Written in 1997, it is still in demand due to its focus on the one essential for all successful companies: customers. Every business wants more customers and to keep the ones they have. No customers, no business.
Salesperson to Friend
Kenneth J. Varga, a graduate of Rutgers University, has an almost 40-year track record as an entrepreneur and consultant to businesses interested in expanding their customer base.
His focus is summed up in this quote: “It took me a long time to change from being a salesperson to being a friend to my customers. Once I made the transition . . . well, the sales simply skyrocketed and kept multiplying year after year.”
What Your Customers Need
The focus of the book is on identifying the needs of your customers and then satisfying them. Providing them with quality and service means you will keep your customers for life. For all business opportunities, these two steps are the most critical skills to ensure success.
Varga covers a wide range of methods in the book, with the emphasis on practical aids you can implement immediately. One is a customer service checklist that helps you monitor how your relationship is working.
He also suggests an array of easy-to-do actions like calling your customer periodically just to see how they are doing. Reaching out to your customer consistently is important if you want to establish a long lasting relationship.
Quality and Service
Varga explains why he feels that the two core components of business success are quality and service. The right marketing methods are important, but without quality and service, they won’t accomplish much.
To Varga, successful businesses – even business in a box opportunities, are able to bring their marketing efforts full circle. This means generating sales, making your customers happy and getting repeat business. In unsuccessful businesses, there is a gap in the circle, the point where the company doesn’t meet the needs of customers. The result is an exit point for the customers, no repeat sales and eventual financial problems.
Understand Your Customers
Varga says it is essential to keep in touch with customers so you know when they are unhappy with your service or product. Most buyers who are dissatisfied, about 97%, will not bother to complain. Instead, they will simply walk away. Without feedback, this can happen over and over.
However, Varga says that studies show more than 70% of unhappy customers will continue doing business with a company as long as their complaint is handled quickly and completely.
The trick isn’t just to smile more. Varga outlines a program that helps to transform employees and businesses into a focused group that is customer-oriented. The results are success for your business.
Testimonials
Motivation and success expert Brian Tracy has said of Varga, “Ken no doubt is the most successful businessman I’ve met.” Mark Victor Hansen, of Chicken Soup fame, remarked that Varga “has the ability to convey his cutting-edge ideas and strategies to his audiences in an easy to understand manner.”
If you are looking for immediate ways to make your current customers happy, and to get new ones, the current book-of-the-month is for you. Read How to Get Customers to Call, Buy & Beg for More by Ken Varga.
