Snow! Christmas lights! Decorations! Father Christmas! Mulled wine! Children laughng! That time of year is here again: equal amounts of joy and stress! And 53% of your customers want to spend more with you - but only if the servioce they receive is excellent. However, considering that 91% of them said in a recent survey conducted by YouGov that they would not visit you again if you messed up the first encounter, it's a tight line to walk. Or is it?

This Christmas, make it as easy as possible for your customers to spend money with you and you'll benefit from repeat custom, great word of mouth advertising and higher average spends, too. Here are a few really simple ideas:

- Offer mulled wine in your store

- Pay for their parking if they spend over a certain amount

- Offer a priority despatch service for peace of mind

- Suggest the most popular things that others have bought

- Run some seasonal special offers

- Extend your opening times

- Consider improving the layout of your premises (online or otherwise), to make it easier for customers to navigate when you're busy, when they're busy and when stresses are running high

- Offer a carry to car service, free gift wrapping or suggested complimenting items

Why am I telling you this half way through December? Because most retailers do something a little bit different during Christmas: we all get swept up with the special moment and decorations and Christmas retail rush - hopefully! But come January everything goes back to normal. Use this festive period to freshen up your cvustomer service offering, while you're in the mood to think about all the ways you can make your customers' experience with you more enjoyable, more interesting and with many more memorable moments that impress them.

Remember that you don't necessarly need to give things away for free: you can add more value to what you currently offer; enhance your services or simply maintain that fun, unique atmosphere to make customers' time with you stand out. If you do something to stand out and help your customers, you'll stand out from all your competitors straight away because you can be bothered. It's the tiny little things that count.

Wishing you all a very Happy Christmas. Jez

PS - if you're stuck for a business gift idea, take a look at my book, Have A Crap Day available from Amazon and www.haveacrapday.com, where you can enter promo code LAUNCHME and get free P&P!