Recipe for success with your customers
Reminisce back to arriving home to mom’s home-made baking … basic ingredients, elementary techniques. Mom’s baking was always the best, why?
Perhaps it was the complete experience: mom in the kitchen waiting for you lovingly, the comfort of home, the familiar kitchen, the first delicious bite and of course, mom’s secret ingredient.
What is a recipe you may ask? A recipe is defined as a set of directions for making or preparing something. How can you duplicate this when dealing with your customers? You must become the recipe: flavourful, real and unique. Here’s how:
Better hand-made than from-the-box
Mom didn’t always measure her ingredients. With years of trial and error, she just knew the right amount of ingredients, and she perfected her loving recipe by hand. Interactions should be real and not from the box. If you just follow a script, it’s going to sound like a script. Be like mom – add an extra pinch of this or that, follow the recipe (mostly), but create your own flavor and blend with your personality. Remember this always: people link up the experience to the overall product! If your personality shines through, the product will be much more memorable.
Keep out the artificial and the MSG
MSG, or Make-believe Simulated Genuineness, alone does not have a pleasant taste, and too much of it is distasteful. And artificial ingredients, the margarine, or store bought pie crust may get you by, but mom knows that people can tell the difference even if you think they can’t. You can’t fake being genuine, so don’t even try! Because once you leave, do you want your audience to look back at the experience as real vanilla, or artificially flavoured? Instead be like mom and parallel your feelings for your audience like they are the family member that you are baking for – watch and see that your dealings with them will become authentic.
Familiar but Unique – don’t forget the secret ingredient!
Comfort lies in familiarity – recognizable to the palette; yet something unique – separates it from the rest. Your recipe must contain the customary ingredients and yet be extraordinary enough to be distinct. Winning the favour of your audience…. is where the added secret ingredient comes in. Mom knows this tip! The secret ingredient can’t be duplicated by anyone else. The secret ingredient is a one-and-only flavour. The secret ingredient is cherished!
Envision this – your 1 cup preparation, 2 tablespoons of understanding, 2 cups of knowledge, 1 cup of professionalism, 2 drops of charm, 1 large smile, & a pinch of humor – all contain the familiar ingredients.
If you want to create a memorable experience, be just like mom and don’t forget your secret ingredient! ….remember to add in the secret ingredient with every interaction….
...that secret ingredient is you!