Every entrepreneur and small business owner should be asking the question, “What do my customers want?”

How you answer the question provides a great indicator into how successful your business is.   Actually its not rocket science.  If you give your clients what they want, they’ll not only buy from you, they’ll stick with you.

Recently I read the results of a customer survey, by Kevin Stirtz, also author of, More Loyal Customers.   He surveyed over 2,000 people and just asked them, “When you are a customer, what do you want?”

Here are the top 12 results reported in ranked order:

1.   Listen to me.

2.   Know more than I do (about your product or service).

3.   Be easy to work with.

4.   Give me what I came for.

5.   Smile.

6.   Tell me your name.

7.   Acknowledge my presence.

8.   Don’t treat me like I’m an interruption.

9.   Show me your care.

10.  Don’t waste my time.

11.  Be honest.

12.  Offer alternatives if you don’t have what I want.

Do you do these top things for your customers?  I know one person who definitely does!  This past Saturday I stopped by a fashion jewellery boutique, Vivah.  I was looking for a watch that would look equally as fashionable with casual, semi and business attire.

I was quickly reminded of what Customer Service Excellence is all about!  Melodie eloquently modeled every one of the 12 things we want to experience.  With a few questions, she was quickly able to show me those pieces that expressed what I was looking for.   When I found the piece that was per-fect, it was too big (small wrists).  Rather than focus on the problem, she immediately started thinking of alternative ideas that could make things work.  

With undivided attention, Melodie guided the process with her expertise and sincerity.  The experience is etched in my mind.  Do you think I’ll go back to Vivah to make another purchase?  Absolutely.  Without a shadow of a doubt.  Not only will I make more purchases - I will be referring others to the same boutique.

Utlimately, that’s what we want as entrepreneurs and business owners.  Customers who stick with us - and tell our friends and colleagues about us. 

That’s customer service!                        

What are the biggest problems facing entrepreneurs and small business owners today?  Is it the economy or …

Doing a little research, the following kept rising to the surface:

- Cash Flow (top concern)

- Overwhelm

- Working Solo / Needing a Team

- Loss of Energy and Momentum

What do you see as the biggest problem entrepreneurs and small business owners are facing?  

You can also participate in my 20-second poll here: http://polls.linkedin.com/p/40259/kpafa

Its important to know what’s going well in your business and raising the voltage.  Its also important to know where your stuck so you can break through to new and welcomed higher ground.   

I’m often being asked how to get people to buy a service or product in an economy when purse strings are closed tight.  

Right now it’s easy to blame the economy for poor business performance.  But what is more likely is that people are floundering and failing because they are stuck employing old marketing and sales strategies with outdated tactics.  Frankly they just aren’t working any more.  

As we drive deeply into the new entrepreneurial renaissance, there is a new light that is burning brightly.  It is one that has redefined marketing and sales.  One that relies on core life purpose at the hub of business.  It is outward centered and lasers on outcomes.  If you want to be successful in the new business sandbox, you need to get clear on:

1. Your life purpose and pursuit.

2. Your unique abilities.

3. How to express 1 + 2 in your business.

4. Stop.  Look.  And Listen to your clients - what they want, need and willing to invest in.  

5. Exercise relationship-based strategies that elevate your clients.

6. Surround yourself with a tribe of talent that shares and fuels your vision and ambitions.

Why does every-body love Zappos (the billion-dollar online shoe store)?  Because it’s all about innovate, customer service and the pursuit of happiness.  (reference Inc., May 2009). 

The rules have changed.

So if you’re a struggling small business owner, think less about today’s economic constraints - and more about creating your own business renaissance.

We’re back on the ball diamonds!  Between our two sons schedules, I can be found at some surrounding baseball diamond almost every night of the week. 

One of the things about baseball is that it takes a team to win.  There can be individual star pitchers, catchers, hitters … but without everyone applying their personal best - through their own desire, ambition and skill - its tough to win.  Small business is the same!  As an owner, you are a star of your business.  But without recruiting a team of players, it’s tough or impossible to win.    

I love when the boys rally.  Once they’re ON game, it’s like they are unbeatable.  The confidence becomes contagious and they build on the momentum of the team’s belief.  They get what they expect and dominate the game.

As a small business owner, you also need a team to create a rally.  Having personal confidence is one thing - but once you experience the power of a team’s confidence, it’s unstoppable.  

Reflect on the successful entrepreneurs and small business owners you know.  Chances are there is a committed and confident team of people surrounding them.  Together they create the juice to win.

It’s exponential.  You squared.

I took my Maxie for a long walk this morning and breathed in God’s green acres.  As I breathed in the fresh country air and watched the birds dance in the sky, wisdoms i had learned from my father came flooding to my mind.

My father was a farmer.  He was a small business man who tilled the soiled and nurtured minds.  Here are the first 5 of my dad’s entrepreneurial-wisdoms I observed through the years.  I just wished he had lived longer so i could share with him what i am sharing with you.

Take heart:

1.  Break bread with your business associates, clients and employees.    When anyone came to work with or for my Dad, the first thing he always did was invite them into our home, sit them down at the kitchen table and have a great conversation.  He got to know the other person - what they wanted, what motivated them and how he could help them from the first meeting.  

2.   We are inter-dependent by nature.  My dad taught me from an early age that independence is not all that it’s cracked up to be.  Inter-dependence is where life is at.  He attributed much of his business success to aligning with the right people in his life including his family, business partners and associates, and worker-bees.  He believed your tribe stood be-side your ambitions and success.

3  Life is a series of negotiations.  This one I didn’t just observe, it was drilled into me.  In order to achieve success, you had to step outside of your own skin and negotiate fair, equitable and successful ventures for all parties involved.  He believed anything less was self-serving and unsustainable.

4. The Sabbath is intended for our own health and well-being.  I remember one particular year when crops were late in blooming which meant much of the harvest went into the Fall.  Many of the surrounding farmers worked day and night to try and harvest their crops before that first frost came.  Not my father!  He used to say, “If I cannot harvest in 6 days, I will not do it in 7.  Remember this.  God included a sabbath because he knew if we worked hard in 6 days, we needed the seventh day to rest and replenish”.   I watch so many entrepreneurs tied to their offices around the clock, 24/7.  Is it a wonder that so many are drained, depleted and overwhelmed.  Does this contribute to us facing the largest global mental health epidemic ever?

5.  Hire passion and desire.  Train skills.   It was the 1950s and 60s.  My father was ahead of himself in many ways.  He clearly knew his strengths and spent his days applying them, and simply contracted out everything else - including accounting, bookkeeping, fixing the machinery …  One thing he  never contracted out was hiring people.   He cherry-picked every single person because he knew what he was looking for.  Passion, desire and good character was hired.  Skill was taught.

I thirsted for my own business and having the flexibility and freedom I watched my family enjoy since my first job in downtown Toronto.  It has taken all these years to finally put words to the powerful wisdoms my father taught me.  Yes, i am his daughter.   

Alot of entrepreneurs strive to be an expert in their niche market, but they question how they can become that expert.

Here is one sure way.  Read to be a leader. 

Jack Canfield did the math for us.  “If you spent just one hour a day reading books in your field and related fields, you would finish reading at least one book a week.  Over 10 years’ time, you would have read 520 books about your area of expertise - enough to put you in the top 1% of your field!”

That means if you accessed information from the genius minds in your related domain, you would have an edge that most others simply don’t have.     

Here are 3 books that are must-reads for every small business owner:

The Success Principles, Jack Canfield

The E-Myth Revisited, Michael Gerber

Step Into The Spotlight, Tsufit

And don’t forget to keep your fingers on the pulse by reading a composite of magazines (including those that aren’t in your particular niche area).   Attend conventions and conferences.  Here’s a great one coming up:

WorldFuture 2009, Innovation and Creativity in a Complex World.  It’s the World Future Society’s annual conference.  July 17-19, Hilton Chicago, Chicago, Illinois.  It all starts with Don Tapscott, “Grown Up Digital:  Understanding the Future Through the Lens of Youth”

Read.  Go where the masters are.  Develop a business strategy of expertise.   

Do you remember Sniff, Scurry, Hem and Haw?  These were the stars portrayed in Who Moved My Cheese.  At the time the book was written, the premise was if you ran out of cheese (like a job or customers), you needed to charter unfamiliar territory to adapt and change and eventually find your new and tasty Cheese.

If the story were written in today’s spiritual renaissance, chances are there would be a lot less exploration of the maze, and a whole lot more emphasis on visioning the cheese first.  

From Napoleon Hill to Earl Nightingale to Bob Proctor, one thing is for sure.  No doubts.  Absolute certainty.  The real secret to our success lies in the ability to control our thoughts.  Our ability to paint a picture in our unconscious mind of what we really, really want.  

If you find yourself looking for new cheese, don’t just step into a maze and start looking.  

Instead find your-self a quiet corner.  Relax. Meditate.  Journal or listen to a paraliminal CD from Learning Strategies, Inc.  Paint the picture of what you want your business and life to look like first.

Once you are clear on your ambition and passion - then you are in a position to manifest your magical cheese - and step into action to get it. 

Why spend all that time in the maze if you don’t have to?