the operators determine the correct person to dispatch your call to.  If the answering service you are considering just offers to answer your calls without taking the time to script out the call taking process, pick another company.
2. Are you able to screen and to forward calls? – This is an important question for very small businesses. No one wants the business answering service to take calls blindly (particularly ones from those pesky telemarketers). However, we also don’t want the service giving the runaround to our best clients. So, finding a business answering service that will screen calls, while also forwarding the important ones to a cell phone will be incredibly helpful. Regarding the in between, the person originally taking the calls could answer questions or direct the caller to right place.
3. Are you folks able to handle orders and/or appointments? – Even with all the technology available to take orders online and to book online appointments, many people still like to do it on the phone. If this aspect is still an integral part of your business, then you need a business answering service who can do these things for you and forward you the information. This question also ties in with number one, as the service also needs to be able to see what’s already been ordered or booked. A business answering service will only hurt you if they continually double-book appointments or call customers back telling them what they want is out of stock.
4. How do you handle messages? – Most business answering service companies have messages set up in a number of ways. You can have them delivered via voice mail, text, email, or fax. It’s up to you to determine which is best for you, and which companies deliver in the way that’s best for you. It’s also important to figure out how the business answering service will take the message, as in what information they will, or ought, to take when taking a message.
5. Do you have a business answering service specific to my industry or service? – Those with a law firm or a medical practice might prefer a business answering service that’s experienced in those industries. Obviously, a law or medical practice will need someone who can handle their clientele well, and will be able to get the information they need from the callers. Most business answering service companies offer more than a general answering service, and have either special answering services or at least experience in working with attorneys, chiropractors, startups etc.

5 Characteristics of a Good Operator

Customer Service Experience- I think it's important for someone to have experience working with customers in a professional setting.  It helps them understand how to act in a professional setting.

Active Listening Skills/Deductive Reasoning- I think it's often important for an Operator to be able to listen to the caller carefully and determine what they are calling about in order to not only more efficiently take care of the caller, but also make sure that the caller does not get upset by repeating themselves.

Inflection in Voice (phone voice)- It's often hard to tell someone's tone/mood, etc over the phone.  Having someone that can create the right tone in their voice to the caller can often times help a difficult call be more easy, or comfort a caller that may be in distress.

Empathetic- Being able to relate to the caller and how they are feeling will allow them to open up and get the appropriate questions answered and the customer feel as though they are truly being taken care of by someone who cares.

Patience- Often times callers can be hard to understand, phone connections can be poor, or a caller could be extremely irate.  Having someone that can be patient with the caller and not get upset can be key in handling some of these situations.