How to be Loved

One of the things we all want in business is to be loved. Perhaps that desire stems from another source like... I don't know... the entire rest of our existence. Wherever it comes from, I think we could agree that being loved is great for any business. So how does one go about "being loved?"

A good friend of mine, who has written many enlightening and inspiring essays that lead to many talks of the same ilk, recently reflected on what it means to love others. He identified the three primary attributes that contribute to feeling loved as feeling respected, understood, and enjoyed. This reflection was given as an encouragement to seek to make others feel respected, understood, and enjoyed as a practical way to make them feel loved. While it's just as important for you to learn to love your customers in this way, I'll let you work on that one as homework. We're going to turn this around to try to answer the question posed by the title.

1. Respected - How do you encourage your customers to respect you? Do you convey your brand message with dignity? I am always surprised by the way some businesses will sink to indecency for attention. We love to use humor and sarcasm in video and website production, but there is an important difference between self-deprecation and degradation. Casting dignity aside may garner some fleeting attention but respect can be hard to regain once lost.
2. Understood - Do your customers understand you? Are you able to communicate your message in an understandable way? There will always be those that seemingly seek to misunderstand, but communicating effectively will ensure that you aren't turning away potential clients that just got stuck on clunky messaging. You're in the business of what you do. We're in the business of communication. While you'll always be the expert on your own product or service, we know how to make you understood.
3. Enjoyed - "Business" can sort of sound boring. There's lots of invoicing and reconciling. There are taxes and objectives and even something called ROI. But let's remember that the main purpose of your business is to solve problems. Solving a problem can be incredibly satisfying, almost as satisfying as having a problem solved.We run the risk of missing that when we get caught up in the "business" side of things. The word enjoy is related to rejoice. Think about that. Your business has the potential to cause joy in your customers! How often do you highlight that as a benefit?

Your customers have the potential to not only work with you, but to love you. Think about THAT when you plan your next video, website, or design project!