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Newsletter #855: The “Help Your Customers” Issue

[Welcome back to the Damn, I Wish I’d Thought of That! newsletter. This is text of the great issue all of our email subscribers just received. Sign yourself up using the handy form on the right.]

When you make life easier for your customers, they pay you back in love, loyalty, and respect — and money, too. How you could do it:

1. With babysitting
2. With reselling
3. With their relationships
4. Check it out: Where Was It Filmed?

1. With babysitting

Ask any parent and they’ll tell you: Kids can put a dent in your social life. The screaming, the crying, the pooping — you usually try to keep that all contained at home. But smart businesses are thinking about ways to help parents out. The Theater Bellevue in Amsterdam, for example, lets parents book a babysitter at the same time they book show tickets. In just a few clicks, parents get both a night out and connected to a reliable sitter.

The lesson: Explore the common challenges that prevent customers from visiting your business and see what you can do to help.

Learn more: Springwise

2. With reselling

People are more likely to buy your stuff if they know there’s a good chance they can resell it later. This concept, along with a devotion to long-term sustainability, is behind Patagonia’s partnership with eBay to sell used gear through their website. This means a customer has the option to buy a used jacket instead of that new one — and he or she can also sell it when it’s time to upgrade. It all adds up to more shopping and selling options for customers, more web traffic for Patagonia, and another way to reduce the waste associated with buying new stuff.

The lesson: Look for behaviors your customers already do — things like selling used stuff, price shopping, or checking reviews — and help them do it.

Learn more: Patagonia

3. With their relationships

Shopping can be a real test for any relationship. But an IKEA in Sydney is trying to avoid being a battleground with their “Manland.” It’s a special area of the store they’ve filled with flat screens, Xbox systems, and foosball tables to keep guys busy while their ladies shop. So now you can drop your kids off at IKEA’s daycare and then leave your guys at Manland. The guys get to relax and enjoy the game on TV and the ladies get plenty of uninterrupted shopping time — which of course is a big win for IKEA.

The lesson: If a lot of shoppers visit you in pairs or groups, how can you make sure everyone is happy?

Learn more: Brain Sugar

4. Check it out: Where Was It Filmed?

This website is pretty new — but it’s already got a great and growing database of the locations where scenes from classic movies were filmed.

Check it out: WWIFDb

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