really matter in the art of keeping a fruitful and long-term

Make Love! relationship with clients.

To Yo u r Drawing your blueprints

...Clients
Copyright ©
Guide by Dr. Salim Hajje Ph.D.,
Strategy Consultant - Business Unlimited -
“From making a pitch to building a brand, designing a logo
to closing the sale, this is a field guide to take with you to
the front lines of today’s business battles.”
Your possible business:
Ask, “What would people love”?
Never mind what clients say they want. The truth is they
don’t really know what they want! It’s up to you to make
them realize that what you have to offer is exactly what
they want. No client ever thought of the ATM, or
Disneyland, or Starbucks. These were concepts created by
brilliant businessmen who sensed what clients would love
if you gave them a taste of it.
Other helpful tips at drawing your blueprints:

From the author of the
“Hot Executive Tops” comes • Ponder over how you would beat your own business if
another guide filled you were in your competitor’s shoes. Then work at
with lessons learned eliminating that weakness.
from real-life
• Ask yourself “If I could start from scratch, how would I
stories in the
current business do things differently?”
environment. • The value of planning is in the process. It teaches you
Designed for the more about your colleagues, clients, and your market.
busy executive • Find the “white hot center”. Every industry has one. This
this guide is the key area where influencers who will endorse your
explores how product to followers are located.
the little details
These are the editors whose reviews dictate the trends
of the industry.
• Nike found the white-hot center of running and
later on, in basketball.

They chose Michael Jordan, who wasn’t even first

choice in that year’s pro draft of college players.
Nike’s earliest contact with Tiger Woods was when
he was playing golf as a freshman in high school.

The 14 Principles of Planning:

• Forget the future. A lot of predictions and
prophecies don’t come true. People
thought TV would eliminate the need
for radio. It hasn’t. Plan around
what you can predict: what
people will love.
• Stop listening. Male
audiences will never admit
they shed tears over
Remains of the Day.
People do not reveal
themselves easily.
It is up to you to let them
see something about

The Secret Guide Series™ Make Love To Your...Clients Copyright © Business Unlimited 1
 themselves that they cannot. When you research on the
market, look for what is hidden.
• Celebrate foolishness. Why do people pay $3.75 for a cup
of coffee? Why would people want to watch a weekly show
about a dozen people on an island? To see who survives all
the backstabbing? Your idea may sound foolish, so it just
may work.
• Resist authority. Put 8 people in a room and watch how
the Alpha personalities take over. If you are an Alpha,
learn to keep quiet so the others can air their ideas.
Alphas have powerful personalities but it doesn’t mean
they have the best ideas.
• View experts skeptically.
• Beware of “science” and “the research shows”. It rarely
reveals what the clients really love.
• Mistrust your experience and memory. Sometimes we
remember things that never happened. Ninety per cent of
eyewitness identifications of crimes are wrong.
• Mistrust confidence. Don’t allow other people’s strong
convictions to sway you. They use confidence as a tool of
persuasion.
• Avoid shooting for perfection. Strive for professional
excellence.
• Common sense will keep you out of trouble, but
breakthroughs require imagination.
• Embrace impatience. Big organizations suffer from
inertia. Keep moving.
• You never know where the water is until you find it.
Spend less time and money on Plan A, and dispatch
small teams off in different directions.
• The service company (Yes, we all live in the age of
services now) that waits for guarantees is doomed.
Nothing in business is guaranteed. Past success is no
guarantee of a future one. To learn, just keep doing.
• Search for the investment that will bring greater re-
turns. Keep looking for the one that will increase re-
turns not just by tenfold but a hundred times what you
put in.
Forget about the “mission/vision statement”.
Most “mission/vision statements” are stuck to a wall in
the office with no one really paying much attention to
them. Rename your mission to your “Passion”, or “Our
Purpose”, “Our reason for coming to work each day”.
It can’t just be about making money. A powerful state-
ment attracts clients, inspires employees, and pro-
duces results. Go deeper than the mere bottom line.
Create and communicate your vision, but rename it.
Remember how JFK concretized his vision-mission:
“American will put a man on the moon”.
Avoid “nice”.
The Secret Guide Series™ Make Love To Your...Clients
If everyone feels comfortable with your idea, chances are
it isn’t good enough or bold enough. A distinctive idea will
always make a few people feel uncomfortable.
To get to the truth, get on the phone.
People speak honestly when they are on the phone for the
simple reason you cannot see them. It is similar to the way
people are in a confessional booth. The customer will be
more candid on the telephone and you will be more likely
to get an accurate insight on your service.
To understand business, read Classic Literature.
Why? Because timeless works, like those by Shakespeare,
reveal something about human nature that no business
book can ever teach you. Novels reveal what clients love.
Examples of classics to read are Hamlet, Macbeth, The
Great Gatsby, works by John Updike, and Arthur Miller’s
“Death of a Salesman”.
For nine businesses out of ten, the Internet is a
customer service tool.
If your business was not specifically conceptual-
ized to be an Internet business like Amazon or
eBay, then don’t expect it to suddenly boom the
day you upload your site. The Internet is merely
an aid and never the answer.
The economy is new, but the people are
old.
The Internet gives but takes. Electronic
communication will never replace the value of
face-to-face contact. The Internet leads us to
neglect our relationships.
You must become more personal with clients,
not less.
Four Building Blocks
1. Clear Communications
We are living in the age of information and
option overload. In the seventies, you only had
to choose between a black phone unit and an
avocado one. Today,
your choices to your phone unit and all its
possible functions are infinite: call waiting, call
forwarding, caller ID, etc.
Because the average person’s mind is cluttered
with information and options, your message has
to be absolutely clear, simple, and visual.
Quick information bites:
• What images would you use to convey your
message?
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 • Do you create the expectation that you are trustworthy,
reliable, and skilled?
• Does your advertising distinguish you?
• Are your materials made of better quality?
• Have you mastered the art of the great first impression?
• Do you fall under a negative stereotype?
• Simplify everything. “The future is bright”. There is only
one number to call for customer service. Clarity and
simplicity comforts people overwhelmed by all the
information in this world.
• Do not cold call or send direct mail. It annoys people.
Let them hear about your in the papers or on TV.
Advertise.
• Get publicity. One article can go a long way. Editors in
local papers are always looking for material to fill up their
space. Retain a professional writer with magazine-writing
experience. It’s an investment in your public relations.
• Beware of testimonials. They only work if the person
testifying has credibility and authority.
• Avoid using words like world class, ISO certified,
superior quality. Instead, replace them with proof. Avoid
superlatives. Avoid clichés.
• Use the direct address, “You” in your advertising copy.
• Be specific.
• Brevity is the key. People want their information fast
and in quick bites. If you cannot describe what makes you
different and excellent in twenty-five words or less, don’t
fix your copy. Fix your company.
• Edit your message until everyone understands it.
• Make your model the Absolute vodka campaign. Simple,
visual, implicit, different, and brand-obsessive. Absolute
brilliance.
2. The Velvet Sledgehammer
A compelling message
The decline of trust
Watergate. Janet Cooke. John DeLorean. Barings Bank. Jim
Bakker. Enron and Arthur Andersen. These are just some of
The Secret Guide Series™ Make Love To Your...Clients
the big events that exposed the corruption that exists in
society.
“A generation is coming of age internationally that doesn’t
take the news straight…it sees giant con games every-
where.”
A service company has to win its customer’s trust. Even 5
year-olds know that a sale sign is just put up in a window
to make you come in and buy stuff. Make sure your mes-
sage is honest and modest. Admit your weakness. Some-
times unselling can be your best strategy. When you admit
a weakness, the client tends to believe you and trust you,
because you aren’t hiding anything.
How to gain trust?
• Sell yourself first. Then sell your company, your service,
or product. Sell your price last.
• Cultivate yours - as well as your people’s - relationship
skills.
• Position yourself in every presentation. Studying your
prospect’s shortlist will help you.
• Wielding the velvet sledgehammer translates to “Sell
softly.”
• Just like in any relationship, you can’t hurry it. Two peo-
ple achieve a strong relationship by reaching beyond
boundaries they usually maintain between themselves and
strangers. A party moves into the other’s boundary only
with the other’s consent. Even together, people must re-
main separate to thrive. Sell slowly. Don’t cross any
boundaries without getting the client’s consent first.
• Sell like you date.
• Perfect your storytelling.
• Find the Force, or the strongest link in the organization,
and sell to that person.
• Treat sub-
ordinates as
equals.
• Sell your
presenters
before you
present, to
create a
great expec-
tation. This expectation makes a client believe you are
good already.
• Use visual aids, not Power points filled with too much
information.
• Keep the lights in the meeting room on during the pres-
entation. Cut the number of slides. You must speak, not
read during your presentation. Edit your slides down to a
Copyright © Business Unlimited 3
 minimum number of words per slide. Present one thought
per slide.
• If you use visual aids, they have to be Visual. Have a lay-
out artist or graphic designer with experience help you
create a professional presentation.
• Package bold ideas conservatively, and conservative
ideas boldly. Package yourself by wearing a funky watch if
you are presenting a conservative idea. Wear a conserva-
tive gray suit when presenting a really cutting-edge cam-
paign.
• Dress honestly and a little bit better.
• Accentuate the positive. Avoid the negative.
• Use uncommon ways to say common things.
3. Blue Martinis
A reassuring brand
The Rise of Invisibles and Intangibles
Clients are buying a relationship with you. Make your
business and your excellence tangible through
your name, packaging, and price.
• Make sure you have a really great name. You
need a proper noun. Not a description.
• Your symbol or logo should be distinctive
and instantly recognizable.
• Your brand has limits. Don’t leap outside of
your area if it is one you are well known for
already.
• Try an unusual name, a contradictory name,
or a little oddness.
• To find an uncommon name, take your first
set of names and then free-associate.
• Test your name. Ask 12 intelligent and ar-
ticulate people from different backgrounds
what they think of your initial list of names.
• Don’t use an acronym.
• A geographic name might work.
• If you are a lawyer, an established architect,
designer, and have a very good reputation,
use your own name.
• Yahoo! is a very evocative name. Think out-
side the box.
Checklist for name creation:
• Is it musical or easy to pronounce?
• Can you say it without being asked to spell
it?
The Secret Guide Series™ Make Love To Your...Clients
• Is it short?
• Is it negative?
• Is it interesting? Is there a story behind it? Is it sensory?
• Do a few people dislike it? (A good sign)
• Does it imply more than one meaning?
Your package/environment is your service.
From the way your people dress, to the letterheads, faxes,
and memos you send out, to the space and design of your
office restrooms, the environment is what your clients see.
The environment is the experience. Make yours
exceptional.
Here are some examples of great service environments:
• Restrooms at the Felix restaurant, Hong Kong
• Cirque de Soleil stage, Bellagio Hotel, Las Vegas
• MyExcite customized home page, Exite.com
• Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston
• Priority letters, FedEx.
• Sephora department store, Paris
• The Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, Wash-
ington D.C.
4. Caring service
Great businesses connect.
Create opportunities for clients to connect,
and this will connect them to you.
Have open houses, seminars, and other excuses
to gather. People are natural social animals.
Service tips:
• Your clients are buying satisfaction.
• Always assume your service needs fixing.
• Nurture every client’s sense of importance.
• Clients want service from people, not ma-
chines.
• Serve your best customers passionately.
• Show that you are making time for them.
• Make use of handwritten, personalized notes.
• Clients want speed of service. Answer the
phone after one ring. Call them back within
ten minutes. Design your space so they can
find things easily.
Cut your service time in half.
• Master the art of the welcome. Hire a really
Copyright © Business Unlimited 4
 remarkable receptionist. This is your business front liner
who warms up calls before they get to you.
• Praise all clients. Even past ones.
• Keep your client’s secrets. Business Unlimited®
The official business grower ©
• Put every promise in writing.
Business Unlimited, Internationally Certified
Ten Rules of Business Manners: Consultant will help You Successfully Design, Plan &
Run a Long Term Customer Service Strategy
• Always wait a second after a person finishes speaking
before you speak.
• Listen with your entire body.
•Formulating Marketing Strategies
•Enhancing Corporate/Personal Image
• Be positive.
•Increasing Sales Effectiveness
• Speak well of others.
•Running a CRM Strategy
• Memorize names.
•Developing Loyalty Programs
• Never try to impress. The effort shows and diminishes
you. •Reducing Time to Market
• Never make your cell phone conversations public. •Developing Distribution Strategies
• Praise but never flatter.
•Conducting Market Research
•Identifying New Opportunities
• When in doubt: be kind.
•Training sales Forces
•Rationalizing Product Ranges
The Traits Clients Love •Improving Customer Service
• Humility. Never praise yourself or criticize a competitor.
• Generosity/Sacrifice. Give up something and you will get Good Work!
more back.
• Openness. Tell the truth even when it hurts. Risk your- Now if you’re serious about running your business
self to earn their trust, the foundation of a great relation- effectively based on good up-to date management
ship. strategy; you really need to know more about how
• Integrity. Integrating words with deeds, promise and per- Business Unlimited can help you reach your goals.
formance. Quality is integrity.
Its where top professionals go to become more
Clients love comfort. successful...

Give clients comfort and you will keep them. A familiar Please contact us at;
brand makes people comfortable. Clarity comforts. A
genuine interest in a client, and your strength of passion in Phone: + 961 4 416061
what you do are great sources of comfort to a client. Direct: + 961 3 394325
consult@business-unlimited.com
www.business-unlimited.com
Parting words:
Your greatest asset is your passion and belief in yourself. This is truly a risk-Free call
Clients love that.

Salim Hajje Ph.D.

The Secret Guide Series™ Make Love To Your...Clients Copyright © Business Unlimited 5