Amazon.com
To longtime sales and customer-service pro Jeffrey Gitomer, boasting about a near-perfect customer-satisfaction rating of 97.5 percent is a major mistake. "That means 2.5 percent of your customers are mad and they're telling everyone. And 97.5 percent of your customers will shop anyplace the next time they go to market for your product or service." Based on a philosophy that's been developed through his syndicated business columns and the more than 150 seminars that he gives each year to companies such as Radisson, Sony, NationsBank, and Time Warner Cable, the book outlines his formula for making customers so faithful they "will fight before they switch--and they will proactively refer people to buy from you." Regularly employing oversized type in screaming bold fonts to grab the reader's attention, Gitomer breathlessly recounts his start-to-finish approach to becoming "memorable" to consumers along with illustrative tales of his own encounters with particularly egregious examples of poor service. All of this is bolstered by an ongoing sampling of his inspirational quips and a variety of self-evaluating quizzes designed to pinpoint individual strengths and weaknesses. Take a deep breath, read it straight through, and prepare to delight thy customer! --Howard Rothman
Booklist
Gitomer, who conducts more than 150 sales seminars each year, is the author of The Sales Bible (1994) and a weekly column in more than 60 regional business newspapers. The first half of his title makes the unconventional assertion to make a point. Although a customer who is not satisfied is not as likely to return, companies should focus on building repeat business rather than just pleasing customers. The two efforts are obviously not mutually exclusive, but building customer loyalty is a separate and different process. Gitomer uses lists, anecdotes, observations, and aphorisms to demonstrate his point and his sales technique. Like his Sales Bible, this book, too, is laid out in a frenetic style: exclamation points abound and boldfaced, oversize motivational exhortations practically jump from the page. David Rouse
