Be damn good at customer service.

Any great leader will tell you that their secret had nothing to do with themselves.  Instead, their success was built on the backs of the teams they assembled.  The businesses that are going to do well in the long run are the ones that filled with customer oriented people at every level of the business.

Take a look at companies that are absolutely crushing it right now:

You may have heard of Zappos!

They’re the leading online shoe retailer in the world, but their primary focus isn’t selling shoes.  They are a customer service company.  The shoes are almost a secondary focus (they aren’t really…but you get the point).  Zappos is probably one of the best retailers you’ll ever deal with.  I buy as many of my shoes as I can through them, and it isn’t because of the price.  Actually, they often are not the cheapest!

However, I know I’m going to be happy with my experience (not necessarily my purchase).  First of all, the shipping is free no matter what you buy.  And once you become a regular customer, you get even faster shipping.  When the shoes show up, you might hate them.  No problem!  Slap the free shipping label back on the box and send them back.  Zappos even pays for that shipping.  And don’t worry about having to ship it back within 14 days.  You’ve got a YEAR to change your mind. [Read more...]

Every once in a while, there comes a time when your business could just use an extra set of hands. Maybe you need the help of an expert to finish a project. You certainly do not want to go through the hassle of hiring temporary staff.

So what do you do? Outsource it.

Here’s the Top 5 Outsourcing Sites you never knew about.

1. Elance.com.  Need a logo? Need to update that old website? Need a ghost writer for your website? Need a professional press release written? Need a print designer? The Elance Work System provides a standardized way to post jobs and receive proposals, hire, manage, and pay for results, and also enables collaboration, tracking progress and providing feedback.
2. RedBeacon.com.  Need 1,300 purple cupcakes with your logo on them. Need them tomorrow morning? Either put on your apron or click on over to RedBeacon.com. They will put you in touch with local service providers waiting to handle your specialty project, even on short notice. Post your job (or crisis), then sit back and wait for qualified service providers in your area to upload their quotes.
3. Mechanical Turk. You may not know it, but Amazon.com does more than sell books. They also own Mechanical Turk, the undisputed leader in Human Intelligence Task outsourcing. Did you just get back from that huge trade show in Vegas? Are those 4,325 business cards in your briefcase haunting you? Have the workers at Mechanical Turk input them into dynamic spreadsheet for a penny per card. That’s right, there’s a guy out there somewhere that would gladly take your penny, and Mechanical Turk will find them for you.
4. Rentacoder.com. One of the biggest barriers keeping small business owners from leveraging the Internet is knowing how to build a website. Why should you have to know how to build a site when there are thousands of freelancers out there that can do it for you? Rent yourself a coder. Rent-a-coder.com is a website for hiring website, software, and application developers. Post you job, put funds in the Rent-a-coder escrow account, and watch your website or app get built.
5. oDesk.com. Oftentimes there just are not enough hours in the day. Sometimes you wish you could just hire a small group of temporary workers to help you get through the day to day, but who wants to use an old-fashioned temp agency? Let oDesk.com help you put together a team of workers. Whether you are looking for new talent or already have a remote team, oDesk offers a complete solution for working online.