"Increasingly, competitive advantage in a crowded market will stem from service added." Tom Peters - Thriving On Chaos. It's almost impossible to succeed in the current market on the merits of your company's products and services alone. Even new offerings are soon copied, very quickly losing their unique status together with any competitive advantage they gave. Increasingly, companies are relying on their reputations for giving excellent customer service to differentiate themselves from the competition. The ability to retain customers is also essential in today's highly competitive market. On average, it costs five times more to obtain a new customer than it does to service an existing one. Therefore, it makes sound economic sense to hold on to the customers your company has already invested time and money in acquiring. The fundamental requirement to giving great customer service is to get the right corporate mindset, one that focuses on giving customers what they really want, and not what they probably want. This series will provide a practical guide to how to define what constitutes a quality service by your customers' own criteria. By asking directly for useful feedback, you'll be able to identify the disparity between what customers expect from your company and what they actually receive. Most importantly, you will learn how to minimize that gap, and increase customer satisfaction and loyalty through process improvement and the enhanced performance of your service team.