As happens so often in business, it is easy for their to be un-intended circumstances that come from even the simplest of actions. Many companies love to tout their long-term business models and forecast on the strength and volume of their business. When it comes to smaller operations (ones like ours) where there are fewer than 50 employees and often times little changes lead to big things, it is very easy to draw a line between actions and results.
This year, MemphisInvest.com has seen unbelievable growth in our business. Much of that growth can be attributed to little actions taken that had nothing to do with our ultimate business plan or forecasting. Follow me for a minute as I show you exactly why our company closed 157 transactions with our clients in the first six months of this year for a whopping 127% increase over last year!
We spent much of last year as owners planning this year and each of the avenues in which we were going to grow our business. We definitely planned an all out customer service blitz for our clients and making sure that they knew exactly what was happening with their portfolios. It was an effort that was built throughout the company. We talked about Customer Service so much the last two years, that it became ingrained in the very fabric of our company culture. And what we saw happening was amazing.
Now, before I get ahead of myself, I want to emphasize that we put a premium on marketing, advertising and travel as well. We were making an effort to get our story out to the general public that we were an absolute success story and the success of our clients was the proof. But all those best laid plans could not lead to the growth we've seen this year. No, it was much much simpler than that.
When we committed to providing the best customer service possible for our clients, every department in our company had to commit to being the best. It wasn't about being better than anyone else, there was no competition...it was simply asking our selves the question - "how good can we be"? Our entire company consists today of 24 full time employees and each are broken into departments. Whether they are in our accounting department, property management, portfolio advisers, customer service or renovation, everyone has a job to do and first and foremost it was to provide great service to our clients.
We started holding ourselves accountable for every action and non-action and began company wide education. Staff members attended Dale Carnegie seminars (and still are) as well as continuing education courses. We studied some fantastic books as a company such as "Exceptional Customer Service", "the Ultimate Sales Machine", "Crush It", "Re-Work", "The Go-Giver" and most importantly "Delivering Happiness". These books and our commitment to study the business principles in them, led us to strive to get better and better and better.
Other companies have tried to use our size as a competition. It's not. We do not care how many houses companies sell or who is the biggest. We completely understand that your growth as a business is all a function of your willingness to improve. Truett Cathy, founder of Chik-Fil-A corporation stated it best and I keep this quote in front of me everyday:
"If you commit to getting better everyday, your customers will demand you get bigger".
That is the real secret to our growth!
