 Thanks for staying with us now with access to fewer resources and generally leaner teams small businesses need to be more creative and tactful in their approach to customer service or experience that's not to say that they can't provide a top-notch experience they absolutely can they just need to be a little more focused with their efforts now customer service is also important for small businesses because it opens a direct line of communication with customers those conversations can lead to product breakthroughs and insight or even reveal a new customer segment you don't even know or you didn't know that it existed there's a strong correlation between customer experience and loyalty and those businesses that get it right are more likely to retain customers and have those customers recommend their products or services to a friend now what does customer experience mean to you and in what ways do you believe it can impact small businesses all right so because she's our very own let me just remind you people again with experience in various disciplines including customer experience customer service customer loyalty digital marketing strategy content development and training both in public and private sector across two continents uti elu has been exposed to various business styles strategies approaches and she's joined us live in the studio hey you know sometimes you know sometimes they underestimate the powerful women that sit on the chair because we don't just try to we don't sit on our own but you know when we have opportunities like this we don't miss it we shine but thank you so much uti it's all right because you know you are giving back to small businesses and i think you know you you do it effortlessly because we've seen you we've seen you uh take on big organizations and they're just going back to back uti elu uti elu let our ways uh wait till they record them let them enjoy small come and learn from me don't be looking at her with one ah she's a madame but thank you so much uti all right so i mean small businesses right um a lot of things has changed um so before social media you know you could easily um how do i put it have contact with your customers because everybody needed to go physical to a store you know to patronize you and all of that because the social media has made customer experience transcend beyond even so i've seen people say that i've been shopping from this i don't even know who the person is so i keep wondering so why would i stay because i used to feel like before before somebody stays with you in your business they must have that personal relationship ah like okay they've experienced you in person and you're such a nice person that makes them come back but now uh people are shopping people are buying amazon they're buying everywhere you know so there is definitely an experience that keeps them going back even though this business seemingly are faceless so because they've not had a personal interaction with the um the business owners so what exactly is that it factor that makes those um customers go back you know what's the experience like for them so i love that you mentioned amazon because um technology has changed the face of customer experience we if i think of the last major milestone that has occurred it would be covid that has changed how businesses are operating so when we talk about creating experiences today it's deliberate right so even if i don't see you money has been my customer for 10 years i don't know what she looks like but she's one of my best customers that can happen today in the past it'll never happen you will probably have met her a couple of times i've gone to a yeah exactly send her a hamper sent her a birthday card you would have done all of those things and those things are still perfectly valid right depending on the type of business that you're running and the type of customer segments that you have they're still valid but today what has changed is first of all the customer has changed so in the past you had a different expectation from your bank than you had from your tailor than you had from your supermarket but today customer expectation is the same across board what we're doing today is rather than comparing my experience with bank a to bank b or shop a to shop b i'm comparing my experience the best experience i've had regardless of whether it's in shop a in bank b whatever business i now have a standard that has been set now you talked about social media social media now has now raised the bar so when social media first started once somebody says i'll go to social media everybody like oh my god what are they going to say and then over the years businesses started to get smarter business started to realize that yes it is possible for things to go viral on social media but then it's also not as easy so depending on the footprint that you have right you can't post today and nobody will ever see you don't have followers if you don't have engagement i mean yes we have a lot of bloggers today that you know somebody might tag somebody and they might then pick up but it wasn't as easy to go viral as people thought so businesses started to go ah okay i can actually come back and respond so if you go on social media today you see businesses respond in a way to challenge people so before it was like ah this business did bad it's gone wrong but even the consumers have changed so now you see people defending businesses when they say something went wrong you see people coming to the comments and you know so the whole landscape has changed you can no longer differentiate on product you can no longer differentiate on price there's pretty much a competitor out there who is either doing the same thing or doing it better than you in terms of quality of product or doing it cheaper so where does the real playground now exist it is in the experience so i am willing to pay more in shop b because i like the experience that i'm paid less in shop a because even though it's cheaper i don't get the experience that i want so experience in itself has become a currency so you can't afford as a business not to pay attention to the experience that you're creating it's so so important for SMEs they always think that they're too small they always think that it's too small so you talk to certain businesses and they go ah we can't afford it this thing or you give certain examples and they go ah but they're a big company they're big companies yeah so that's the first place where i find that for small businesses i always say look as a business owner you set the tone of your business and a lot of people are fighting i want to get the best product i want to get the best product but if you ask them what do your customers truly want they probably can't tell you so they're sourcing all sorts of different things have you noticed when you go into like clothing stores we're starting to get better now but you remember clothing stores everywhere will be jam-packed squashed you have to start trying to pick out one thing you can't even see what they're selling because you're trying to be all things to all men so i see it oh i think somebody will like it you buy it i see it so you have all these products but somebody will come into your store they can't see they can't some people will be turned off by it because they can't even see what you're selling exactly and then some people they walk into your store and you don't have anything that represents them so it means that you don't understand your customer base so that becomes the problem so first and foremost as a business owner i say look you can't be all things to all men what's your business niche who is your customer so if you are a big bank you will have lots of different segments of customers but as a smaller business you have less income you even more power because you can then streamline your customer so you've got smaller income you've got less of a marketing budget you know everything is on a smaller scale so you have to be more deliberate and targeted who is my customer there's no point in wasting marketing spend or even your energy or your staff's energy trying to serve a customer who isn't your customer because guess what you're doing in your business service you will never be able to please that customer the experience you're trying to create if you have even gotten to that far where you're creating an experience for your customer you wouldn't have been able to satisfy the customer so what happens is you run the risk of somebody then having a bad experience of your business and then telling other people so very important as a business owner to understand most times we focus on our product the business owner wants to get the product right they want to get the pricing right so that they're profitable but if you really really want to go to the next step you now need to think about the experience what am i layering on it that if somebody opens a store right next to me tomorrow selling the exact same product what is going to make people walk past that door into my so um i've heard you've said so much and in all that you've said you've told us that customer service is the bedrock of any business and we know that a positive experience creates a second time customer you know but what really brings them back what's what what makes the customers come back is it the services or is it the product so i mean a great product is fantastic doesn't matter how great the experience is you still have to have a product that meets the expectations of your customer now set that aside the service also has to be thought about but i like when you said service because i was hoping that somebody will allow me to do my two-minute talk about the difference between service and experience so the service is great right because but the service only exists when somebody comes to you so for me to serve you you have to have a need you have to want something either you've bought my product and you need help with it or you need some information about your product about my product yeah so there is a push and a pull you are doing something that requires me to then respond so service is reactionary right um and service is great i'm going to celebrate customer service week next week is my own Christmas next week is my work Christmas so we're going to be celebrating customer service week and all of that is in the delivery so you talk about service delivery it's an action it's doing something in reaction to something but imagine you have customers you bought something and nothing has ever gone wrong with it you've used it it's been fine you've never had reason to go back to that shop what how can you be a loyal customer right because it was a one of purchase right so there was no need for service now imagine if that business doesn't think about customer experience where will so that means they would have to increase their marketing spend to keep bringing first-timers first-timers to come through the door exactly so at the end of the day what you are trying to say is product over service so the pro no it's not even that it's that you trust me to understand that service is only a part of the journey so i have a service you came you bought i served you you left the product is fine you never needed to ask me a question you never needed anything else you've gone it's like a house you bought a house the house was fantastic great and you've moved on where is the experience in what is going to bring you back it now and that's where you start to talk about experience that's the difference so service is a point in time i need something you give me no experience is a business thinking about the end to end so first of all how do you find my business that's the awareness is a starting point so business owners today social media is where everybody goes right but remember we talked about your customer type is your customer type on social media is your customer type on instagram or are they on facebook or tiktok now or tiktok so you've got to know and understand your customers to then determine how you build awareness some businesses need a website some businesses don't so that's when you start to think about the experience so now you've created awareness now i know of your business now i contact you i want to see your product what information about your product is out there so you see social small businesses today asking their customers for reviews asking them to post comments post pictures why because they're trying to make sure there's enough information out there that when i have a need i know there's an association with your product yeah and then there is enough information out there to say ah this particular business feels to be really good about this thing everybody's saying nice things so today you want to buy something what do you do especially right now the cosmetic industry every time you go online they tell you oh this cream is amazing you know baby girl's skin you know this i'm like how should i buy this cream because i'm just here and i'm reading the reviews and i'm like so i get you so you're getting that point of it so you've got the the the um information out there so you're building on the awareness then this is you ask now where product comes in you have to then have a great product to back it up other if you didn't have a great product you wouldn't have had the great reviews and good awareness exactly then you buy the product so you've bought your cream now you don't know whether you should use it in the morning or use night so what is the experience what information have i given you to have to experience the product in the way that you will get the best out of it and if you don't give me i don't use it other like you know there's some cream they tell you don't use during the day because of the storm you use at night so if i use that cream during the day and i get burned that's the bad experience so you have businesses you see some businesses today who even add some little cards when you buy stuff so what they have done with the hair business is that now they don't just give you hair they give you a brush if it is the other head that needs a spray bottle give you the spray bottle they put a they put a brush they put a they they put a small card that tells you how to care for your hair okay all of that is building on the experience so it seems like a little serene a little sweet now it goes all of these things are creating that experience that you are defining because remember you need the hair to look fly for somebody to say ah where did you get that hair and you say oh i got it from this place ah don't worry if you go to them they will check you they will tell you what you need that's what you're trying to create the end point is customer loyalty and advocacy so you give them the information to have success with your product to love your product to recommend your product because it is cheaper for me to convince you to buy from money than it is for money to take out and add on social media or on tv to sell the product absolutely she will trust me more when i tell her yes i'll just your review exactly i'll just the power of review so you get to that point where you've created that positive impact now your product is selling itself your experience is selling your business and you're not even spending money advertising exactly i have one question for you but let us quickly go to break i see that oh god we will continue to teeter in the clock all right thanks for saying with us now if you just didn't see that we are having an amazing time i think we should not be bringing in guests again i'm telling you okay what do you know about our customer experience and we're focusing on small businesses right now remember you can join the conversation send us an SMS or whatsapp is very one eight zero three four six six three you can also tweet at us at waishu afka woman hashtag waishu so uti so now you've done all these fantastic things the customers all your people are sending reviews in and all of that so a friend of mine went into a store based on the reviews i mean this person they have like boutiques you know all of her and you know people are always talking about how nice their clothes are and everything then she now walks into the store to order i mean to pick up a dress and all of that she the experience was horrible like so she said she walked into the store and the girls were looking at her like maybe she had come to steal or something you know like it was she said it was just but she said so i now told her about another place where i get my dresses she now mentioned that but is it that i said no it's a different because she's never that no matter how nice the clothes that she sees on social media she's never gonna enter that store again and this is a big issue there is a big disparity from the experience some people face online and when you don't physically visit businesses how do we correct this so i love that question it's a fantastic question it's a concept called the moment of truth so what are the most important aspects of a business if you are selling clues right then the first time you see the outfit the first time you try it on the first time you engage maybe somebody if you go into a store these are all different moments of truth but every business is different so for a bank for example opening an account is a moment of truth if the account opening process doesn't go well you probably abandon it right if you successfully open an account then transacting is the next thing if the transaction fails it's a problem if the transaction fails there's a problem but if it fails and it's quickly reversed it's you know what i mean so what happened in that business was that you've created good awareness you have a good product your online experience so maybe when she chatted on social media the person was fantastic oh you we have it in stock yes is this price is this color is this okay i want to go into your store the business has not defined the experience in the store so you haven't told your staff in the store that the minute somebody walks in somebody must be there to greet them somebody must be there to say oh right i understand that just by looking at you i can tell that you are size 12 what kind of outfit are you looking for today are you going for an event um what colors do you like you like black i like colors so there's there key things that you need to define that should happen there should be a template exactly so you need to define what should happen at that point in time because that's a moment of truth for that business for that type of business is the in-store experience so because you have told your staff what to do as soon as you walk in your world imagine if you walk to your store oh welcome to the store madam oh you look so fantastic are you looking for a particular outfit there's something and somebody's just engaging you and they tell you that we have sweets exactly have some sweet and they you know the and you know what i mean so there's all sorts of little things and don't forget that in Nigeria it's actually easier because we are conditioned for poor service so any little you do people are like wow wow so as little as giving you very easy to so that's why people it's very easy to please because if you just did the barest minimum you would stand out right so i tell people all these people that are shopping on that are selling on instagram and everywhere i asked one day i said do you have the list of your customers do you have their phone numbers so somebody says i have a friend she sells bras your size your size buy a few things your size is your size i said every every time you get new stock every single person that has ever bought in that size for you you must send them a message so and these are things that are not overly expensive but it's deliberate so you take what you know of the customer that you have and you create more business it is here in Nigeria that i've seen people go absolutely nuts that they were not wished happy birthday by a business yes so it goes a long way a four Naira SMS in fact if you're sending me books as a business i actually don't like you when i see all the messages from all the banks because i have accounts in many i love that you said i don't like it so remember i talked about customer engagement and understanding your customer you are different man yes you don't like all those messages no so as a business do i know your preferences true so these are the things that you know and for a small business it's easier because you have less customers so you have the ability to simply you know what say it's an excel sheet when you pay can i take your phone number can i take your yeah what did you buy most places have some sort of epos system that you scan the thing so you even have a record of what was purchased it's a simple thing that changes the business so today when you see businesses that are leveraging technology that will say there's some businesses you go to today they'll say oh can i have your email address so i can send you a receipt because you know if somebody asks you can i have your email address you know i don't want you to bother me i just want to send you a receipt yeah i've collected your email address thank you oh so that's what they do yes now so and it's so simple so you find yourself now being able to create a database of customers yes and you're collecting information so on your birthday at this person oh you bought this thing i'm running a 10 percent 20 percent promo email is free but so let's stay on that estimate and email for a bit because my dental clinic now only once in a year with the same message merry christmas you know even christmas so happy birthday to david salih happy birthday to have a happy birthday on one just one only once in a year so they will i mean i'm saying that every person in the family one email okay okay and i find that a bit worrisome right if you really are targeting business it's not enough for you to just wish me happy birthday right how so what if i got in the message you say what's the dental situation like the christmas it was just i'm giving them free tips christmas just finished you must have had a lot of sweet things you know come in for a 50 discount what's it called wash and all of that there's every likelihood yeah that's what i'm going to just take it what do you want to think about oh my darling you know i'm learning from the best you're not enough for me you're also gonna say that because right there's every likelihood that i would i would go for that dental clinic you know i suppose you're sending me a happy birthday so and with what mani said people do not understand their customers right they just do a one-size-fits-all especially for bigger organizations you know so how do i begin to help correct that for them so bigger organizations sorry let me since we're talking about the bigger organizations go tv i tell you the truth i get so many phone calls and they are very offensive it's like with notice you've not paid like seriously i'm not interested in your subscription anymore so the thing of it for for big businesses right is it's harder like i said you have a lot of customers and a lot of times they collect quite a bit of information about you but that information and that data is not leveraged so remember i said the thing about collecting preferences one of the things that is fantastic to collect at the time that you onboard a customer which is when you get a customer into your business for the first time please collect their preferences how would they like to be addressed how would they like to be contacted is it email is it phone even when you say phone is it called is it sms is it whatsapp collect preferences so that you are also not wasting your time effort and energy and money because a lot do you know how many sms's i block that i just get i don't like sms's because 160 characters in as far as i'm concerned is not enough to speak to me so if you are sending me 160 sms character sms that means i have to do something to find out more where there's no difference drink take a glass right i want the full bottle of water so i prefer an email i want the shots the the shot cup when you call me when you call me two different people and you say different hello and you say hello and you say hello mister you've lost me and this would have called the same um good good morning sir i said you miss you're not you're talking to the wrong person exactly i am because you because for me because my name is uti right they make the association i think it's a guy so they say nice to see mr i'm like clearly you're not serious about what you're trying to do yeah so the importance and this is where we we come back to the small businesses these are this is information that a lot of businesses don't know how to collect because they say ah you just bought from me and this but imagine how much you can collect when you are chatting with someone on social media it's actually even harder when you when you come into a shop because you buy you pay you go most times when it's not telling you can i collect which is i said develop the tactics to get what you want oh we need to send you some additional even if it's not every sitting because some people again they'll say oh i don't have the money for that you say oh i want to send you a five percent discount next time you're coming in can i get information abc but even when you're on social media at least for you to order you will collect name phone number email address or house address handle everything you ask the person for email address deliveries now i do media because they will deliver to your doorstep exactly so you start to see ways in which you can collect but beyond that basic information now you start to collect preferences how do you understand the difference between money that likes an sms and uti that wants an email you start to think so this is where small businesses need to start to think about how they can collect this information because this is where you start to make a difference in the fact that money always will get my messages because i always send her sms so i know she will read it if you send me sms not only will i see that we block you i would read it even better than or quicker than i'll read the and what's up messages and the emails you know what because it's brief my life is like this i'm on the go let me read it like if you if the sms is two pages of sms i'm not gonna read it so you have to know the different customers that you like i said it's harder for big businesses because you have a lot of customers you now need to start trying to define what makes this set the same can i put them together but even in the set that is the same you agree that a rich man that has 100 million and a rich man that has one billion they are not they're not in the same class but everybody we say they are rich so those are the kind of but when you have smaller businesses it just takes a little bit of thought a little bit of channeling that idea which is why i said it usually starts from the owner to say how do i want to distinguish my business don't just focus on the product so mani has a love him let me give us more please give me more because what you just said just now you say it starts from the owner i understand you know my communicate communicate and they will not even get it but it's all right mani's guys in our office the staff that work directly with her will understand mani way better than the security guard at the gate but she has a security guard has she stopped to tell her security guard exactly what they should say when somebody arrives yes how they should park a car when somebody arrives what they need to tell the car so you see some businesses they will say your car is parked at your own risk certain things that you need to define that right certain things that you need to define so when you start to think about every micro every part of your business experience doesn't happen by chance right you must tell down to your cleaners how to mop your floors right how to you know if you mop a floor in the detergent versus floor cleaner there's a difference there's a difference you need to define all of those things so it's a lot of work and it's not something you do overnight you do it with time so what is most important and what will make the most impact to your business so you collect data and you say you're making data driven decisions but those are the that's how deliberate you have to be about it so most people will say oh and my customer service people have told them to smile or I've told them to say welcome and that is because welcome to so business then what happens then afterwards what do they do have you empowered them that so why do we enjoy amazon so you know what he you know sorry to cut you remember the place you recommended I take my son for his birthday yes ah I will go there 10 10 million times over please you need to tell me about it because my son's birthday first of all from the phone conversation when we got we had booked the mail ahead of time and everything he was back to back okay so madam this has been sorted so have you confirmed this day it was then when we now got there you know it was okay they've assigned a manager to me to ensure that everything is in place so the menu's already so how would you like I said I thought the experience was uh online or did the experience that came at it was it was not far from what is consistent a journey for me the customer journey was amazing because it was not different from what I've experienced from the phone conversations all the way to the final day it was such a beautiful day and they made suggestions yes so again think about when you shop on amazon it's something that we've now become so used to it's not groundbreaking anymore you buy a remote and they tell you people that bought the batteries also bought this this but even in your business you don't need an algorithm to tell you that you need to be thinking ahead so you understand your product better than anybody so even down to the person that is selling let me use who has outfits today it's looking like adiré right yes right there's a way you wash it to stop it from fading now imagine oh I bought the adiré right I've bought this outfit now you said oh you've given me the care tips right I gave you a little card that said this is what you should this is what you do imagine if you cycle back in three months and say oh hi well how's the dress going we hope you've had a pleasant experience with it and it's still looking lovely here's a reminder on your care tips and then here's a few ways in which you can style your outfit and you send her a few pictures with a new one where to issue I haven't even told her do you know we have no design if you like this one people that like this one there's this this this so you find similarities in this in other products that you have and you share so whilst you are doing this hard effort of I need to find customers I need to focus your customers are right there in your you've sold to them already it's easier to get the customers you have 80 20 roll get the 20 to do the 80 bird in hand then keep trying to find more so yes it's great to find more but imagine if you did that well we'll be selling your market for you she'll be like ah you like my outfit or this shop is fantastic what you're wearing exactly yes that I spent years exactly so that's what it is so you create that excitement around your business because the goal the overall goal of customer experience like I said is first that I get to the point where I'm loyal to keep on purchasing and then that I advocate that I will tell money money ah come on by me because I'm in this space I'm an advocate if I see a business that I like I as I'm living there I've told like one two three people yes and those are the kind of customers that you then want to attract so you create a deliberate experience for the right type of customer they have success with your products then finally I have one question for for uti why would I try to pull out that question I want to say to small businesses I want to ask you this question was it costing them not having that experience wow so how much does it cost you today to acquire a customer the money you're spending on social media ads the money you're spending dealing with customer complaints hiring staff there's a cost to everything right not delivering or not thinking about your customer experience is detrimental to your business in the long run because this outfits today right we have a brand that you and I like she started off selling a very unique kaftan yeah today they are like 20 other people trying to copy it at a cheaper price so if you are not particularly enamored to the brand you just be like ah why will I pay 10k here when I can pay 6k here but if you have gone to her store you have experienced her stuff you have that girl has called you on the phone to speak to you right it means that you've connected with that brand the experience that they've created has made the difference so so so so so critical for us in that experience that if you are not doing it you are losing money that's a simple thing absolutely because one you're not leveraging the customers that you have two the people that are even coming to you do you know what kind of experience they have so you see some people that own businesses they must always be present they must always be in their shop they must always be in their salon why if you define the way things should be and you put processes in place and you train your people you have policies around everything that you do it will continue to run so that's the goal for you is define everything so when you don't you are losing business and you will be more effort to get business money please my question to your resource guests your own in-house booty is how can a small business owner deal with complaints supposing a boutique is highly recommended and you go there for a purchase and it appears that what you bought is returned because it was later discovered to have some defects maybe factory error how would the customer react if not replaced i'm talking from experience this is Austin from Delta okay so first things first businesses must always view complaints as a gift feedback i can choose to simply walk away i'm not complaining i never come back thank you so when i complain i'm actually giving you an opportunity to turn around a bad situation and you actually data shows that customers who have complaints and the complaints are well handled they stay a little more loyal than customers who never have complaints right so a complaint is an opportunity if you know your product well right if you know your product well so for this person who went to boutique and bought something now typically in this part of the world we deal with a lot of integrity issues a lot of fraudulent issues so we tend to have a lot of places that have no return policies for a lot of reasons trust right yes so we have all of those kind of things but a business has to in the same way that you have a marketing budget you have to have a budget for service issues like this right where because you know your product when i gave the example of who has outfit and coming back three months later you kind of have to know the quality of product so if you're not producing your product if you are saying you're just buying wholesale and selling you have to know the quality of your product right it has to be tested so that if somebody comes up and tells you are this thing had a hole in it you know that okay if actually defect is possible because this brand they are not so or it's not possible there must have been an error but you have to define what potentially if a customer has bought a hundred thousand dollars worth of products from you how much how much profit did you make from them and what percentage of that profit are you putting aside if it's in this kind of business where you may need returns you're not going to give everybody returns and you don't expect to see returns every day right but if you have a big ticket customer that came into your boutique and spent a lot of money on and she comes back there's a sacrifice you make because you want to keep that relationship going you have to define the acceptable level of loss so the same way you define how much you will spend on marketing is the same way how to dedicate some money to it it may not necessarily always be money you may find that okay i'm able to replace i'm able to exchange yes because that product in itself that you are collecting back right you've you've exchanged for the customer you've created a fantastic experience this one now depending on the extent you can sell it mark it down and still sell it and you are selling as is so that is a way to then do it so you don't totally lose out you don't totally lose out so it's really about defining understanding that customer base understanding the quality of product of course if you buy if you are selling a 33k 22k then your customers also have an understanding that if i wear it once or twice it's okay not be saying i buy exactly do you know what i mean and it's not the event so when you look at your price point you start to create niche experiences i can't buy something of 50k and i come and tell you how the problem there you are speaking english but thank you so much how very enhanced thank you so i mean this was fantastic yeah thank you mani we're going to continue who to please we have to because this is the big one i have stories before we go and show you followers everywhere at where should i cut it off instagram twitter facebook everywhere youtube now follow us drop your comment or more importantly follow all the engagement like share this show of today go and look for the link and share to people that need it small businesses that need it's very important small things that you do that will just transform your business now if you miss today's quote here it is again there is a spiritual aspect of our lives when we give we receive when a business does something good for somebody that somebody feels good about them and definitely they will definitely come back we'll see you guys again i hope you come back on monday at 8 p.m as we bring another great conversation to your screen