Service Magic: The Art of Amazing Your Customers

by Chip Bell

Like stage magic, service magic is made up of more than tricks, hocus-pocus, and bravado. Service magic is an art and depends on developing customer rapport, excellent timing, and many hours of practice. Customer service wizards Chip Bell and Ron Zemke have decades of experience advising and coaching the world's biggest businesses in the fine art of providing excellent service. In their new book, Service Magic, the authors use examples from diverse industries to reveal inventive-and fun-approaches to customer service. Using new models for creating customer delight, they share a conjurer's trunk of ideas for sweeping away the mundane and creating customer experiences that will leave customers delighted, charmed, and wanting to come back for more. Readers will learn about the magic-building customer service strategies at play in industries such • Hospitality-How Marriott, Ritz-Carlton Hotels, Hotel Monaco, Old Faithful Inn, Berns Steak House, and Radisson have performed service magic for retaining guests, especially during a downturn in the travel and leisure market. • Financial services-How do USAA and American Express keep their customers happy when so many financial services companies are churning accounts faster than the Fed can drop interest rates? • Health care-See how some of the biggest health care providers, including Mayo, Aurora Health, Children's Memorial Hospital of Chicago, Grace Presbyterian Village, and Wayzata Dental, have created caring, nurturing, and helpful environments for patients and families. • Retail-Byerly's, SuperQuinn, Mary Jane's Farm, Macaroni Grill, Victoria's Secret, and Sewell Village Cadillac are vastly different retailers. Nevertheless, they share some common approaches to service and customer care. • Entertainment-Universal Studios, Disney World Resorts, All Outdoor White Water Rafting, and the St. Paul Saints have all captured the hearts and souls of customers through the magic of service.

Paperback

First published April 22, 2003

About the author

Charles L. "Chip" Bell, Jr., lives in the City of New Kensington, Pennsylvania, with his wife, Linda, is the father of two daughters, Jennifer and Jessica, and is a practicing attorney specializing in personal injury litigation, with his main office in Arnold, Pennsylvania.

Born on February 23, 1950, in Harrison Township, Pennsylvania, he grew up in Tarentum, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Tarentum High School in 1968, attended Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania, from 1968 to 1972, and graduated Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude. He served in the United States Army from 1972 to 1974, attended Duquesne University School of Law from 1975 to 1979, and graduated Cum Laude. He practiced law as a personal injury trial attorney with the law firm of Rosenberg, Sewak, Pizzi and Bell from 1979 to 2002, and thereafter as a sole practitioner up to and including the present date.

He is a member of the American Association for Justice (formerly the Association of Trial Lawyers of America) and the Pennsylvania Association for Justice (formerly the Pennsylvania Trial Lawyers Association) and has served on the Board of Governors of the Pennsylvania Trial Lawyers Association from 1988 to 1990. He is also a member of the Western Pennsylvania Trial Lawyers Association and served on the Board of Governors in 1988. He is a founder and past president of the Academy of Trial Lawyers of Southwestern Pennsylvania, a member of the Million Dollar Advocates Forum, and certified in Civil Trial Advocacy by the National Board of Trial Advocacy.

He is the author of the Jake Sullivan series of novels, the first of which, Come Monday, was published in June of 2011, and the second, Trying to Reason With Hurricane Season, in October 2011. His third novel, Havana Daydreamin', was released in April 2012. His fourth novel, A Pirate Looks at Forty.has just been published as of June 2, 2014.

Reviews

[Jim Serger · Rating 5 out of 5]

How does that company time after time continue to WOW me? Grocery store, barber shop, car rental, hotel, E-commerce, day care etc......The craft is not unlike a magician as the authors explain, they WOW us because they like magic put customers at center stage and perform so well we keep coming back, telling our friends and evangelizing on their behalf.

[Saqib Khan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some really good advice.