How well does your organization stand behind its product or service?

Our reader poll today asks: How well does your organization stand behind its product or service?

• Extremely well: We ensure 100% customer satisfaction. 47%
• Very well: We stand behind our work the vast majority of the time. 35%
• Well: We generally stand by our work but occasionally miss. 11%
• Not well: We regularly miss customer expectations and standards. 6%
• Not at all: We don’t back up anything we do. 2%

Backing your product matters. 82% of you make pretty strong commitments to backing your product or service. For the 18% of you not in that group, recognize it may not affect that customer sale or relationship today, but it’s costing you dearly tomorrow. It’s far too easy these days to build a bad reputation for your business, given online reviews and the speed of information sharing. Many times, the commitment you need to make isn’t big relative to the cost of lost opportunities.

The next time a customer or client has an issue with your product or service, try resolving it on the first interaction. Go above and beyond what they might expect. You will see the immediate benefit of a happy customer and, more importantly, you’ll see future sales come through due to your enhanced reputation and referrals to your business. Don’t all into the trap of winning an argument today that will cost you dearly tomorrow.

Do you agree with these poll results? Let us know in the comments below!

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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These results were originally a SmartPulse poll in SmartBrief on Leadership which tracks feedback from more than 240,000 business leaders. Get smarter on leadership and sign up for the SmartBrief on Leadership e-newsletter.