Meet Margie Sneideman from Becker’s Diamonds and Fine Jewelry! She has worked for Becker’s for 30 years.
Margie was kind enough to catch up with us to talk about Clientbook! Here’s what she had to say.
Tell us about yourself and your role.
I’m Margie Sneideman and I’ve worked for Becker’s for 30 years. Becker’s is a 42-year-old family-owned and operated company. I started in customer service then became a sales floor consultant, and then rose up to a diamond salesperson (which is my current position).
I’m also one of our two main buyers and I do all of our television and radio ads. I’ve had lots and lots of training over the years as Mr. Becker (the owner) strongly believes in constant education (and he puts his money behind it).
Tell us about your business.
Paul and Risa Becker opened Becker’s Diamonds and Fine Jewelry in 1978 with a mission to make customers happy and to give the Make It Perfect or “Wow” experience.
It is still a family-owned and operated company that focuses on deep relationships that are customer-focused.
We are happy to say that we have lifelong customers. Our customers are generations-strong. Children of customers become future customers.
We are based out of Connecticut and have two locations.
Why did you decide to give Clientbook a try?
We met Clientbook through our buying group. They had already vetted Clientbook and trusted them so we thought we would give them a try.
When we first tried out the product we were impressed by how innovative and easy it was to use. We also noticed it was different from anything else we had tried.
Brandon (Clientbook Founder and CEO) presented it very well. We hadn’t had any luck in the past so we were excited to give Clientbook a shot.
We needed something that appealed to:
- Part-timers
- People who aren’t computer savvy
- The all-hats employee(s)
- Service department
We found out very quickly that everyone benefited from it.
If I had to describe the Clientbook App in a few words I would say, “it’s stupid simple”. It helps you cut to the basic core of what you need to do and it helps you to get your hands on the information quickly.
What, if any, reasons were you skeptical to give Clientbook a try?
I’ve heard other products that claimed to help with clienteling and they all ended up being gimmicks. I was afraid Clientbook would be disappointing like other systems have been. But Clientbook ended up making sense and was easy to understand.
How quickly did you see an impact from the app?
We saw an immediate impact! We loaded our client base and we were off. Day 1, I quickly started adding personal information to my top 100 clients.
It was easy to start tagging and organizing. I never did that when I used pen and paper but having an easy system had me organizing 50 people in 15 minutes. I was able to start tagging people to inform them of future events. Having this system ignited a new way of brainstorming for us!
It was also fun seeing how I could turn a prospect into a human being just by adding a picture. I didn’t get that with a piece of paper.
I remember customers by their jewelry. I attach their stories to their jewelry so adding a picture to the notes makes it personal.
Being able to remember important things like spouses’ and kid’s names have always been important to me and this made it easier. It helps make it a visual and mental story for me.
Tell us about your experience with the app (the good, the better, and the hard stuff).
In the beginning, we struggled a little bit with sending out group messages about a particular sale we had. The mass texting took some adjusting trying to figure out the time of day to send as well as how to filter certain customers.
We got both positive and negative feedback from this experience and we learned very quickly how to refine around that moving forward.
We worked with Brandon on this issue and he was super responsive and helped us to move forward.
I also really love the fluidity between information-gathering and touching the client. As a salesperson, I get ideas that pop into my head all of the time. I can easily pick up my iPad and drop the notes into Clientbook.
Even on my day off, other salespeople can jump on and respond without having to search through my desk or run around looking for answers.
It fosters cooperation because of the ease of continuing conversation based on all the note-capabilities in Clientbook.
What advice would you give to another company on the fence about Clientbook?
Spend the money because you will quickly see it returned. It will be in the form of customer loyalty and respect. This tool allows you to keep up. That means immediate contact and immediate gratification.
It’s faster and better than email. When the customer needs you, they can get to you.
Anything else you would like to add?
Clientbook is versatile enough to be used in various ways. I prefer to use it on my iPad but our GM uses it on his phone almost exclusively.
Also, Brandon is an incredible teacher and trainer. He trains specifically to your industry and makes it very personal and easy to understand. He’s super responsive and he makes you feel like you are his only client.
Igniting the Fire with Clientbook
Margie’s feedback has shown us that Clientbook can bring back the personal side of clienteling. Helping to make a long-term relationship authentic and genuine.
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