Customers are considered as the key stakeholders of a business. Some even regard customers as the number one priority of every business because it is the existence and presence of customers that contribute in making businesses what they are. Businesses deal with people and people may be organised into a number of publics. When a business maintains good relations with each of these publics, each of the publics will in turn project the good image of the business to the general public. It is by spreading the good image of the business that will bring more customers to help the successful growth of the business. 

Every business has a number of publics that influence the activities of the business. A public is a group of people or organisations that have interest or potential interest in a company and whose work directly or indirectly contributes in building up the image of the company. The banks for example, constitute one public; the insurance companies form a public. The banks and insurance companies together with individuals and organisations that deal with financial matters relating to the operations of businesses in a country form the group called financial publics. A company generally has seven publics that it relates with on frequent basis. This paper briefly discusses the seven publics of a business for us to have clearer understanding that there are publics outside the company that indirectly influence business growth, sustainability and profits, apart from the Customer Service offered by the Company itself. 
This paper uses the word “firm” for businesses, companies, partnerships and all other organised business entities unless it becomes necessary to use the word “company” or any of the alternative words indicated. 

Financial publics include the banks, insurance companies, investors, share-holders and other individuals or groups that have financial interest in the firm. Businesses should maintain good relations with their banks, investors and others mentioned to be able to access loans, overdrafts and investment funds when needed.

The media publics include newspapers, radio, TV, journals etc. Any of these, with reasons, could create favourable or negative perception about the firm in the minds of potential customers of the firm. This therefore means that a firm must maintain good public image in order not to incur negative media reports on the affairs of the firm. This secondly, makes it important for larger businesses to have a Public Relations Office or officer who will keep abreast with the daily newspapers in order to be able to spot any negative information about the firm in any of the newspapers, and then take immediate steps to correct such negative information. For medium, small and micro enterprises (MSMEs), it is similarly recommended that the owner or owners should make the effort to read or listen to the daily news in case of possible government policy changes, or some negative information on which they would need to take action to protect their enterprises. 

Governments rule by direct government policies, by regulations and bye-laws passed by government agencies and institutions. A firm must always be abreast with changes in government policies and changes in regulations issued by government agencies and institutions. It is therefore important for a firm to have regular consultations with government offices to be able to update itself on policy changes in their country. Smaller firms, especially micro businesses and traders, as already said under media publics, must also make the effort to get to know of any changes in government policies that may affect their businesses. 

Citizen-action publics include Consumer Societies and similar voluntary groups that uphold the interests of the consumer. Environmental Protection Societies, Friends of Rivers and Water Bodies are some of the voluntary associations that form part of citizen-action-publics. To be able to ensure its good public image, a firm must maintain good relations with all such citizen-action-publics, wherever relevant and necessary, that is, if such relationships will not cost a lot of expenses and distractions. 

Local publics include voluntary neighbourhood and community groups and associations. These groups generally make requests for improvement in living conditions in their community or neighbourhood. It will be important for every relatively large firm to have a Community Relations Officer who will be responsible for dealing with issues relating to the community in which the firm operates. 

General publics refer to the general customers of the firm. The customers’ view of the firm is very important for the success of the firm. This is why a firm, depending on its size, must maintain a dynamic Customer Service Unit or Division. In general, the Customer Service Unit should work with the Marketing Division to ensure that advertising campaigns mounted by the firm are appropriate for the success of the firm. 

Each firm has a number of internal groups that together form the internal publics of the firm. These groups consist of the employees, the Board of Directors, the managers, the suppliers and the distributors. It is important that the internal publics be kept happy with good morale and motivation in order for them to project a good image of the firm to the public. 
Employees should be informed about the progress of the firm at monthly or quarterly meetings. Newsletters should be produced to inform the internal publics on the successes of the firm. Many firms have some volunteers, people who come in to help at times when the firm has to carry out some important event and needs more hands. The firm’s volunteers must be invited to take part in the fun and enjoyment of the firm’s occasional house party. 
People need recognition and promotion to higher levels in the course of their work in a firm. The firm must therefore make it a point to send some of its workers, managers etc., on staff training or refresher courses periodically. This is important for maintaining the goodwill of all the people who work for the firm. 
It is the goodwill and positive image that a firm creates with its publics that brings more customers and that secondly, helps the work of the Customer Service Unit of the firm to be more rewarding and successful. 

There are three concepts that deal with the way businesses relate with customers. These concepts are: 

The three concepts are related in a serial fashion; one coming after the other. Although discussed separately the three concepts are all segments of customer service. 

Customer Service (CS) is the way and manner the people who come to the firm’s premises with the intention of making a purchase or making enquiries on the firm’s products and services are treated. Customer service is an event that starts from the moment a potential customer enters the firm’s premises to enquire about a product or some services. The potential customer need not come physically to the firm’s premises to enquire about their products. Other ways for making enquiries include telephone-calls and email. 
Where a potential customer chooses to come physically to the premises of the firm to enquire about a product, it is the customer service representative of the firm, in many cases, the customer service clerk who starts the conversation. On entry of the potential customer, the customer service clerk, would say something as follows: “Good Morning, Madam”; “Good Morning Ma’am”; or “Good Morning Sir, How can I help you”? With this brief introductory question, the potential customer now starts enquiry about the product or service they needed. The potential customer may probably not have come to the firm’s premises to purchase a product, but rather to make a complaint about the firm’s product or services. 
Whatever the reason for the potential customer’s presence on the premises of the firm, the presence of this person begins the first contact and the first live-chat between the potential customer and the firm, represented by the customer service clerk. In this first encounter, the customer service clerk takes a reactive position by providing suitable answers to the enquiry issues raised by the potential customer. Whether the first encounter is through physical presence, telephone or email, a good customer service clerk should realise that the first encounter should be the beginning of Customer Experience. The attitude of the customer service clerk at this point is most important. The clerk must listen carefully and use polite and clear communication language at this first visit of the potential customer. The first chat between the potential customer and the customer service clerk is the customer service segment of the possible relationship that could be formed between the potential customer and the firm, that is, if this first chat is handled very well. 

Customer experience (CX) is described as a journey carefully crafted by the customer service unit working together with the marketing and sales divisions of the firm for the benefit of potential customers on their first visit to the firm’s premises. Let’s suppose the potential customer comes to the shop of Basic Home Needs Ltd., and enquires about the refrigerators sold by the firm. 
The customer service clerk would already have welcomed the potential customer to the shop or premises of the firm and would also have answered the potential customer’s questions on the types of refrigerators sold by the firm in the initial customer service segment. After the beginning reactions and answers provided the potential customer, the customer service clerk will now take a proactive position and ask questions on whether the fridge needed is for a family or for a single person. The clerk may also ask questions on the size of the freezer compartment of the fridge and other related matters. This will help the clerk to determine the capacity of the fridge required more accurately. The customer service clerk will verbally describe the fridges the firm has in stock; but it will be more powerful if the clerk would take a walk with the potential customer round the video presentation of the firm’s fridges in the show-room of the firm. The clerk would point out the various fridges, their sizes, their various colours and prices. 
The clerk could also show the potential customer the range of blenders, rice cookers, combined rice and vegetables cookers and other household appliances that could be of interest to the potential customer. The clerk could quickly communicate with the Sales Division of the firm to send an officer or clerk to the show-room to add to what the customer service clerk has already told the potential customer. It will be good if the sales clerk comes on time; but if not, the customer service clerk could go ahead and enquire whether the potential customer has an email address to which the sales division could forward the range of refrigerators, their various colours, capacities and prices in the next few minutes. The customer service clerk can also ask if the potential customer has a website from which the customer service unit could read and acquire more information on possible needs of the company the potential customer works for. 
Depending on the quality of the presentation by the customer service clerk and the sales clerk, the visit to the show-room and the information and pictures forwarded to the email address of the potential customer, a potential customer who had come to enquire about a simple white-coloured fridge may decide to purchase a family size aluminium metal coloured refrigerator that may cost the equivalent of 400 US dollars, a little bit more than other similar fridges available, and a combined rice and vegetables cooker at the price of 50 US dollars, a total of 450US dollars. The sales clerk asked for the house address of the person who is now a customer, promising that the items would be delivered to the address within three hours. The firm, the sales clerk explained, has a policy for free delivery of purchases with total price equal or more than 400US dollars within 20 kilometres radius from the firm. Now, Imagine that the potential customer had originally intended to spend no more than 350US dollars on a refrigerator. 
We realise that within 10 to 15 minutes, a good customer sales person would have taken a new and potential customer through a journey of experiences that has been carefully developed by at least three units or divisions of the firm. These experiences include the initial greetings and chat with the potential customer; the oral presentation of the customer service clerk; the video presentation in the show-room; the additional presentation by the sales clerk; the information and pictures forwarded to the potential customer’s email; possibly also the address of the website which the potential customer has provided the customer service clerk and the promise of delivery of the items purchased within three hours. If this journey is carried out meticulously, the potential customer would have been taken through a journey they would never forget. 
There are a lot of firms that may have similar products and services that meet the needs and desires of a customer. The customer’s problem is to make a choice of a firm from which to purchase the services or products they needed. A person becomes a trusted friend of a particular firm once the firm is able to meet their needs. Efficient customer service helps the customer to build an emotional relationship with a firm’s product or products. it is most likely, that given the processes and experiences the customer service clerk and the sales clerk of Basic Home Needs Ltd., have been able to pass the potential customer through, he or she would decide to purchase from Basic Home Needs Ltd., and not from any other firm any time the customer needed to purchase a domestic appliance and other related items. 
Currently, businesses are able to access the telephone, email and website addresses of possible customers. A message or an advert may appear on the phone or email from a company asking one to consider purchasing a product from the company. In such situations, the company is taking a proactive position requiring that the recipient of the message would give the message careful consideration and then make a decision whether to say “Yes” or “No”, or take some appropriate action. The representative of the firm or whoever sent the message is now in the position of leading the receiver of the message on the journey of experiences. The recipient of the message could be invited to the firm’s premises, if the firm’s location is not too far from the recipient. If the firm’s location is far from the recipient, the firm could send more information to the recipient’s phone or email etc., providing information on what the recipient should do to keep the relationship going toward possible sales. 

Customer support or after-sales support, consists of activities undertaken by a firm to resolve any difficulties that the customer may encounter in the course of using the product they have purchased from the firm. After-sales support is intended to provide advice and other services that may be necessary to ensure customer satisfaction. Customer support is the third segment of customer service and starts within the period of customer experiences, becoming more necessary and sometimes more frequent after purchase has been completed. 

The loyalty ladder explains the processes a person goes through before becoming a trusted friend or customer of a firm. Initially, when a person enters the shop or premises of the firm, the firm sees this person as someone who is coming to waste their time, or someone trying to find out which of the many firms around will be more able to meet their needs and desires. The person at this point is yet to make a decision as to the firm from which to make a purchase. The person, a potential customer at this stage, would possibly have gone through a window-shopping process; moving from one shop to the other in search of a shop that has the products or services they needed. 
The Customer Service personnel of a firm should take the positive view that the person who has just entered the firm’s shop is a potential customer. With this view, the customer service clerk will engage the person in a commercial conversation with a purpose. The purpose is to assist the person to make a purchase by giving the person the relevant information about the offerings of the firm: type of product or service required; colour desired if relevant; price expected etc. All this is aimed at providing the person with adequate information on the quality of the firm’s products and services, making it easier for the person to decide whether or not to make a purchase of the offerings of the firm. 
Once the person makes a purchase, they now become a customer. The customer moves on to become a client based on the quality of the after-sales service the firm will provide the customer. If the firm follows up and provides the customer with professional services in addition to the product sold, the customer graduates to become a client. 

How well the firm will serve the customer and also provide after-sales support, will move the customer to client status and on to the status of a supporter of the firm’s products and services. This progression is referred to as the Loyalty Ladder. At the stage of supporter, the person will not direct any person who needed something similar to what they purchased from the firm to any other shop except to the shop where they were treated very well; where they were given memorable experiences, and where they were besides, given good after-sales attention. 

Efficient customer service has a multiplier effect in bringing friends and family members of the customer to the firm. 
Assuming we have one person being able to progress from a potential customer to becoming an advocate; this person on the average may have a wife and two children. This person also has two siblings, making a total of five persons apart from the customer-advocate. If the advocate makes a recommendation to these five persons, and if each of these five persons has a friend and passes on the advocate’s recommendation to them, now ten people, besides the advocate, get to know the offerings of the firm together with the positive recommendations of the advocate. 
If these ten persons also have friends and family members, the numbers will keep soaring. The firm may not have to advertise or use other promotional techniques to convince such persons to patronize their products and services. This helps the firm in reducing their advertising costs. 
The word-of-mouth information that goes round becomes so powerful and more convincing than an advert; making it easier for the firm to make additional profits without incurring additional advertising costs. There is a procedure for calculating the Net Promoter Score (NPS) that indicates how likely a customer would recommend the product or products of the firm to other persons. Businesses should check out how the NPS data is obtained, calculated and used. 

Efficient customer service is very important if businesses are to remain in business. If businesses are to survive and grow then they must be ready to do everything within their reach to ensure that their customers remain satisfied at all times. This means that businesses must take the necessary steps to train staff to be customer-centred. Employees must realize that their continued employment with the firm is because they have customers to serve. Firms that are customer-centred are able to deliver on time and avoid delays in delivering the needs and desires of customers. 
Efficient customer service personnel know how to show courtesy by using polite questions and statements such as “What can I do for you, Sir? “I am sorry; I will be with you in a moment, Ma’am.” “Let’s see what we can do about this problem.” Employees must exhibit professionalism if the customer is to believe that they are being served well. 
As the customer service personnel get more acquainted with a customer, they should now change from being formal in their approach to customers to a friendly approach. Instead of “What can we do for you, Madam?” The question could now be “What can we do for you, Mrs Kumah?” 

The important factor in any business is that a customer should come back time and again. Repeat customers and repeat services are what ensure the sustainability of a business; and it is always the quality of customer service a first time customer receives that will bring them back time and again. 

It has been noted that efficient customer service increases business profits from ranges between 70 and 90 percent. 

Studies have reported that an angry or frustrated customer tells on average about eleven other persons about their nasty experience. Others may tell more than eleven people depending on the number of contacts within the circle of the frustrated or angry customer; the size of the family of the unhappy or frustrated customer etc. It is also reported that, on the average, the eleven persons who hear the story of the unhappy experience of a customer will each tell the unhappy experience to about five persons. This means that any negative impression created by a firm’s customer service staff could now reach 55 other persons sometimes in less than two weeks. 
When we calculate the level of potential revenue that could be lost to a firm by a customer service clerk who treated a potential customer with disrespect, consequently causing a potential customer frustration and anger, we realise that rude customer service behaviour leads to tons of revenue losses. On the other hand, friendly and respectful handling of customers with adequate provision of effective experiences at the beginning of the encounter between the potential customer and the customer service clerk of the firm, increases business profits. 

Studies show that 75 percent of potential customers will not come back because they were not satisfied with the firm’s customer service. 
Studies also indicate that it costs about six times to attract a new customer than it does to keep an existing one. As more customers decide not to buy from a firm or shop, the firm may consequently, within the short time, not be able to pay its staff because of low patronage of the firm’s products and services. 

In summary, the Customer Service Unit should note the following: