A counter offer they cantt refuse

By Mike Dandridge

doors the customers use. Stop. Look around. What's your first impression? Full rvarehouse or do you need to post "Going out of Business" signs on those empty shelves? Slorvly walk by the displays. Even if you don't have enough material to fill your shelves and rvalls you can borrow a technique from the grocery industry called "fronting the shelves." Move the products you do have to the front of the shelf or wall hook. making the display look fuller. This sounds absurdly simple. but most dealers don't do it.

THE building supply industry is I changing with lightning speed. Good, old-fashioned customer service just isn't enough to win you a Supplier of Choice Award anymore. Why? Because today's savvy and informed customer e.Ypects great service.

A new means for providing a higher level of service is emerging that could put a company years ahead of its competition. It's called Customer Experience Architecture, and it's a process for evaluating all of a merchant's points of contact with a buyer and then improving key indicators to provide enhanced performance.

In Customer Experience Architecture, everything matters, from the way you answer your phone to the striping on your parking lot to the toilet paper in your restrooms. The place to begin is at your sales counter or showroom.

Now some may be thinking, "Oh, not our customers. These are working folks, and they don't expect anything special from us." Maybe not, but just know that the contractor picking up hardware or lumber from your store today will buy from retailers who do provide something "special." He'll take his son for ice cream where the server turns a double-dip cone into performance art. He'll take his truck for an oil change and be served cookies and coffee while he's waiting. He'll stop for donuts at a bakery that offers free WiFi. These vendors and others like them have raised the standards of service-for everyone.

It's a matter of perception. When a customer walks up to a well-lit sales counter filled with a rvide assortment of merchandise. he assumes the warehouse, too, must be full. On the other hand. when he enters a showroom with dusty shelves and empty rvall hooks. he rvonders if this business has the inventory to fill his needs.

When I was an outside salesman. I would invite customers to "drop by and see the store." Invariably, rvhen they rvould visit, they wouldn't want to linger at my cluttered desk or walk through the warehouse. They wanted to see the sales counter. so they could touch and hold the tools of their trade. They rvanted to feel the weight of a new hammer drill and explore the features on the latest hand-held test instruments. They rvanted to sip strong coffee and swap stories with other contractors. In other words. it rvas through the sales counter that the customer "experienced" our branch and it could be a positive or a negative influence on his perception of our entire operation.

In fact, one of the fastest ways for a business to improve its image and separate itself from the competition is to focus on designing a better customer experience. The initial steps may seem simple and basic, but as the process evolves. it will become more complex -and increasingly difficult for competitors to imitate.

1. See through their eyes. Enter the store throush the same

Rather than randomly display products just to fill up shelf and wall space. build a consistency to your merchandising. Design your own plan-o-grams for every display in your store. This creates uniformity in your merchandising and simplifies reordering inventory. Think customer-centered rather than product-focused. Examine displays each day. preferably before you open. Good merchandising provides a competitive edge.

2. Merchandising begins at your door.

Manufacturers spend millions of dollars developing attractive packaging designed to sell the product inside. The world inside your door serves as the packaging for your place of business. Floors with cracks. ceiling tiles with water stains, burned out lights. stopped-up plumbing in dirty bathrooms. all contribute to the message you're sending your customers.

The days when these things didn't seem to matter are gone and they're not coming back. Replacing fluorescent lights and throwing on a fresh coat of paint can transform a dungeon into a shorvroom over a rveekend. Washing rvindorvs and removing excess vendor decals from the door makes it seem less cluttered inside. A clean parking lot and a legible sign make a storefront more inviting.

If your store interior looks like every other store in town. it will be "invisible" to your customers. Learn from a mistake I made rvhen I doubleordered a quantity of expensive flashlights. Displaying them side-by-side in neat little rows on three shelves of a prominent display sold two in four weeks. No one noticed them. So. I took the flashlights off the shelves. piled them into a wheelbarrorv intending to pay the restocking charge for their return. Before I could roll them off the sales floor, three customers each bought one. I left the wheelbarrow where it was. We sold out in three weeks.

The simple lesson: be different. When appropriate, use non-traditional displays. Find a couple of old hardware store "pickle barrels" to hold bulk material. Or, use open stepladders to display hard hats or extension cords. Experiment. Anything new, surprising or out of the ordinary will gain customers' attention and keep your counter from being invisible.

Customer Experience Architecture provides a blueprint for the performance of your entire operation. Constructing an effective customer experience is an ongoing process, but it can give you a competitive edge that is difficult for others to replicate. Most of your competitors will be slow to adopt this level of service, and will spend the next three years trying to catch up with you. Others won't attempt at all because it's new and unconventional. Some may laugh and call you crazy. Meanwhile, the people that matter, your customers, will be casting their votes for you as the Supplier of Choice.

- Mike Dandridge is founder of High Voltage Performance and author ofThe One Year Business Turnaround. He can be reached at (254) 624-6299 or via www.h i g hv o I ta g ep e rfo r manc e. c om.

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