Your Staff is Killing Your Business

Why your staffing needs to match your branding

Do your staff reflect the brand image that you are portraying in your marketing? The way your staff interacts with your customers is your branding, it needs to give the same feel that your facebook posts or radio ads give as well so you’re consistent all around. A big issue that clients I have worked with have had is they just hire the cheapest employees they can find, they hire high school students because they can pay them a student wage, or whoever else is willing to work for minimum wage. Then they get some miserable worker who doesn’t give a shit about the customers and is just there to get their paycheque. 

If you walked into an entertainment centre with your family looking to have a great time and the first thing you’re met with is some lethargic employee with an attitude that doesn’t give a shit about your experience, you’re already starting off on a bad foot right? You don’t want your customers to experience that, you’re not Karen’s Diner, it’s not fun and quirky, you’re just going to get upset customers and bad reviews.

Take value in your hiring process and find the people who actually care. I found in all my experience as an owner, hiring was the most important thing because I wanted to make sure that everyone who worked for me shared the same vision as me. We were there to make sure that people were having fun, feeling welcomed, and being part of our community. Now this leads to increased staff costs as well, but I was willing to pay a few dollars an hour more than my competitors because while hiring that would give me the best pick of the staff in my area. If someone was only making $17 at my competition, as loyal as they may be when I offer them $21 and benefits, you can bet they’re coming my way. 

But this cost was directly related to my branding, we were the top rated location based entertainment within 200km and majority of the reviews specifically named how amazing my staff were, in local community groups customers would post pictures and rave about how great their experience was, in parent groups if someone asked for reviews our customers would go in and rave about how great we are. That is worth an extra $4 an hour as far as I’m concerned because it directly related to the brand image that I was putting forward.

It may seem simple, but make sure your employees share your values, they need to be fully aware of the core values of your business and go into it every day. Take on those extra staff costs if it means that your employees will be happier and higher quality. Do the extra training, work with them on how to interact with customers, how to answer the phone, how to answer emails, and how to deal with conflict. Your business is only as strong as the weakest link, one shitty employee and you’ll be getting bad reviews left and right.

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