Login
ISCOVER
Facilitating great customer service is all about being remarkable. Trail Homes' Nick Young outlines how to be remarkable and boycott being transactional.
No-one will dispute that the industry deserved a hiatus – particularly as 2019 was so tumultuous. As January starts to close in, our minds naturally turn to a time of planning and preparation to make the most of the year ahead. The natural tendency is to focus on: "What do I need to do to achieve X?’"Conversely, the less obvious — but equally powerful — question should perhaps be: "What do I want to be." Not for you – but for your clients.
To continue reading the rest of this article, please log in.
Looking for more benefits? Become a Premium Member.
Create free account to get unlimited news articles and more!
Looking for more benefits? Become a Premium Member.
Why? To achieve the utopian state of having a constant stream of customers championing your cause and stimulating the referral pipeline.
Naturally, happy clients require the staples: understanding of their circumstance, industry/ product knowledge, appropriate solutions and timely execution. Though competently completing these tasks alone are rarely what prompts a rave review: it’s how they’ve been performed.
As to the client, the value of the exchange is not just transactional. It’s how the client has felt through the process and what it means for them personally to have an issue or opportunity resolved.
The opportunity to bypass being considered a facilitator, is therefore to be integrated, connected and genuinely remarkable before, during and after the engagement.
To take the term literally, being ‘remarkable’ stimulates remarks, or dialogue, because the subject is so unusual, exceptional, interesting, or excellent. Remarkable gets your attention.
Inspired by author, Seth Godin*, here are some ways to escalate your ‘remarkability:’
- Understand the urgency of the situation: Half-measures simply won’t do. Neither will a transactional approach. Listen, commit and act in accordance to the need.
- ‘It’s not about you, it’s about me:’ Remarkable doesn’t mean remarkable to you. It means remarkable to your clients. What can you do that your clients are going to remark about?
- Being noticed does not = being remarkable: Remarkability equates to value, not simply going through the motions (i.e. lip service).
- Extremism in the pursuit of remarkability is not a sin: Live and breath being remarkable so it’s no longer an active choice, but an innate, ingrained behaviour.
- Remarkability pushes the boundaries: To be remarkable, you need to constantly be evolving – whether in your offering or approach.
- Be a trail blazer: If it’s the norm, if it’s expected, it’s not remarkable. Part of what it takes to do something remarkable is to do something first, better or differently.
- Being remarkable is a commitment: If you don’t continually reinvest and reinvent, you won’t be remarkable for long.
- It’s not all fairies and rainbows: It’s a hard slog and not everyone appreciates your efforts. Though being persistent in demonstrating value will pay off, as those who recognise talent, appreciate commitment and respect genuine intent will become your biggest champions.
- Embrace the new world: Being remarkable is closely aligned with embracing change and identifying, and fulfilling, opportunities. Work out what is at your disposal that you haven’t already embraced – particularly if it helps streamline your processes and enables you more time to be customer-interfacing.
- Be proactive: Work out ways to celebrate your achievements and scale your reputation. For instance, at the close of each successful transaction, ask your clients to write a review on Google Business, or send you an email about their experience – then share their accolades with your network via social media.
- Get moving: Use this time of year to ask yourself the tough questions about your offering and approach to identify what can be done to change ‘good’ to ‘great.’ But don’t go on the journey alone. Collaborate smartly with brokers that have complementary skillsets, partner with aligned professional service providers such as accountants and solicitors, dedicate resources to enable you to implement initiatives and importantly, consciously make it part of your daily routine to challenge status quo and reach your next personal best.
*References: https://seths.blog/2007/01/how_to_be_remar/
Nick Young is a results-driven specialist who has more than 20 years’ experience in the mortgage broking industry, and now heads Trail Homes: Australia’s most established and longest serving trail book purchaser.
