In today’s tough economy, cutting prices and providing good service aren’t enough. To be truly successful, innovative businesspeople must learn the art of Positively Outrageous Service (POS)—doing the unexpected unexpectedly and giving the customer more than he or she could hope for. POS put customer service guru T. Scott Gross on the map in the early 1990s. In this revised third edition, he contemporizes his work by examining what’s wrong in the service industry today and how to turn those negatives into POS. In his signature, slightly irreverent, but always insightful style, he shows managers at every level of the service industry how to:

• Build a customer base by following the four key principles of promotions—have fun, get people to your store, get people involved with your product, and do something good for others
• Hire the right people and show them the fundamentals of POS
• Energize and obtain the most creativity out of employees
• Win over customers when mistakes happen, no matter who is at fault

POS is not just a way of doing business, according to Gross; it’s also a state of mind and the key to success in the twenty-first century. T. Scott Gross is a consumer advocate whose client roster for consulting, training, and speaking reads like a who’s who of the Fortune 500. Countless businesses, including Southwest Airlines, FedEx, McDonald’s, Sears, and Wal-Mart, have asked him to motivate the troops at sales meetings and conferences worldwide.

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This folksy compilation of stories about people and companies who deliver “Positively Outrageous Service” (POS) has the right mix to prove that people love great service and the companies that deliver it. The stories may meander, but author T. Scott Gross is so popular because he knows how to weave humor, personal anecdotes and actual business stories into a cohesive argument that almost all business is personal and local. This form of bottom-up business advice places great importance upon the front-line employees who represent your business. Gross explains that front-line workers can make or break your brand and your sales, no matter what size your business is. He provides good business lessons, so don’t let the light reading mislead you. This book is for managers of any business in the service sector who want to give their employees the power and motivation to deliver great service.

• “Positively Outrageous Service” (POS) is based on loving your customers.
• To work at its best, POS should be a surprise and excessive.
• Word of mouth remains the most powerful marketing tool. Spark it with POS.
• Because motivated employees are 30% more productive than unmotivated ones, they can help build your business and your brand.
• Companies with high employee turnover often cannot deliver POS.
• Empower employees to solve a customer’s complaint as soon as they hear it and without getting their supervisor’s permission.
• Employees prefer having realistic goals and being rewarded for achieving them.
• Teach employees that they are each their own “MicroBrand,” shaped and positioned by their abilities, reputation and performance.
• Customers hate waiting. Work to eliminate lines. When people must wait, offer amenities to make the process less annoying.
• Small business can compete with larger ones by delivering POS.

Making the Transformation

The idea of giving great service is a transformational process for the employee, the customer and the corporation. Great service is not a lofty concept. It can come from people at all levels of an organization. Often, the people who don’t get the corporate spotlight are the ones who make the greatest impact on customer service.

“Positively Outrageous Service is as much about who you are as it is what you do.”

Take the case of a night clerk at a national motel chain. A guest arrived very late and upset. He told the clerk that his bags were lost and that he had an important 9 a.m. meeting. It was so late that the clerk knew only one store was open that could supply a new dress shirt, a tie and the other items his guest needed. Worse, the visitor had no way of getting to the shopping center and no margin of extra time. So the night clerk gave him directions and his car. The clerk delivered “Positively Outrageous Service” (POS) and the motel chain gained a customer for life.

“If you manage to surprise and delight a customer, how you do it doesn’t much matter.”

POS is the result when people who have a natural service instinct do whatever it takes to make a customer happy. Employees who provide POS are not following corporate guidelines or instituting some protocol; they create and implement the best possible service. POS is:

• A surprise to the customer.
• Greater than the customer’s expectation.
• Whimsical.
• So superb that it generates a positive buzz among other customers and their friends.

“Every sales carries with it a promise.”

POS can look bigger than it is simply by being a surprise. People love the unexpected, so a one-time incident of POS creates a feeling of anticipation that will long outlives the actual event. This lasting impact demonstrates the psychological concept that a random reward can help shape consistent behavior.

“A brand is nothing more than an expectation.”

One restaurant used this to maximum effect when it randomly offered all of its diners a free meal on some Monday or Tuesday nights. The manager did not announce which of these evenings the restaurant would serve meals for free. Therefore, people lined up on those nights for the chance of getting a free meal. When the restaurant served up a freebie, the only stipulation was that patrons tell their friends about their experience. The idea worked well. The restaurant was filled to capacity every Monday and Tuesday night.

“The logo is what your see. The brand is what you think.”

From the marketing perspective, the restaurant manager chose not to buy TV or radio advertising, but instead spent his ad budget to provide free meals to everyone in the place once a month. So, instead of advertising without offering something very different from his competitors, the restaurant manager gained distinction with a unique promotion. He also made his patrons into marketing envoys through word-of-mouth advertising. They willingly passed along the news about their free meal, because it was just plain old fun.

Four Wall Marketing

One of the oldest business theories states that the customer is always right. That means your main marketing thrust happens inside the walls of your business. Whatever positive experiences the customer has inside your store or office, those “four walls” are the basis for your success or failure. Happy customers tell other people, and soon generate repeat business. This is the simplest marketing lesson any businessperson can learn.

“Service always occurs in the customer’s mind.”

The corollary of happy customers is motivated employees. Studies have shown that businesses that are known for concentrating on customer satisfaction also care about their employees’ well-being. Customer satisfaction and a lack of employee turnover are connected.

A wider definition of a “customer” includes anyone who does business with your company, such as suppliers and other vendors. Like other customers, a vendor who has a relationship with a business feels more warmly about it. For instance, a vendor can provide superior supplies, offer competitive intelligence or make suggestions that can improve your business.

“I believe customers of the future will pay for privacy and for a relationship.”

The best bet is to try to make everyone happy by treating all the people you encounter in your business as customers. But making people happy is a challenge. Create response systems to determine your customers’ level of satisfaction. This allows your customers to convey their opinions to senior managers who can provide quick responses and who have the authority to extend some type of remedy. This can be as simple as a “thank-you” or, in more extreme cases, a refund.

Shorter Lines, Happier Customers

One of the more interesting customer behaviors happens when people wait in lines. People generally do not like long lines, so when the wait seems too long, people leave the line. That means you lose a customer.

“Excellent customer service only occurs when employees have an excellent, visible standard that they can imitate and against which they can compare their own behavior.”

If people were served faster, there would be no lines. When there is a delay, a line will build so that everyone waits in line for as long a time as the original delay. You can make lines look shorter by snaking them back and forth instead of setting them up as a straight path. When people see too many other people in front of them, they envision the wait to be longer than it really is. To make waiting more pleasant, some companies offer amenities: Southwest Airlines pours free coffee, Marriott provides free juice and fruit, and Olive Garden restaurants serve free breadsticks.

Addressing Errors

When customers have legitimate complaints, businesses that want to deliver POS should go overboard to make amends. This can include:

• Profuse apologies. Admit the mistake and say you are sorry.
• Make apologies even when you made a mistake and the customer did not notice it. When in doubt, apologize.
• Don’t be afraid to go overboard when admitting a mistake. Offer a coupon for a free meal or an extra desert.
• Don’t make complaining customers angrier by forcing them to wait for the manager. Give all employees who have customer contact the authority to correct mistakes.
• Establish a procedure to solve and monitor customer complaints. Involve at least two people in this procedure: the person who actually solves the problem and an executive who can record the problem.

“The behavior you get is the behavior you reward.”

While making apologies may seem like a great effort, for smaller businesses it has a much larger meaning. In today’s marketplace, large operations, such as Kmart, Wal-Mart or Sears, can drive down prices so that no small business can compete. What makes small businesses attractive, however, is POS, which may be the best differentiating factor for small businesses against their competition.

“If you empower idiots you get dumb decisions faster.” [ – Robert Terrlink, former head of Harley-Davidson] ”Offering the customer an experience along with the product will be a significant competitive advantage.”

Small businesses can learn from companies such as Sears (and its affiliate Land’s End), Hooters, Southwest Airlines and Victoria’s Secret. These companies all sell their products by combining good service with showmanship.

Riding the Trend

Your POS can have greater impact when it capitalizes on an emerging trend. Today, Americans work more hours than they did a generation ago. By 2000, 75% of families had two people working. As a result, leisure time has become scarcer, so customers appreciate the value of faster, better service. This niche ideally fits small businesses. You can reap great rewards if your business can make shopping or a leisure event more entertaining or memorable. Besides, people are not actually saving the money they “save” by going to large discounters. They are spending it on luxury items or on items from smaller business that offer special amenities and service. Businesses that recognize this trend can attract a large percentage of this re-directed cash flow by providing POS.

“Other than innovation, which will provide only the most fleeting of advantages, service will be the last frontier.”

Motivated employees are one of the most important drivers of POS. To get your staff members to deliver POS, guide them to feel as if they are part of a larger team. Boost their competitive orientation. Help them become willing to take risks, and give them the latitude to do whatever it takes to get the job done correctly and to help customers. While these steps may sound straightforward, union rules, corporate guidelines and inertia often curtail even a motivated employee’s ability and willingness to deliver POS.

In reality, not all employees are motivated. Many would never think “outside the box” or take a risk. Many employees do not want that kind of responsibility. Worse, employees who do not want added responsibility often work at less than their full capacity. A survey of employers found that many employees could be 30% more productive if they were better motivated. To get employees more involved:

• Don’t punish creative thinking.
• Praise people who work to resolve a conflict or overcome an obstacle.
• Make employees responsible for solving any problem they encounter.

As part of this effort, provide employees with quantified feedback about how well they are doing. Establish a specific measure to set an expected threshold for performance. Once employees exceed that level, they will feel as if they have accomplished something special. Often, that is a large reward by itself. Acclamation is another positive force. Commendation from managers strengthens loyalty and increases motivation. One study found that if a company that was well known for praising its employees announced that it was hiring and offered to match applicants’ salaries and benefits, 27% of the employees in the poll said they would quit their jobs and join the new company. The reason: the company praised its workers. The message: do not underestimate the power of public praise and recognition.

Building a MicroBrand

When employees are motivated and deliver POS, they are also engaging in marketing. Most people think of marketing as using advertising to reach a wide audience with a promotional offer or announcement. But quality service is marketing at the individual level.

Think of each employee as essentially a human extension of your brand, no matter how small or large your company. This means that your most effective marketing tool is your employee who, for better or worse, also serves as your brand representative. From the employees’ perspective, their actions serve as their personal MicroBrands. You want to achieve a positive alignment between your corporate brand and each employee’s personal MicroBrand.

Most small businesses traditionally draw their clients from within a 10-mile radius. This works well for micro-marketing because word-of-mouth is the strongest marketing tool available. To establish a powerful system of micro branding, identify opportunities for POS, empower employees to act, reward employees for their efforts and then aggressively market what you are offering. Remember: great employees are the key. The goal is to keep the good employees you already have and, when you hire, to seek people who embody the successful characteristics of your best employees. To enhance the performance of other workers, train them so that they become more confident of their skills. As people become more confident about what they do, they also become better equipped to handle tough situations.

T. Scott Gross is a customer service and management expert who works with large corporations. He is the author of eight books, including Why Service Stinks.