to delegate the role of delivering service
unless you lead by example and set the
standards.
You must be present to understand
the impact your brand is having on
customers so that you can pick lessons
on the opportunities to improve. Build
relationships with your customers as
people buy people.
So often, I am called by strangers who tell
me that they would like me to train their
teams and when I ask how they got hold of
me they tell me that their friends referred
them to me. This means that your greatest
source of business as an entrepreneur will
be generated through referrals who you
might have given your all at the beginning
of your start up.
Trust is very key and giving good customer
experience is very important. Today the
penetration of E-Commerce is very low
as customers have not yet learnt to trust
online platforms due to heavy fraud and
delivery of low quality products against
high definition photos which flood social
media platforms.
Trust is earned. Here I always tell
entrepreneurs to over deliver what they
promised so that they can use that trust to
earn repeat sales. Imagine the first person
Keep your brand
promise and develop
standard operating
procedures
which
should be cascaded to
anyone who is selling
or working with your
brand. Customer ex-
perience is the only
unique proposition
in your business. The
rest can be replicat-
ed in a few days but
your loyal custom-
ers will not leave you
for the new brand in
town if your service
is exemplary.
30 MAL34/20 ISSUE
Feedback will come back to you and it’s
your prerogative to ensure it’s packaged
in pink ribbons or it will land like a lost
elephant in your little house, leaving mas-
sive destruction in its trail. I always say I
know a good CEO by the way he responds
to emails or phone calls. If he simply does
not, he will run down the organization as
his priorities are not on the right person.
who did a money transfer transaction
successfully and how much trust they had
on the system that was to deliver the hard
earned cash to his intended recipient?
your make or break.
It takes lots of strength and blind trust to
give your money to an agent sitting in a
money transfer shop to send it virtually
to another stranger sitting in the remotest
village in your county to give hard cash
to your relative in the village. Your brand
must earn this level of trust in service
delivery to acquire and successfully retain
your customers. Looking back, I also learnt as an
entrepreneur, record keeping is very
critical. You cannot afford to have poor
records or to send the wrong information
to your new found clients. Imagine
walking into your doctor’s office and he
starts telling you about your failing liver
when all you had was a cough because
he has the wrong file. So often when we
deliver the wrong product to the wrong
customer we are actually none the worse
than the disorganized doctor.
You must anticipate the pain points
and mitigate these loopholes with great
urgency. I cannot stress the need for trust
particularly in the payment processes and
if you still want clarity about money and
trust, try giving your own mother ten
thousand shillings and confirm if the first
thing she will do is count the money to
ascertain that it’s truly ten thousand bob
in legal tender. Feedback will come back to you and it’s
your prerogative to ensure it’s packaged
in pink ribbons or it will land like a lost
elephant in your little house, leaving
massive destruction in its trail. I always
say I know a good CEO by the way he
responds to emails or phone calls. If he
simply does not, he will run down the
organization as his priorities are not on
the right person.
As you start your business, hire the right
staff and train them to make sure they
understand your vision and their roles.
Training is not just on the product which
they should understand end to end but
make sure they buy into your dream.
Training and product knowledge builds
confidence which means that they can
easily tell a client what your brand stands
for and the impact it will bring to their
lives. Great CEOs respond to customer
issues and sometimes in person as this
is the person who pays them too not
the strategic partners who they chase
all over town to form a coalition to get
more coins from the ignored customer.
As the lead entrepreneur be accessible to
your customers. Pick up cues of areas of
improvement and new services to create
new revenue channels.
Employees who enjoy a good employer
experience will stick with you during the
bad and good times as they buy into your
dream. Being accessible to the employees
for clarifications and motivation is
mandatory. This is your brand and the
word out there on what you can deliver is
Another key area I tapped into is
leveraging on technology to ensure ease
of doing business. Most entrepreneurs
and professionals fear technology due to
the common notion that it’s expensive and
complicated. With cloud based platforms
where you only pay for connection and
license fees for top of the range customer