Customer Service, Stock Market, Motivational Speaking, And More

This is a special article. It is the 500th article I’ve written for Forbes.com. It is hard to believe that I’ve been writing at least one weekly column for Forbes for almost 10 years, and I haven’t missed a deadline! Thank you to those who continue to read this column. To celebrate this milestone, I thought it would be fun to share my top 10 articles based on the number of readers.

1. Customer Service Is the New Brand (July 15, 2018) – For the longest time, leadership in many companies saw “customer service” as the place customers went when they had problems and questions. Smart leaders knew better. They recognized that the experience their companies and brands provided after the sale was a big reason customers came back and helped make them stand out from their competitors. Customer service and CX can make a brand!

2. The Real Reason Shoppers Aren’t Returning (September 1, 2019) – At the time, there were many articles about how foot traffic in malls was down. Some said the retail world had overbuilt. Others blamed it on online retailers like Amazon. ServiceChannel’s report came out and indicated that 86% of consumers continued to shop at brick-and-mortar locations. They also shared the top three reasons customers didn’t return.

3. How to Outperform the Stock Market by 679% (April 7, 2019) – This may have been my most popular article to date. I summarized the Siegel+Gale World’s Simplest Brands report, which claimed that if you had invested in a portfolio of the top 10 simplest companies to do business with, you would have outperformed the major indexes by an amazing 679%!

4. So, You Want to Be a Motivational Speaker? (June 30, 2019) – I’ve been fortunate to be hired by companies and brands around the globe as a keynote motivational speaker. Along the way, many executives have shared thoughts about their next career, and they want to become speakers too. So, I shared some ideas and tips on how to get into the business.

5. How to Make Better Zoom Calls—Or Any Type of Video Call (July 5, 2020) – Remember what happened in 2020? (How could anyone forget!) Everyone left the office to work remotely and most of us started using Zoom on a daily basis. Covid-19 pushed us several years into the future of video communication. I focused on making virtual presentations versus basic online etiquette for video calls and included nine ways to “leave boring behind” and capture and keep your audience’s attention.

6. Businesses Lose $75 Billion Due to Poor Customer Service (May 17, 2018) – In 2018, a study claimed that bad service costs businesses more than $75 billion a year. Since this article was published five years ago, numerous studies have appeared with even higher numbers. There are plenty of other stats and findings in this article that will remind you of how important it is to deliver a better customer service experience.

7. The Impact of Virtual Work From the Home Workforce (February 28, 2021) – Prior to the pandemic, working from home was only available to a small percentage of the workforce. That changed in March 2020. Since that time, companies have made big decisions about coming back to the office, and it’s impacting more than just the employees.

8. What Customers Want and Expect (May 8, 2018) – Not only are there some good stats and findings here, but there are also some recommendations on how to keep your customers coming back again and again. If you want up-to-date stats on customer service and CX, you can find them in our 2023 Achieving Customer Amazement study sponsored by Five9.

9. How Happy Employees Make Happy Customers (May 27, 2017) – I’ve written about this topic many times. What’s happening on the inside of an organization will be felt by customers on the outside. So, a focus on “happy employees” might be a very powerful strategy for your organization.

10. Will AI Take Over the World? (December 17, 2017) – This article was written years before the public knew about ChatGPT and generative AI. Movies like I, Robot, starring Will Smith, are science fiction. (Or are they?) For now, AI, when used the right way, is helping companies create better customer experiences.

I can’t end this article without thanking the good people at Forbes who gave me the prestigious opportunity of being a regular contributor. It took several years to get noticed, and I remember the phone call with my first editor, Fred Allen, who recently retired. He’s the one who gave me a shot at this. Here we are, 500 articles later, and I hope that I’m able to write a similar article when I hit number 1,000! Thank you, Forbes.com!