Retail is in the detail Baby . Follow your Heart.......... but take your Brain with you
Working with ordinary people to achieve extraordinary things
The customer is the most important person in your business
Unequivocally the main retail principle to master. Customers should be centric to your business, and everything you do should reflect this. Knowing your customers, focusing on them in everything you do, will help you grow your business. Knowingly under-delivering Customer excellence to appease business "needs" is to dilute the long term success of the enterprise.
Understanding your customer
So, in the quest to improve your understanding of your customer, every retailer should focus on the detail, decide what core elements are at the root of your offering and get things right the majority of the time. Mistakes happen, but learning from them is key and don't repeat sloppy errors. Customers will allow you some mistakes, but too many will turn them away.
Understanding the five P’s
This is a key principle agreed by all visionary retailers - People, Product, Price, Place, Promotion - the basic foundations of a successful retail business, whatever the offering. Working on the art of the possible is the local management task - if product, price and place are thrust upon you and outwith your control, then People and Promotion is your game.
Go the extra mile
Providing great customer service starts with understanding, knowing and delivering the expectations of your customer. The journey really starts when you consistently and effortlessly deliver just a little more than the customer expects. Doing this each time you and your team interact with your customers will win them over and engender a reciprocal loyalty creating a lasting bond.
Like minded team players 
The gifted retail manager achieves retail excellence through creating performance that is greater than the sum of it’s parts - where ordinary people achieve extra ordinary things through motivation and leadership in an environment of clear rules and expectations; in a voluntary team environment the creation of which, is the realm of the gifted people manager and excelled by the retail visionary. The driving force has to be delivering to our vision - what is the business about, what do our customers expect, what have we undertaken to offer, is our next and every succesive action conducive to those aims?
Recruitment and selection
Lastly, because it needs above all to be remembered and in the front of our mind, nothing is more important than recruitment, selection and RETENTION of your team.
In an environment where three or four of the five P’s are outwith your control and given the intimacy of bricks and mortar retail with the end user - Recruitment must be head and shoulders above everything in the pursuit of retail excellence. Successful candidates must match your retail objectives and your stated expectations of your business and of your team in delivering. Develop a structured interview technique. Share the hiring decision of candidates. Recognize that overlay of your customer service objectives onto your candidate requirements goes to the root of the business raison-d'etre. Whilst establishing the Customer Offering can be challenging, following and delivering against the 5 P's is as nothing compared to recruiting and retaining the team who will deliver it. Establishing your retail offering and recognizing the Customer Profile therein cannot compare to the breadth and individual needs and ambitions of those you select to deliver against it. Never under-estimate the value in planned recruitment and interview skills even to the extent of hiring a professional to supplement your recruitment/selection sessions.
Hire slow. Fire fast. Never compromise candidate quality because of a dearth of applicants - better to temporarily wind in the business offering to match team capacity than to compromise on team quality.
Always to be avoided is the Box of Sorry...............
