4 SIMPLE WAYS TO SHOW YOUR CLIENT YOU CARE

In the security industry, there’s a lot we can’t control. Company ownership can’t do a lot to control the external circumstances that lead to incidents on site, and you can’t control how your officers respond in real time.

What you can control is the effort you put into each account ahead of time.

The bulk of that effort is preparation you do as an organization by hiring reliable officers, setting efficient routes, and giving your employees the tools they need to do the job. Another key portion of this is how much personal attention you put into each account.

Put in the right amount of attention and you can move the needle with your client. This can go a long way toward improving the likelihood of retaining their business in the long term. For at-risk clients, it can even save your contract.

Customize training to align with their goals

Put in the work to find out what’s actually important to the client, then ensure that your training aligns with those objectives.

Each property is unique and will come with different client expectations. Having a one-size-fits-all training plan for all properties means that officers must informally learn the nuances on their own, usually from supervisors or fellow officers. But high turnover is baked into the security industry. At any given time, you may not have officers who have spent more than a year on a property. Over time, passing important client information from person to person can result in a game of telephone, where the vital information gets distorted until it no longer reflects the original.

Rather than relying on your officers to transfer that knowledge on their own, formalize each client’s unique expectations as part of the training regimen for that property.

Make sure reports are actionable or useful

Reports are a valuable tool for communicating with your clients. However, they are only useful when your client has enough time to read them.

One way to show your client that you value communication is to tailor your reporting to their workflows. Get an understanding of how much time your point-of-contact has available to follow up on reports (even what time of the day they are most likely to be available). Change your reporting schedule to fit your client’s needs, rather than expecting your client to accommodate for your report.

And of course, make sure reports are actionable for each client based on their needs. Your client wants important data up front where they can see it. With up-to-date guard management software, security company leaders can do away with handwritten reports forever, and start putting together visually-appealing and information-rich custom reports that tell the full story. For quarterly and annual reports, you can make a big impact by arranging trends derived from collected data at the forefront of your proposal.