A Guide to In-Store Customer Experience Enhancement

With the digitization of our world, customer opinion can greatly affect the credibility of any business.? Customer can build or break the reputation of a company with a simple review on Yelp, Facebook, Twitter, or any number of local business review sites. Products and prices has become only a part of the overall experience of customers.

Enhancing the customer experience has now become a priority for businesses because the marketplace has now changed.? It is important to engage customers in a positive way, carefully considering how they feel while they are in the store. ?Building customer relationships should be the priority behind customer experience enhancement.?? Focusing on improving company public perceptions via enriching customer experience on a one on one basis will increase revenue and forge loyalty.

Put Your Best Foot Forward

When dealing with clients, personable customer service should always take precedence.? Sales representatives, front-desk personnel, customer service representatives, and members of the staff who interact with clients in a regular basis should always represent professionalism.? They must actively pursue a positive image for the company by ensuring a positive customer experience.

Connecting and maintaining relationships with customers should be the priority.? The business-client relationship does not start and end at the point of sale.? Establishing a positive customer experience from the outset can help effectively forge these relationships.? According to Business Week?s Jeneanne Rae, ?Building great consumer experiences is a complex enterprise, involving strategy, integration of technology, orchestrating business models, brand management and CEO commitment.? (i)

Essentially, businesses are encouraged to expend some of their resources devoted to study consumer patterns.?? Using analytics, companies distinguish the parts that they do well and aspects that need improvement.

Why Enhance Customer Experience?

Enhancing customer experience might sound like an overwhelming process, but there are a host of intangible positive effects, aside from increase in revenue, that make it a worthwhile pursuit.? When employees provide excellent service to customers, they also receive positive affirmation in the process.?? The positive customer experience motivates staff and encourages them to replicate the same result in every interaction.

In-store experiences that focus on client happiness and satisfaction elevates a company?s reputation that no amount of marketing can replace.? Marketing does not make respect, service, and care tangible.? People are the ones who care for other people.? With shopping ever more associated with feelings, it is important that clients feel a human connection with their suppliers.? Treating customers graciously makes them feel valued.? Respecting their needs acknowledges that their patronage is important.

In short, customer experience enhancement is a very human affair, which relies on improving relationships and creating connections.

Enhancing Customer Experience: It?s all in the Details

While most business research tout that customer experience is spread over a series of platforms, which include social media, online interface, etc., the most visceral and impactful of these experiences are the ones associated with in-store interactions.?? Our society might be pushing for virtual exchanges these days, but we still consider our most important experiences to be sensory in nature.

We base our opinions from conscious and unconscious cues from our surroundings.? Businesses must remember that their facilities must always present them in the best light.? The general appearance of a store is a valuable facet of the customer experience.?? Visitors should encounter safe and sanitary conditions in order to make the most of their time at a store.? Sometimes investing in something like adequate floor covering can sometimes be the difference that separates two nearly identical stores.

For example, compare these two nearly identical food service restaurant businesses. ??The first takes care to have floor mats in their kitchens that discourage the proliferation of microbes and germs.? They use effective kitchen mats that absorbs moisture and can be easily drained.?? Using this effective tool to promote sanitary conditions in the kitchen, the business enhances the customers experience by assuring them that the food they purchased was cooked in a clean and safe environment.

On the other hand, the other restaurant does not prioritize nearly as much on floor coverings as the former.? While their food might not be poisonous, it can be argued that they do not care about proper sanitation and safety in their food preparation.? After noticing that their floors are dirty, moist, and full of litter, the consumer, out of fear, refuses to patronize their business, and takes his custom to their competitor.

Tiny details ?even things such as floor mats ? matter .? Presentation matters.? How customers feel matter.? Take the time to know your customer, and make them feel that they are important to your business.

Sources for this report include:

(i) Rae, Jeneanne (November 27, 2006). ?The Importance of Great Customer Experiences?. Business Week. Retrieved 2012-11-25

Source: http://www.eaglemat.com/blog/a-guide-to-in-store-customer-experience-enhancement/

the chronicle spinal stenosis the forgotten man mike jones just friends chronicle george lopez

Source: http://muscovy-bleeder.blogspot.com/2012/12/a-guide-to-in-store-customer-experience.html

department of justice doj dept of justice weather chicago swizz beatz mpaa south carolina debate

PS3 is the top Netflix device in the world | Video Game Blog, Video ...

By Victor VellonPublished: 05 December 2012 11:19 AM UTC

Posted in: News, Playstation News, PS3, Video Games

Tags: Netflix, PS3

Those that still don?t believe the PS3 is worth a purchase should take a second look,?especially?if you you like Netflix. Not only do you get a system that performs well, but it seems the latest and greatest plans for the Netflix service will be tried first on Sony?s PlayStation 3.

CEO Reed Hastings of Netflix mentions that soon it will be the only system to use what is being referred to as a ?Max voice interface feature?. PS3 was also previously the first system to offer full-HD streams as well as 5.1 Dolby Digital Plus. You know what else is awesome? You enjoy this all and don?t have to spend an extra $60 to play online or use features such as Netflix.

?PS3 is our largest TV-connected platform in terms of Netflix viewing, and this year, at times, even surpassed the PC in hours of Netflix enjoyment to become our No. 1 platform overall.?

While it seems Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are all fighting to be the ?entertainment in the living room? system of choice, this speaks well for the PS3. Did I mention you not having to pay an extra $60 a month just to play online? Stream movies you don?t have on Netflix on the number one platform to do it all, pay nothing for playing games online (unless you choose to pay for Playstation Plus) and watch 1080p Blu-Rays? Sounds like a deal to me.

[Source: Destructoid]

Article from Gamersyndrome.com

Related posts:

1. Netflix to come to PS3
2. Netflix Finally Making its Way to the Wii
3. Netflix Coming to Wii?
4. Netflix on the DS?
5. New Hitman: Absolution Trailer: ?Living, Breathing World?

Source: http://gamersyndrome.com/2012/video-games/ps3-top-netflix-device/

mario manningham williams syndrome hoya casa de mi padre corned beef and cabbage diners drive ins and dives jeff who lives at home

Saving the Snow Leopard of Afghanistan

Link Information - Click to View

Saving the Snow Leopard of Afghanistan
By TJ WINICK and MARY COMPTON In Afghanistan, one of the most dangerous places in the world, Boone Smith is on a mission. Not for the military, but for wildlife organizations that want to track down the most elusive big cat on the planet: The...

Source: ABC News
Posted on: Thursday, Dec 06, 2012, 8:24am
Views: 6

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/125753/Saving_the_Snow_Leopard_of_Afghanistan_

guild wars 2 adrian gonzalez Jerry Nelson Foo Canoodle Isaac path Tropical Storm Isaac path

PRAGMATIC CAPITALISM ? In Search of the Holy Grail of Investing

Attached is the latest from Niels Jensen at Absolute Return Partners. As always, it?s a very good read.

?Using U.S. market data going back to 1926, Vanguard analysed the predictive powers of a whole range of metrics. The rather depressing conclusion ? at least from an economist?s point of view ? is that we are pretty much wasting our time by assigning any value at all to what goes on in the real economy. Of all the metrics tested by Vanguard, only P/E ratios seem to explain some reasonable proportion of future (real) stock market returns, and that is only if you are prepared to take a very long term view (10 years in the Vanguard study).

I have been writing the Absolute Return Letter since October 2003. At least 75% (I haven?t checked) of all those letters have focused on various aspects of the macro economy and a great many of them have gone on to make predictions on stock prices, interest rates, commodity prices and currencies. Have I been wasting my and, more importantly, your time during all those years?

I don?t think so, but my answer does require some clarification. At Absolute Return Partners, when structuring portfolios for our clients, we distinguish between three different time horizons ? the very near term (the next few months), the medium term (from a few months to a few years) and the long term (many years). Most mutual funds, pension funds and insurance companies allocate the majority of their capital to the medium term, making it a very crowded space and the more crowded the space, the more efficient it usually is, and the more difficult it will be to generate alpha.

The short term is often ruled by more aggressive investors. Hedge funds dominate this space, frequently at the expense of private investors. The long term is the least crowded; it is in fact distinctly un-crowded in the current environment. As I have repeatedly pointed out over the past couple of years, one of the most noticeable implications of the?financial crisis?is the craving for?liquidity. This has driven more capital than ever before towards the short and medium term, creating very attractive opportunities for those investors who can take a long term view.

Despite the findings of Vanguard and others I maintain my long held view that it is possible to identify long term economic trends which are likely to have a quantifiable impact on asset prices; however, the effect is only measurable over the very long term. Now, we cannot construct portfolios with only the long term in mind. If we did that, we would almost certainly go out of business before our ideas came to fruition.?

The Absolute Return Letter 1212

Source: http://pragcap.com/in-search-of-the-holy-grail-of-investing

cispa baltimore ravens space shuttle new york courtney upshaw russell wilson catch me if you can delmon young arrested

Smartphones might soon develop emotional intelligence: Algorithm for speech-based emotion classification developed

ScienceDaily (Dec. 4, 2012) ? If you think having your phone identify the nearest bus stop is cool, wait until it identifies your mood. New research by a team of engineers at the University of Rochester may soon make that possible. At the IEEE Workshop on Spoken Language Technology on Dec. 5, the researchers will describe a new computer program that gauges human feelings through speech, with substantially greater accuracy than existing approaches.

Surprisingly, the program doesn't look at the meaning of the words. "We actually used recordings of actors reading out the date of the month -- it really doesn't matter what they say, it's how they're saying it that we're interested in," said Wendi Heinzelman, professor of electrical and computer engineering.

Heinzelman explained that the program analyzes 12 features of speech, such as pitch and volume, to identify one of six emotions from a sound recording. And it achieves 81 percent accuracy -- a significant improvement on earlier studies that achieved only about 55 percent accuracy.

The research has already been used to develop a prototype of an app. The app displays either a happy or sad face after it records and analyzes the user's voice. It was built by one of Heinzelman's graduate students, Na Yang, during a summer internship at Microsoft Research. "The research is still in its early days," Heinzelman added, "but it is easy to envision a more complex app that could use this technology for everything from adjusting the colors displayed on your mobile to playing music fitting to how you're feeling after recording your voice."

Heinzelman and her team are collaborating with Rochester psychologists Melissa Sturge-Apple and Patrick Davies, who are currently studying the interactions between teenagers and their parents. "A reliable way of categorizing emotions could be very useful in our research,." Sturge-Apple said. "It would mean that a researcher doesn't have to listen to the conversations and manually input the emotion of different people at different stages."

Teaching a computer to understand emotions begins with recognizing how humans do so.

"You might hear someone speak and think 'oh, he sounds angry!' But what is it that makes you think that?" asks Sturge-Apple. She explained that emotion affects the way people speak by altering the volume, pitch and even the harmonics of their speech. "We don't pay attention to these features individually, we have just come to learn what angry sounds like -- particularly for people we know," she adds.

But for a computer to categorize emotion it needs to work with measurable quantities. So the researchers established 12 specific features in speech that were measured in each recording at short intervals. The researchers then categorized each of the recordings and used them to teach the computer program what "sad," "happy," "fearful," "disgusted," or "neutral" sound like.

The system then analyzed new recordings and tried to determine whether the voice in the recording portrayed any of the known emotions. If the computer program was unable to decide between two or more emotions, it just left that recording unclassified.

"We want to be confident that when the computer thinks the recorded speech reflects a particular emotion, it is very likely it is indeed portraying this emotion," Heinzelman explained.

Previous research has shown that emotion classification systems are highly speaker dependent; they work much better if the system is trained by the same voice it will analyze. "This is not ideal for a situation where you want to be able to just run an experiment on a group of people talking and interacting, like the parents and teenagers we work with," Sturge-Apple explained.

Their new results also confirm this finding. If the speech-based emotion classification is used on a voice different from the one that trained the system, the accuracy dropped from 81 percent to about 30 percent. The researchers are now looking at ways of minimizing this effect, for example, by training the system with a voice in the same age group and of the same gender. As Heinzelman said, "there are still challenges to be resolved if we want to use this system in an environment resembling a real-life situation, but we do know that the algorithm we developed is more effective than previous attempts."

Share this story on Facebook, Twitter, and Google:

Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:

---

Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Rochester, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

---

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/top_technology/~3/mz9RnPRx0Iw/121204081324.htm

peyton manning super bowl nsx chad ochocinco roman numerals new england patriots superbowl halftime madonna

Software guru John McAfee seeks asylum in Guatemala

Founder of McAfee security software John McAfee emerged from hiding in Guatemala where he plans to seek asylum. McAfee claims he is being persecuted by police in Belize where he is considered a person of interest in the killing of another American.

By NBC News staff and wire services

U.S. anti-virus software guru John McAfee, who is on the run from police in Belize seeking to question him in a murder probe, has turned up in Guatemala City to ask for political asylum.

He said he is being targeted by authorities in Belize because he refuses to give money to its government. ??

McAfee has been in hiding for three weeks since police in Belize said they wanted to question him as "a person of interest" about the murder of fellow American Gregory Faull, with whom McAfee had quarreled.

---

McAfee smuggled himself and his girlfriend, who he calls Samantha, across the porous land border that Belize shares with Guatemala. He stayed at a hotel in a national park before heading for Guatemala City on Monday evening.

"I have no plans much for the future now. The reason I chose Guatemala is two-fold," McAfee told Reuters by telephone from Guatemala's Supreme Court, flanked by his lawyer, former attorney general and lawyer Telesforo Guerra.

"It is a country bordering Belize, it is a country that understands the corruption within Belize and most importantly, the former attorney general of the country is Samantha's uncle and I knew that he would assist us with legal proceedings."

McAfee has denied involvement in the murder and told Reuters on Monday he would not turn himself in. He posted repeatedly on his blog while on the run, describing how he would constantly change his disguise to elude capture.

He is traveling with a photographer from Vice magazine, which revealed his location by posting a photo of the two together under the headline, ?We are with John McAfee right now, suckers.?

In his latest blog post, McAfee wrote:

I apologize for all of the misdirections over the past few days. It was not easy to exit Belize and required many supporters in many countries. I am in Guatemala and will be meeting with Guatemalan officials this morning. If all goes well I will do a press conference tomorrow.

Vice Magazine reporters are indeed with me in Guatemala. Yesterday was chaotic due to the accidental release of my exact co-ordinates by an unseasoned technician at Vice headquarters.? We made it to safety in spite of this handicap. I had to cancel numerous interviews with the press yesterday because of this and I apologize to all of those affected.

On Tuesday, McAfee appeared with his hair and goatee died black, and wearing a dark suit and tie - a far cry from the surfer-style blonde hair highlights, shorts and tribal-tattooed bare shoulders he sported in Belize.

"(Guerra) is now attempting to get political asylum for myself and for Sam. I don't think there will be much of a problem. From here I can speak freely and safely," McAfee said.

'Bonkers'?
McAfee says he believes authorities in Belize would kill him if he turned himself in for questioning. Belize's prime minister has denied the claim and called the 67-year-old paranoid and "bonkers."

On the Caribbean island of Ambergris Caye, where McAfee has lived for about four years, residents say he is eccentric, impulsive, erratic and at times unstable, with a penchant for guns and young women.

He would often be seen with armed bodyguards, pistols tucked into his belt, and McAfee's neighbor had complained about the loud barking of dogs that guarded his exclusive beachside compound.

His run-in with authorities in Belize is a world away from a successful life in the United States, where he started McAfee Associates in 1989 and made millions of dollars developing the Internet anti-virus software that carries his name.

There was already a case against McAfee in Belize for possession of illegal firearms, and police had previously raided his property on suspicion he was running a lab to make illegal synthetic narcotics.

McAfee says he has been persecuted for refusing to donate money to politicians, that he loves Belize, and considers it his home.?

Guatemala is a canny choice to seek refuge. It has long been embroiled in a territorial dispute with Belize. Guatemala claims the southern half of Belize and all of its islands, or cayes, rightfully belong to it. There is no extradition treaty between the two countries.

A Guatemalan government source said there was "no reason" to detain McAfee because there was no legal case against him pending in the country.

Harold Caballeros, Guatemala's foreign minister, said his government was unaware of any arrest warrant and would study McAfee's asylum request once presented, saying its success would "depend on the arguments."

Guerra told Reuters McAfee would return to Belize once his situation in Guatemala was made legal, citing the fact he had crossed into the country illegally to avoid capture by police in Belize.

"He can go to the United States, there is no problem with that," he added. "We have asked the U.S. embassy for support with our (asylum) request."

He said the asylum request would be formally presented on Wednesday.

The U.S. Embassy in Guatemala City said in a statement McAfee would have to work within the country's legal framework, but declined to elaborate. "The embassy does not comment on the actions of American citizens, due to privacy considerations."

More world stories from NBC News:

Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook

?

?

Source: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/12/04/15683685-software-guru-john-mcafee-suspected-of-murder-seeks-asylum-in-guatemala?lite

Google Docs 911 masterchef Dictionary.com Chicago teachers strike yahoo finance september 11 2001

Auburn hires ex-assistant Malzahn as head coach

New Auburn football coach Gus Malzahn greets fans at an airport Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in Auburn, Ala. (AP Photo/Todd J. Van Emst)

New Auburn football coach Gus Malzahn greets fans at an airport Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in Auburn, Ala. (AP Photo/Todd J. Van Emst)

Newly hired Auburn football coach Gus Malzahn arrives at Auburn University Regional Airport and greets fans Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in Auburn, Ala. (AP Photo/AL.com, Julie Bennett) MAGS OUT

Newly hired Auburn head coach Gus Malzahn speaks during an NCAA college football news conference, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in Auburn, Ala. Malzahn received a five-year contract worth $2.3 million annually to try to get the team back on solid footing. (AP Photo/Todd J. Van Emst)

Newly hired Auburn head coach Gus Malzahn smiles during an NCAA college football news conference, Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2012, in Auburn, Ala. Malzahn received a five-year contract worth $2.3 million annually to try to get the team back on solid footing. (AP Photo/AL.com, Julie Bennett) MAGS OUT

Arkansas State head coach Gus Malzahn, from left, quarterback Ryan Aplin and linebacker Nathan Herrold are presented with the Sun Belt Conference trophy following their NCAA college football game against Middle Tennessee on Saturday, Dec. 1, 2012, in Jonesboro, Ark. (AP Photo/The Jonesboro Sun, Krystin McClellan)

AUBURN, Ala. (AP) ? Gus Malzahn stepped off the plane in Auburn and rushed over to a waiting throng of fans, exchanging high-fives and smiles.

He trumpeted "a new day" for the Tigers an hour or so later at his introductory news conference as head coach Tuesday night, but really he's hoping to return them to days only recently gone by.

Malzahn brings his fast-paced offense back to Auburn two years after that style ? and quarterback Cam Newton ? helped the Tigers win a national title.

"It will be fun for our fans and we will get this thing turned around and play championship football like Auburn expects," he said.

Malzahn was the Tigers' offensive coordinator during their 2010 national championship run before heading to Arkansas State for his first college head coaching position. He led the Red Wolves to a 9-3 record, a Sun Belt Conference title and a berth in the GoDaddy.com Bowl, then parlayed that into a job in the powerhouse Southeastern Conference.

The 47-year-old Malzahn received a five-year contract worth $2.3 million annually to try to get Auburn back on solid footing with players he already knows and some he recruited. He replaces former boss Gene Chizik, who was fired one day after a 49-0 loss to No. 2 Alabama to complete a 3-9 season.

Malzahn hasn't ruled out coaching in the bowl game for Arkansas State, which said he had a $700,000 buyout. He said he would talk to Arkansas State administrators about that Jan. 5 game with Kent State but that Auburn is his top priority.

Auburn athletic director Jay Jacobs declined to say whom else he interviewed, but said Malzahn was "the clear unanimous choice of our search committee."

"The characteristics that he brought to the table were head and shoulders above everybody else," Jacobs said.

The offense especially is in dire need of a makeover after struggles in transitioning to a pro-style system.

Auburn had the nation's 115th-ranked offense last season, averaging 305 yards a game. The Red Wolves were ranked 19th in total yards under Malzahn.

"We will be a fast-paced, attacking-style offense and defense," Malzahn said. "In this day and age, I believe you have to."

It's the second straight time Auburn has turned to one of its coordinators from an unbeaten team. Chizik ran the defense for the 13-0 team in 2004, and was hired by the Tigers despite a 5-19 record in two seasons at Iowa State.

The search committee was comprised of Jacobs, Auburn Heisman Trophy winners Pat Sullivan and Bo Jackson, and former Tigers player Mac Crawford.

Jackson said he was confident that "we got the right man."

"We talked to a lot of talented coaches, a lot of coaches that are going to be Division I coaches other places, and they're all stars in their own right," said Jackson, the 1985 Heisman winner. "Gus shined a little bit brighter than those guys in the interview process."

Malzahn said his first priorities will be recruiting and hiring coordinators, but didn't mention any candidates.

Auburn owes more than $11 million in buyouts to Chizik and his coaching staff.

The Tigers are hoping Malzahn can return them to success after a winless SEC season.

But Auburn is also looking for a coach to instill discipline to a program plagued with off-field problems the last few years, including the arrest of four players for armed robbery after the 2010 season.

The NCAA has been investigating the recruitment of signee Jovon Robinson, who was ruled ineligible after a guidance counselor admitted to creating a fake transcript.

"I feel very confident that everything is fine, and that's my understanding," Malzahn said.

The hiring was welcome news for players who just endured Auburn's worst season in 60 years.

"I know coach Malzahn, and he's an amazing man," defensive end Nosa Eguae said. "He's a standup guy. I'm looking forward to the future. I can't wait to get started and turn this thing around and get some wins."

Malzahn was earning $1.3 million a year with the Tigers and interviewed with Vanderbilt after the national championship season. He took a substantial pay cut to join the head coaching ranks with the Sun Belt Conference team. Malzahn replaced Hugh Freeze, who also left after one season at Arkansas State to take over at Mississippi.

Malzahn also made a couple of decisions with players that didn't pan out. Tailback Mike Dyer transferred from Auburn ? where he was suspended ? to Arkansas State. He was then dismissed by Arkansas State in July after a state trooper found marijuana and a gun in a car the national title game MVP was driving.

However, Jacobs said discipline was a factor in choosing Malzahn.

"The wins and losses and all of that comes into play," he said. "When Gus came in and laid out his plan to the committee, he touched on everything that we thought was important and then some. It is all important."

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2012-12-05-Auburn-Malzahn/id-7d67105d4c2944a6b29187b0cb12848c

ravi leigh espn greg oden st patricks day st. bonaventure ira glass