26
January

One routine question = opportunity

One routine question = opportunity
You hear it most places you go, restaurants, stores with clerks, fast food drive-thrus, even the food marts in most gas stations and it comes in variations:
Can I get you anything else?
Did you find everything you need?
Will that be all?
that all translate into the same thing, can we sell you anything more?
We hear it so often, it’s a routine, both on the part of the person asking and in our responses, nope, I’m good, yep, got everything, yes, that’s all and we pay the bill and we’re on our way.  Every once in a while tho, we pause, we think, we do have something else we need, something we couldn’t find and we break from routine.  Opportunity!  Even if the store/restaurant/fast food/whosis can’t get us what we asked for, they tried, they voiced concern and a willingness to fulfill our needs and wants.
Tonight, as I’m sitting in a decent mid-level restaurant, the waiter brings my check instead of the question.
Maybe on a different night I would have said, no, nothing else, just my check please.  But tonight, the waiter lost 75% of his tip and cut the total check in half, all for the lack of one little routine question.  Because this night, the night the waiter was in a hurry to turn the table, I wanted coffee and dessert and the resulting higher check would have gotten him a much higher tip.
Instead I drove a block down the street and got my dessert from a cafe/bakery and went home for coffee.
One routine question missed = opportunity lost.

You hear it most places you go, restaurants, stores with clerks, fast food drive-thrus, even the food marts in most gas stations and it comes in variations:

Can I get you anything else?

Did you find everything you need?

Will that be all?

All translating into the same thing, can we sell you anything more?

We hear it so often, it’s a routine, both on the part of the person asking and in our responses, nope, I’m good, yep, got everything, yes, that’s all and we pay the bill and we’re on our way.  Every once in a while tho, we pause, we think, we do have something else we need, something we couldn’t find and we break from routine.  Opportunity!  Even if the store/restaurant/fast food/whosis can’t get us what we asked for, they tried, they voiced concern and a willingness to fulfill our needs and wants.

Tonight, as I’m sitting in a decent mid-level restaurant, the waiter brings the check instead of the question.

Maybe on a different night I would have said, no, nothing else, just my check please.  But tonight, the waiter lost 75% of his tip and cut the check total in half, all for the lack of one little routine question.  Because this night, the night the waiter was in a hurry to turn over the table, I wanted coffee and dessert and the resulting higher check would have gotten him a much higher tip.

Instead I drove a block down the street and got my dessert from a cafe/bakery and went home for coffee.

One routine question missed = opportunity lost.

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