Book Review: Raving Fans

I read this book a little while back. Raving Fans is a management book on customer service. It is written as a parable as many of Ken Blanchard and Sheldon Bowles are apt to offer. It was a pretty easy read, and contains a simple plan for outstanding customer service: Decide, Discover, and Deliver.

Deciding what your vision of the perfect performance is the starting point. Create a vision of perfection that is centered on the customer. Until you know what it looks like, you can never generate Raving Fans. The recommend taking time away closing your eyes and imagining what your company would look like if it were operating perfectly. Then begin bringing that vision to reality through those you manage.

Discover what your customer's vision is. Only after you have a firm handle on your own vision can you then listen to your customers to find out what they expect of you. The fact is though that they don't have a full vision for what you should be doing. They have only a limited vision of what they want you to do. Finding those two or three things they are focused on helps to smooth the bumps between what you offer and what they need. It is in this process that you may find that their vision is something that is not at all a part of your vision. At that point you have to be able to say, "Farewell, but we can't help you."

Deliver plus one is the idea that knowing your vision, and your customer's vision you are going to build systems to make sure you deliver every time. The "Plus One" idea is that changes occur in one percent increments. It is embracing the idea that we can deliver plus make a one percent improvement above expectations.

Pretty simple but good advice, plus a handful of snippet things to think about:

• Marketing: "The assumption was that the public was a mindless group of buyers and that with proper advertising and promotion, products could be produced en masse and sold to naive buyers. Unfortunatly, as I tour the country speaking,, I find too many young managers still think this way."
• "Washrooms will always tell you whether a company cares about their customers."
• "Don't offer too much, at least at the start."
• "What you have to do is promise more and deliver more."

Pretty easy read. Good travel read.

--Ben