'Tis the Season to Focus on the Basics

When I remember the summer of 1995 and how I made myself knock on one Columbus, Ohio, door after another, a thought comes to mind:

Thank goodness we learned early that direct selling was an inefficient way to build our business!

Because if the success of Angie’s List had depended on my door-knocking and cold-calling skills, we wouldn't have more than 2 million member households today, and you wouldn’t be reading this.

But if I could time-travel back and give my 22-year-old self a pep talk, I’d praise her dedication to growing the business one member at a time, despite slammed doors, belly-dancing butterflies and tears.

That young woman didn’t have any business expertise, but she had a business partner with a great idea and the ability to raise capital. As important, if not more so, she possessed personal qualities of persistence and a willingness to learn from mistakes.

You’re going to need these traits, and more, if you want to make the most of your business opportunities this holiday season. Start with zero tolerance for breaking the basic customer-service commandments, which say that thou shalt:

• Promptly respond to your customer. This is important in all cases but one: when you receive negative feedback, especially online. Don't respond when you're feeling emotional; take the time to ensure a calm, effective reply.
• Pay close attention to what he or she tells you. This is a crucial skill for all business situations, including dealing with online customer reviews. Smart companies use feedback to fine-tune operations.
• Do what you say you will. Almost nothing is more important to earning repeat business.

If this is your high season, these rules are just the beginning. To ensure sales figures that you can be thankful for after Black Friday and Small Business Saturday, you must kick your performance up a notch.

Make sure every aspect of your operation is in excellent running order. Be exceedingly focused on pleasing your customers, and be prepared to under-promise and over-serve in every way possible.

My advice stems from 18 years of working to continually improve the customer experience at my own company, which works with thousands of small businesses every day. But if I were to go back and encourage my younger self as she labored through those tough early days, I’d share some other hard-earned lessons:

• In the long run, the entrepreneurial journey is more rewarding than any particular milestone. Enjoy each day as it comes. Build some fun into your work schedule.
• The quality of the people you hire and partner with is the most important indicator of whether your business will succeed. Hire smart and treat your team right.
• Managing people is hard work, especially for detail-oriented, task-focused folks. Be willing to adapt and grow as you go along.

There’s a lot I could tell the newbie entrepreneur I once was, including the fact that yes — despite the fears, the tears, the misses and mistakes — I would do it all over again.

Angie Hicks is founder and chief marketing officer of Angie’s List, the nation’s most trusted resource for local consumer reviews on everything from home repair to health care. Follow her on Twitter at @Angie_Hicks.

Photo: Chelsea Gomez (Oakes)/Flickr