The box arrived via courier from Cape Town in under a week. The expression on our faces said it all. With the current load shedding issues in South Africa, we decided to dust off the generator and crank it up. From wear and tear, it required about a meter of piping to replace a worn out part. Searching the web, we came across a boating company in Cape Town and phoned them. They gladly said they would assist and send us an offcut of the pipe we were looking for. No problem.

The pipe was couriered up to Johannesburg for free. It was just over 2 meters long and perfect for what we needed it for. But inside the box, was a boat part catalogue which has held our attention for hours since then. Clever move. We don’t have a boat. We’re not thinking of buying a boat either (although if you ask my husband, I suspect he would answer differently). 

But the episode was a perfect example of delighting a customer!

To highlight some key lessons:

• We stumbled across this boat company via a Google search for an item related to generators – BE FOUND
• The company supplied more than what we required – ADD VALUE
• They covered the cost of sending the part to us – ADD EVEN MORE VALUE
• We were thrilled and amazed that they would go out of their way to help us, without expecting anything in return – DELIGHT
• Adding in a product catalogue was a genius move – AWARENESS & SURPRISE
• My husband is a mechanical engineer so the product catalogue of boat parts is right up his alley – KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE
• You bet that we will tell everyone we know about this experience going forward – BUILD BRAND AMBASSADORS & WORD OF MOUTH

When last did your business delight a customer?

** Unsponsored blog post. This is a true story.