I popped into my local florist this morning to buy some flowers for the lovely National Bank lady that has been guiding my boyfriend and I through our first house purchase (we move in on Thursday- hurray!) While we were speaking to the very polite girl behind the counter, a woman from a large real estate agency down the road came in, plopped down a floral display, proclaimed that everyone in her office had told her to bring them back as they were hideously ugly and then left.
Firstly, there was nothing wrong with the flowers- they were gorgeous. Secondly, it turns out that the florist provides the real estate agency with the flowers. For free. Somehow I don't think they will be providing them with free blooms for too much longer. My boyfriend and I were stunned by the rudeness of the people at the estate agents. This will no doubt influence our view of that particular branch of XXXX from now on and also the perceptions of other people that we tell (through this blog for example!)
This also brings to mind a building company that a prospective client was telling us about earlier this week. The builder made a few mistakes which prolonged the building work and resulted in the client having to shell out more money on labour costs. The builder eventually reimbursed the client but not before getting into a right tizzy and blaming the mistake on every man and his dog (all the client wanted was for the builder to say sorry and give him his money back....) The builder doesn't realise that the way he acted could have dire consequences on his business. Every person that client chooses to tell about the builder and his behaviour could be another lost customer, put off by how unreasonably he acted.
Business owners need to remember that their best PR team is themselves and their employees. Everything they do- the way they answer the phone, how they deal with complaints, how they phrase their emails, every manner in which they communicate with their suppliers/customers/employees- reflects back on their company.
Also worth bearing in mind is that human beings are genetically wired to remember the bad things for a lot longer than they remember the good things (this is actually true- interesting story about it here in Time!) A bad reputation can be very hard to shake so it really is worth making sure that you don't develop one in the first place. The only way this can be done is by communicating properly with your audiences and ensuring that you fulfill the promises you are making to them...
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