Get In The Game is a weekly column by Dan Yarrington, managing partner of Myriad Games in Manchester & Salem, New Hampshire, Treasurer of the Professional Game Store Association, and Editor-in-Chief of GameSalute.com.  This week, Yarrington talks about ways to improve customer relationships.

Welcome back to Get In The Game, a column that focuses on proactive ways we can improve the games industry.

Game stores begin and end, rise and fall, succeed and fail based on their relationships with customers.  Some are awesome and some are broken.  Some people consider themselves customers when it is not their custom to actually purchase anything at all.  Customers exhibit all the frailties, peculiarities, and potential of our most marvelous people.  So what do we do when a relationship with a customer is broken, when we’re not nurturing mutually beneficial interactions on an ongoing basis?  Relationships break, but there is hope.  We can rebuild it.  We can make it better, stronger, faster...  We can build better customers and empower the passion of our clientele to build better stores.

First, what makes a good customer, from the perspective of a store?  "A customer who spends a lot of money, obviously," you might say.  But the definition is not so simple.  It’s easy to remember the customer that drops $400 in one day.  It’s the folks that visit and spend money regularly, say once a month, who make your store an integral part of their gaming experience.  They make a custom of frequenting your shop and purchasing your goods and services.  They contribute their time as well, helping build up the store by referring friends, helping to coordinate and promote events, and doing whatever they can to invest in the relationship with your store.  We should be doing everything we can to invest in our customers, help support them, strive to continually improve our services, listen, learn, and grow our relationships.

A) Listening.  Make sure your channels of communication are wide open so that your customers can get their feedback to you via whatever means they prefer, whether it’s in person, by phone, via email, through Facebook, on Twitter, by carrier pigeon, or whatever other arcane methods they may employ.  As you listen to feedback, pay close attention to patterns.  Are you continually getting requests for a certain type of event?  Listen carefully.  You need to filter out of the single, loud voices, and focus on the massive amount of softer, less distinct undertones.  Get ideas, think about how to best implement them, engage with customers, and get them involved in making their suggestions a reality.

B) Doing.  Most people skip right over this step and jump to the next one.  Don’t be like most people.  This is the majority of the time and energy you’ll invest in improving relationships.  You need to be active.  You need spend time, every day, interacting with customers.  Filter ideas for workable options.  Try out different solutions.  Innovate and don’t be afraid to fail.  Don’t try to do everything, just do the right things.  When you find something that works, keep doing it.  When you find something that doesn’t, stop doing it.  Even if only half the things you do are the right things, you’re still better off than if you had done nothing at all.  You’ll be able to build on your previously successes, introduce new ideas and programs, and continually refine your service portfolio.  When you find something that enhances the customer’s experience at your store, make it a part of your routine.  It could be a simple courtesy email or phone call letting them know a title they’d just love has arrived. It could be reorganizing your game space to allow for better traffic flow.  It could be coordinating a special launch party event for that ardent group of regulars who just jumped into that new miniatures game.

C) Sharing.  Make sure you’re taking part in the discussion, not just passively absorbing information.  Chat with your customers and let them know what ideas you have for improving things.  Get their feedback on your thoughts.  Find out where you’re way off base and where you’ve found something that they might truly appreciate.  Express your gratitude for your customers, their business, and their support.  Thank them for visiting, each and every time they walk through the door.  Welcome new faces and give them the grand tour.  Share your thoughts each day in person, by phone, through blog posts, emails, podcasts, or whatever media you can. Become a part of your customers’ lives.  Look for how you can add value to your customers and build them up.

With these simple building blocks, we can dramatically improve our customer relationships, find satisfaction in our ongoing interactions, and add layers of depth and value for all those who take part in improving our enterprises each and every day.

What are you waiting for?  Get In The Game!

The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.