The First Impression

The Experience Account – The Experience Account is just like a checking account. Good moments in the experience add to your balance and negative moments take away from the experience account balance. In most cases we start at a negative balance due to bad experiences with other service-related businesses. As the ‘face’ of the company, each technician must work to build the experience account balance for the entire company.

The First Impression – People will make a decision about you in the first few seconds after having met you. That First Impression must be designed to produce a positive result. With that in mind always follow the ‘SELECT’ steps.

‘SELECT’ Steps

• Stop a couple of kms from the job site and pull off in a safe location. 
• End any phone conversations before arriving at the job. 
• Look in the mirror. 
• Everything needed to go to the door is at hand. (Job File, meters, camera, etc.) 
• Check your uniform, tuck in your shirt, dust off any crumbs, check your shoes. 
• Timely arrival. If you are going to be even a few minutes late, call in advance to correct the arrival time.

Arriving At The Home

• Upon arriving at the home, immediately get out of the vehicle and head to the door. 
• Ring the doorbell and step back a couple of steps, but remain facing the door. 
• Smile and greet the customer kindly. 
• By following these steps, you can make a deposit into the experience account even before you speak. Conversely, it is nearly impossible to completely eliminate a negative first impression.

Building Trust Is A Worthy Investment

Defining Trust 

Trust – An assured reliance on the character, ability, strength or truth of someone or something. 

Trust can be placed in an individual or a company. It is hard to create and easy to break. There are no tricks to earning trust. There are principles and activities that will helps us to build trust. Below are a few examples of the principles of character, ability, strength and truth. 

Character 

Trust the customer. If you believe that all customers are not to be trusted, they will sense this and be distrustful of you also. Your actions will also show your lack of trust in them. Start by assuming all customers are trustworthy and you will find that the vast majority are. 

Communicate and listen. Make eye contact and listen carefully to everything the customer says. Respond professionally and in a kind manner. 

Show respect for the customer (i.e. be on time) and their property and belongings (don’t set tools on counters or furniture). 

Ability 

Certification goes a long way in telling someone that you have the ability to accomplish the work you have been hired for. 

Answer questions that they may have briefly but clearly. Make sure that they understand what you are going to do in their property, but don’t be a know it all. 

Keep your work environment clean. Often the greatest impression made on an individual is how clean your workspace is. Since most people don’t know much about water restoration, they have few other ways to judge your ability. 

Strength 

Exceed the customer’s expectations. For the extra mile when you can for no other reason other than to be helpful to the customer. 

Handle customer complaints immediately. Take ownership of them and make sure that there is a resolution brought to the issue. Even if the issue doesn’t involve you, you are the face of your company. 

Truth 

Obviously don’t lie. Don’t purposely omit details either. 

Do what you say you are going to do. If you don’t people perceive that as lying. 

Follow through on things like being on time. This speaks to the truthfulness of what you say.