I was relaxing on a flight last month in my usual window seat, happily reading a book with the soft, natural sunlight beaming through the window. A member of the cabin crew passed by and, seeing me reading, stretched out her hand and switched on the light above me. She smile, and then she walked away.

I was distracted from my reading, and a little puzzled. The extra lighting from above was too bright for my comfort. I like soft, even dim lighting when I read, but friendly cabin crew did not know that. She thought she was serving me well. After she left, I reached up and turned off that the light.

When you give a great service, customers appreciate you more. When you give bad service, customers can be a pain in the neck. The other view is also true. When you are an appreciative and considerate customer, service providers will often serve you better. If you rant and pound the table, people will serve you grudgingly if at all.

Here are the tips I use to be a better customer and enjoy receiving better service:

Many of us enjoy doing business with people from countries, ethnicities, and backgrounds that are different from our own. This brings into our lives, and the lives of those we serve, a wonderful sense of the colorful, cultural, and amazing world in which we live and work.

This colorful combination is also loaded with opportunities to accidentally misstep or inadvertently create negative impressions. Since our definition of service is “to create value for someone else”, then service can enhanced when we are conscious of others’ backgrounds and their cultures, and the manner in which they prefer to be served.

Let me tell you a story from my own background, and how I accidentally offended the host from one of my most influential clients (this was before my time with UP! Your Service).

In the world of uplifting service culture, we put the needs of our customers as our highest priority. Entire systems and ways of interacting, are based upon “the care and feeding” of our most valuable resource…the customers and colleagues we serve.

So what should you do when a customer surfaces who is mean-spirited, abusive, or accusatory? What happens when you clearly know that a customer is not being honest?

Many organizations are eager to learn and implement best practices. However, simply trying to replicate what works in another organization is bad practice. Wal-Mart’s much-publicized $1.85 billon mistake is a timely reminder.

So, what went wrong?

“See the world from your customers’ point of view” is a catchy and familiar phrase, but not always easy to accomplish. The world view of any other person is influenced by his or her past experiences, current concerns, future hopes and fears – not yours.

It may not be easy, but understanding what someone else perceives is essential to improving the service you provide. How else can you know what to do, change or do better if you can’t get an accurate view of how you are performing in your customer’s eyes right now? This means shifting your attention from what you are doing to caring about what someone else is experiencing.

American Express Global Customer Service Barometer says that 92% of people are most influenced by a company’s reputation or brand, and 88% say that they are most influenced by the recommendations of family and friends.

So, the question begs asking… how can “word of mouth” be motivated, encouraged or leveraged? How can you create “buzz” even if you are a single employee, or manager of a business? Does it take a huge budget? An ad agency? Nope. Sit down, we are going to offer you some staggering statistics.

What are the seven characteristics of one-to-one service that matches every customer value dimension? Learn how to give each customer what they want, exactly when and how they want it.

Your service vision should be unique and powerful. Customers should hear it and say, “Yes! This is who you are.” Employees should read it and say, “Yes! This is who we want to be.”

Organizations often have written statements declaring their commitment to superior service. While the intentions are good, many of these statements are not distinctive, motivating or clear.

Here are 3 guidelines you should consider when crafting your service vision:

Service education leads to creative thinking and practical action. This action produces new and greater service value. What happens in effective service education?

1. A new understanding of service value
2. Colleagues learn and apply a common service language
3. Personal behavior models beliefs
4. Taking new and valuable actions