Anniversary Waltz
Just a little reminder can boost your sales while keeping your customers in the good graces of their mothers-in-law. Clifford's Flowers, in Quincy, Mass.,... Read more
Customers
Recent Customers Articles
Virtually Persuasive
On the Web, in-depth information is a powerful and persuasive sales tool. It also helps to overcome a major inhibitor of Internet commerce: a simple lack ... Read more
Call Waiting
Inc. 's Road Warrior examines the pitfalls of GTE's Airfone in-flight data service and asks readers for help in making this product work even better. Read more
Every Click They Make
Your online customers already tell you what they think of your Web site and products. All you need to do is learn how to listen. Here's how to extract valuab... Read more
Dell: The Secrets to His Success
Direct from Dell, by Michael Dell with Catherine Fredman HarperCollins, 235 pages, $26 Michael Dell has been trying to impro... Read more
Feed Back the Feedback
Walk into the Rhode Island gift shop called OOP and you will be dazzled -- if owners Jennifer Neuguth and David Riordan have done their job well. "The who... Read more
The Perfect Internet Business
Garden.com is one of the hottest Internet companies around, but what's so special about it is how basic it is. Here's what you can learn from the secrets of ... Read more
Customer Bait
What are the most effective techniques for attracting new customers? Referrals and one-to-one marketing, according to a survey of 900 sales and marketing ... Read more
The Right Stuff
The key to entrepreneurial success isn't just spotting the hot business opportunity, it's developing the discipline and stamina to stay focused on it. Read more
How to Create a Department from Scratch
When Peer Bearing Company in Waukegan, Ill., decided to relieve the sales department' s paperworkburden, HR manager Jerry Baker found himself balancing th... Read more
Parting a Sea of E-Mail
Flooded by E-mail from customers? Emerging E-mail management software will automatically sort, route, index, and reply to customers' incoming messages. Read more
Seller, Beware!
How to spot the customers you don't want. You know just who we're talking about: the high-maintenance, low-profit customer. The on... Read more
Saturn Knows How to Keep Customers
The Saturn Difference by Vicki Lenz John Wiley, 274 pages. $24.95 Talk with Saturn owners, and chances are you'll hear... Read more
How to Measure the Soft Stuff
Increasingly, company leaders are realizing that they can no longer afford to focus exclusively on financial results, and that long-term success depends, ... Read more
The Future of Business
Reviews of five new business books, including the latest work by management guru Peter Drucker. Plus: the founder of GeoCities reveals what he's been reading... Read more
Being There
A collection of five short articles about companies from the 1999 Inner City 100. CEOs explain why they started their businesses in the inner cities and cite... Read more
Just Say Yes
The customer is always right. Always, always, always. Right? Ok, maybe not. In fact, sometimes the customer is so wrong, it hurt... Read more
Home Depot: Customer Service King or Ruthless Competitor?
Inside Home Depot, by Chris Roush McGraw-Hill, 266 pages, $24.95 Finally, you've got the time to finish that home p... Read more
Putting the Robots In Charge
A growing number of companies marketing on the Internet use "robots" to respond to e-mailed inquiries and customer service questions. Robots - software th... Read more
Nine Elements to Help You Sustain Success
Discovering the Soul of Service by Leonard L. Berry The Free Press, 288 pages, $26 ValuJet made more money in its f... Read more
Your Price Is Too High
On nearly half of my proposals, prospects tell me my price is too high. WhenI was just starting out, this really threw me. I'd tuck my tail between my leg... Read more
How To Listen More Than You Talk
Everyone in sales knows that you're supposed to listen more than you talk,but it's not as easy as it sounds. First of all, customers ask questions, andsom... Read more
The Value of Time
For many kinds of products, the add-ons provide much more profit than themain product. For sure, McDonald's makes more money on each drink than on a BigMa... Read more
Why Did They Buy?
Our company has a standard procedure: After new customers are closed, ourassistants call them. They explain that part of our ongoing total qualityprogram ... Read more
The Power Of " Free"
When I charge a purchase, I usually pull out my American Express card ratherthan one of the other credit cards in my wallet. That's because I get afrequen... Read more
Simple Misunderstandings Vs. Objections
I have learned to classify sales objections into two categories: realobjections and simple misunderstandings. A real objection is something prospec... Read more
Creating Win/Win Negotiations
Here are four ways to create negotiations where everybody comes out ahead. Read more
Creative Training Makes Lessons Stick
The Big Book of Customer Service Training Games by Peggy Carlaw and Vasudha Kathleen Deming. McGraw-Hill, 210 pages, $17.95. Don't... Read more
Confessions of an Information Sinner
With his first business, Ron Bienvenu overloaded his newsletter subscribers with reams of extraneous information. Now his software system, SageMaker, sends o... Read more
Your Price Is Too High--Not!
How many times have you heard that old buyers' complaint: " Your price is too high and if you don't come down, I'm going to buy from your competition" ? H... Read more
Hot Tip: Privacy Guidelines
In the wake of the Monica Lewinsky scandal, the National Retail Federation (NRF), which is based in Washington,D.C., and is the largest U.S. trade group f... Read more
In Good Company
It's no accident that Jackson Lan locates his 17 computer stores in close proximity to big retailers like CompUSA and Computer City. The CEO of PC Club, w... Read more
Damage Control
Like many businesses, Professional Exhibits & Graphics, in Sunnyvale, Calif., sends its customers follow-up letters that include customer survey response ... Read more
