“The most crucial thing to do for customer service is to make sure the customer feels heard. Customers reach out for support because something isn’t right, they need help or they are unhappy with a product or service.
An empathetic agent can help diffuse the situation even when they may not have the power to provide the solution the customer really wanted.
This is a skill that involves more than being nice or just listening. You really need to understand the customer, be aware of what they might be feeling and connect with them. Showing them this kind of respect can really help to remove the anger and let the customer know that their concern is going somewhere.” – Jonas Fandrey
My name is Alex Micol, a member of Scalers and founder of Treecom, and I’ve been working in the e-commerce space for the past 2.7 years. I generated 7-figures in sales, and today I’m here to tell you the 3 Most Crucial things to Improve your e-commerce performance.
Before I start, you have to know I was an affiliate marketer before. So if you’re an affiliate, know that it took me many trials & errors with my team to get anything working.
Here we go!
1. Your Team comes first: Pick the people you feel comfortable working with. Problems are coming in every day. You’ll need people around you that won’t see problems, just solutions. Money is just the result of your teams actions
2. Master the 4 macro-areas of e-commerce: Marketing, Fulfillment, Sourcing and Customer service. Note: if you want to scale your business, all areas must grow together. You can’t scale if one of the areas lacks quality and scalability.
3. Deliver quality before going for quantity: If you focus on the quality of the user experience, you’re going to experience fewer headaches when scaling. You will enjoy SCALING. Don’t buy cheap products. Buy the qualitative version of the product you would want for yourself.
In other words: Team first. Quality. Results after.
There are a few tricks I have learned over the years that I 100% attribute to my happiness in life and my success professionally. I have picked these up from authors such as Gary Bishop, Eckhart Tolle, Mark Manson, and others.
– Be yourself, however wild and weird and untamed it may be. Do all the things you love and do them often. And don’t kill the younger voice inside of you that is pushing for you to take new chances and try new things. Live your life how you want regardless of other’s opinions – you can’t control anyone else or their thoughts – so make your personal happiness your priority.
– If it’s out of your hands and there is nothing you can do to change a situation, don’t let it eat you up and fester inside. This is much easier said than done, and we are all human, but once you can detach yourself from the feelings that are connected to the negative situation you will find it’s much easier to solve problems and live a happier life.
– Quit complaining. Negative words and thoughts will lead to negative realities. Complaining does nothing to lead to a resolution so keep it positive and move in the right direction.
– Be aware of the present. Enjoy the moments, all of them. We all work online and are behind a screen for a significant part of each day when you are getting a coffee or walking to the mailbox immerse yourself in the moment and truly appreciate the interactions you have with those around you. Your positive attitude and awareness can make someone day, or better yet, they can make yours.
– Be compassionate. You have no idea what anyone else is going through or the struggles that someone may be having. We are all here for a short period of time and think about how much better things could be if we all cared for one another just a little more.
To keep it short: Be yourself, don’t sweat the bullshit, Quit complaining, Live in the moment, and love everyone as hard as you can.
Whether you’re leading a company or leading a team, at some point you try to figure out: How do I maximize the performance of my team?
Below are a few points to help you do exactly that.
Establish Long-Term Goals for your business.
Map out your Talent needs to accomplish those goals. If you’re thinking that you don’t of the right players on your team to accomplish those goals, then you’re probably correct.
Identify why your company is a great career advancement opportunity for “A” players.
Understand Talent Compensation pressures to attract that Talent.
Start building a Talent Supply Chain for key positions.
Recruit by Talent level, not location.
Build your recruitment process with the focus of a race car pit crew. Great candidates are not on the market for long. Think fast, act fast.
While we are all active within the Digital Space, at the end of the day, business is done first between people and not between companies and thus building long term relationships with people is a key factor to succeed.
With that in mind we’ve set the scenery at the affiliate conference DMIEXPO to allow attendees to maximize their time while at the event (we supply attendees with everything they need for quality networking, from free luxury dining & espresso bar to multiple networking areas). You need to get out of your comfort zone and approach people. If you’re the shy type person I have a cool trick for you: go with another person (could be someone you meet there and offer him to walk and meet people together). It makes the approaching easier and less stressful. Talk to as many people as you can (don’t get stuck on one – this is not the time for very long meetings), introduce yourself, you never know what can happen by getting to know new people, creating new relationships and while even enhancing old ones.
As for business cards, bring a lot of cards (always take them with you on your carry-on to make sure you have them and they are not lost with the airlines) and make sure to write on each business card you get some key points and action items so when you get back to your office, you’ll remember what are your actions for each person you’ve met. – Itay Paz, Founder of DMIEXPO
“Meet as many business partners as possible personally. It is the best fraud protection there is. Someone whom you have never met, and who has no personal relationship with you is a lot more likely to take advantage of you then someone whom you personally know and frequently meet. Therefore, the single most important thing to do during our TES Affiliate Conferences (and any other event you attend) is to go out, network, mingle and meet as many people of your industry personally as possible. In the end – it is your business and your life insurance. Note, the one with the bigger personal network is the one who receives the (insider) information, and makes in doubt the deals in case of all things being equal.” – Andreas Bischoff
