Seth Godin Quotes

Quality in a service or product is not what you put into it. It is what the client or customer gets out of it.

It's sad that we have become so accustomed to bad service that we're shocked when we get good service.

In the telecommunications, consumer products, and railway businesses, there are very real consequences if you don't meet the consumer's needs and desires. There are also substantive rewards for doing so, and especially for exceeding customer expectations.

When you open any kind of food service establishment, you do all this planning, but it's not until you've opened the door and people are inside that you learn what people want you to be to them.

The customer wants what the customer wants - when they want it, where they want it, and how they want it. And if you want to build a big business, and you want to be meaningful to a big, broad group of customers, you need to think about how you're going to meet them in the various places where they might expect to see you.

If you are seizing on a new business opportunity, deliberately move your customers' expectations up a few notches and consistently over-deliver on your promises - you will leave your competitors struggling to catch up.

Quality in a product or service is not what the supplier puts in. It is what the customer gets out and is willing to pay for. A product is not quality because it is hard to make and costs a lot of money, as manufacturers typically believe. This is incompetence. Customers pay only for what is of use to them and gives them value. Nothing else constitutes quality.

When you sell a product or service, you're making a promise to your audience. If you don't understand your audience, you'll never be able to keep that promise and you'll ultimately let them down.

When you go into your customary barber shop, you will wait for the man who gives you a little better shave, a little trimmer hair-cut. Business leaders are looking for the same things in their offices that you look for in the barber shop.

It used to be a good hotel, but that proves nothing - I used to be a good boy.

The big room or big suite doesn't mean a lot to me. It is what the people do or don't do that matters.

Companies can add value and simultaneously promote themselves if their product or service truly improves the lives of their customers. I mean really improve lives, not wishful thinking, rationalization. That's the acid test.

The customer deserves to receive exactly what we have promised to produce - a clean room, a hot cup of coffee, a nonporous casing, a trip to the moon on goassamer wings.

Sometimes you're wrong, but if I'm a repeat customer, it means I must have valued the past experiences.

I am tired of hotels promising to go the extra mile only to have them refuse to go round the corner!

The customer is always right...even when they're wrong.

The key is to set realistic customer expectations, and then not to just meet them, but to exceed them - preferably in unexpected and helpful ways.

It's ironic that retailers and restaurants live or die on customer service, yet their employees have some of the lowest pay and worst benefits of any industry. That's one reason so many retail experiences are mediocre for the public.

The service in L.A. is the best. You don't get sarcastic, surly, fed-up waiters and waitresses like you do in England. They're good at their job and they're there for the customer. The only depressing thing is a lot of them have written more screenplays than me.

Customer service is the new marketing.

Good service can save a bad meal, but there is no level of food that can save bad service.

When we make a pledge, we mean it. We keep our word, and what we begin, we will finish.

The best feature of a product should really be the customer service.

Biggest question: Isn't it really 'customer helping' rather than customer service? And wouldn't you deliver better service if you thought of it that way?

You always think in terms of customer benefit. You always think, "How could I really benefit people at such a high level that they would love to buy my product or service and recommend it to others?"