Survive The Amazon!

It’d be so simple for me to help retailers implement policies and procedures instead of dumb stores like Holland & Barrett who sell as much garbage as good things lose customers with their ill thought thru rewards programme. I’m just going to get all my stuff from Amazon today. Sorry; Not Sorry! It’s down to 2 solutions: and I’m available to come help you implement them in your business. Otherwise, I’ve no more f**ks to give for you retailers.

I wanted to have a quick discussion about why retailers are going out of business and losing business to Amazon because I think this is very important. I just had an experience at Holland and Barrett a chain store that sells supplements and vitamins and mixed quality to be honest with you. They sell some great stuff and they sell some garbage but that’s beside the point.

What is really important is that I am at the cash wrap the till and I’ve got about 80 British pounds worth of purchases to make and I’ve got a coupon a voucher.

And yes it is commencing in two days. Got that but I am actually shocked that there is so little employee empowerment so little trust that they were not able to or didn’t think to say

Do you know what it’s OK courtesy gesture we’ll take it now.

It’s only two days that would have just closed the sale right there but compared to the fact that available and accessible is Amazon online on the app with prime means I’ll get it delivered tomorrow. I just when I just left the stuff right there on the counter walked out the door and said well that’s fine.

• And I ordered everything on Amazon and it’s being delivered tomorrow.
• And each product was actually about two to four pounds cheaper.

So guess what?

Those 400 extra points that I would have had on that voucher would NOT even have closed the gap but sort of in my heart I would have felt good because of the supporting the brick and mortar store the jobs the local aspect of it and all of that corny schmaltzy stuff.

But you know what I’m not going to do it anymore and here’s the reason why guys because we need to understand as business people that the old adage the customer is always right and if you think the customer is wrong. See the previous sentence is actually the way to do business if you want to survive and of course much of the nation of France will disagree with me but a they’re also going out of business the brick and mortars quicker than anything losing business to online retailers.

We can blame it on cocooning we can blame it on all these concepts but the bottom line is if that were true if that were the real reason why we would have solved it by now but I’m now going to reveal to you the reason why and the solution to that and for those of you that choose to adopt and implement this you will survive. And for those of you that choose to ignore this message I will guarantee that you are on your way out of business slowly or quickly but you will not survive. You will be eaten alive by Amazon and online retail because they are customer centric. I have a problem I call them up or I email them and they take care of me every single time because they are customer centric. They understand that it doesn’t matter how hard you tried we don’t care. What matters is how the customer feels.

And so what are the two policies the two procedures the two modus operandi that you can implement and put into place that will virtually guarantee your survival number one employee empowerment and power to what create service solutions?

I’ve talked about this before but if that employee at Holland and Barrett was empowered to say to me and create the exception say you know what this coupon voucher is good in two days but I’ll take it now I would they would have had a sale and so those kind of discretionary things are necessary for your survival. Because they will kill you if you don’t.

Number two is a very generous unconditional no questions asked money back guarantee. Why is that important. It’s trust versus fear because if you fear that you’re gonna have an army of customers taking advantage of you and ripping you off then you don’t deserve to be in business and you won’t be in business for very much longer if that’s your attitude. If you have an adversarial attitude with your customers and your clients then you will not be in business very much longer.

Does it happen that people rip off businesses that take advantage of refund policies and other generous procedures?

Of course it does but that is a minority of the case and it is a worth while cost of doing business because overall you will prosper by trusting your customers not naively not blindly but overall.

Therefore, those two policies implemented together will virtually guarantee your survival as a business and not implementing them will virtually guarantee your non survival your death as a business. Because I’ll tell you what I know I am not alone in saying that Holland and Barrett if you’re listening you have permanently lost my business because of the availability and accessibility of Amazon and their customer centric model and your unreasonable first of all markups and your prices. But second of all your rewards and loyalty program is just plain stupid. Because I can save money shopping online and I don’t feel bad doing it anymore because of my experience today. If you took care of me if you took care of your customers half as good as Amazon does I would shop with you consistently every time not because of the quality or products you sell a lot of garbage in that store. But because I want to support the local employees and the brick and mortar store but because you choose to ignore that and operate your business in a way that is obviously not trusting of the customer or trusting of the employee I don’t think you deserve to be in business and quite frankly you’re not going to be in business very much longer. I guarantee you that not virtually I do guarantee that because we don’t need you because we get better quality better prices and better service online. In a company like Amazon. So this is where I got to take my hat off. So for all of that you know evil empire conspiracy around the company and all the controversy around the way they treat suppliers and employees that’s another issue but the way they treat their customers. Hats off. Brilliant. Fantastic and for now I will be a loyal customer because all of this sustainability stuff we can work on that and a company like Amazon is poised and this is a hint. Hopefully you’ll take it to create an impact that is significant. In terms of sustainability environment and all of these factors that we’re talking about now a company like that is poised to create and contribute in a way that nobody else is even capable of doing. So the potential is there. The hope is there and so I hope they do it and then I can be a customer forever. But for the time being the number one priority should be customer centrism. I call it creating service solutions and by employee empowerment and superior customer value because that customer is valuable to you because you have created superior value to that customer. Think about that.

Justin Answer