I had an important experience lately that proved how important it is to take care of your customers. A small business customer of ours got into a situation in which they went significantly over their plan and owed us quite a bit of money. They received the automatic invoice we send out alerting them of the amount they went over their plan and what they owed us. The lady in charge emailed us in a bit of a panic; she didn’t realize how much of our service they used. I had two choices to make: the first is just charge them what they legally owe us; the second was to call them up and work out a deal with them. I chose the latter and it really paid off.

Let’s do some math (these numbers are fictitious). Let’s say they paid us $100 per month for service, and their overages were $600. If I would have just charged them the additional $600, I would have made a good chunk of change that is equivalent to six months of their service. Their contract was up the following month. Based upon their financial situation, I could almost guarantee you that they would have cancelled service. So I would have made $600, but lost their business. By calling them up and working out a deal with them, I was still able to get some money in overages because, let’s face it, we have our hard cost, and I was able to increase their agreement for another 12 months. So instead of losing the client the following month and only making $600, I am now able to keep the customer on for another 12 months, making an additional $600.

But money aside, so many other good things came out of this that I would not have ever imagined. By personally calling them up and talking them through their dilemma, it showed that I cared (which I do). I was able to lower their costs which made them so happy it triggered a series of other events.

I had to take a trip to Miami recently where this company is headquartered. I reached out to this company to let them know I was coming into town for a convention and offered to meet them in person and grab a drink. They were so thankful that I helped them out that they told me to not make any hotel reservations because they were going to comp us two nights at one of the top hotels in South Beach. But wait–it gets better. The people I met turned out to be really kind and gracious. They not only took care of our hotel rooms, but they took us out, bought us drinks, and even introduced me to contacts at four other companies, all of which I am currently in communication with to switch their providers to mobileStorm.

I got so much more than I asked for and it simply stemmed from caring about each and every customer no matter the size. By being proactive, I not only earned a customer for life, but I received more than I ever imagined when I first picked up the phone to give them a call.
During these hard economic times, it’s important that you get creative. If your overhead is $.75, it’s much better to make a dollar than nothing at all. Challenge yourself to get creative with your customers and keep them happy, because if you won’t, the competition will.

Jared Reitzin
Entrepreneur Tips