Thursday, May 13, 2010

Tough Life, but someone has to live it

It's been quite manic the past few months. I envy and applaud those full time bloggers who make it a habit to share their thoughts and communicate on daily basis. When I decided to setup my blog, I was under the impression that time is no issue - "I will make time," I assured myself. Then the buzz of owning something new faded away following few posts on my blog. Before I knew it, I was pleading the supernatural powers for more time in the day to finish the tasks I intentionally piled on my plate. Few months following my last post, I realized that my last posting was in October of last year and so many things that I piled on my small plate needed to be communicated, since life is too short, as I always like to remind myself when I have a minute to take a deep breath from all the life's struggles that I seem to face on daily basis.
So what's been keeping me awake at night and pushing me to lose the pleasures of life? Well, it's a new project that I so passionately placed so adequately on my infamous "plate" - launching a monthly business magazine. It's what I like to describe as my own experiment with pregnancy in most of its stages and trimesters - of course I don't mean to mock the pains and pleasures that mothers go through when pregnant with real babies but metaphorically, at least for me, it resembles that!
Alam Alryada (عالم الريادة) magazine was an idea and with time it grew in my being and developed and after a couple of months of hard labor, it is close to realization. It's my new baby that brought me back to the field of journalism, after more than a decade of forced exile - not in the political sense of course!! After all those years I forgot how pleasurable the pain of writing is...how every brain cell in your head screams out words and letters begging to make sense to the reader.
I am glad I took on this challenge, even though my stress level has skyrocketed in recent months - yes for those who know me I am more stressed....but enjoying every minute of it. Talking about stress, my lovely wife and I were watching a movie the other night and one of the actors said a remarkable sentence, which I would like to plagiarize and use as my motto for years to come. He said: "Stress is the fertilizer of creativity". How true in my case.
Back to my new project, I think I had enough fertilizers to make sure the zero issue looks amazingly enjoyable to read.
Will keep you posted on my delivery date!!

Is Customer Retention a Necessity or a Luxury?

Renno Communications Group taps into Customer Retention Program

As part of its continuous efforts to raise the bar of the communications industry and introduce innovative solutions across the region, Renno Communications Group (Renno CG), a communications consulting agency in the Middle East, announced today the launch of its Customer Retention Program (CRP).

Commenting on the launch of CRP, Samer M. Renno, Chief Executive Officer, Renno Communications Group, said:

'Providing an optimal customer experience is not a luxury but a necessity. The current global financial downturn has uncovered significant flaws among the major sectors, from hospitality to retail and banking, when it comes to customer service, as many companies have become more focused on gaining new customers and neglected the retention of their existing ones.'


Renno added, 'Recent studies of customer experiences indicate that 43% of all customers who defect do so because of service issues, while three quarters of these defectors cite employee attitude as their core frustration. Most serious aspect of these studies showed that 83% of those who have a negative service experience tell at least one other person. With so much riding on employee-to-customer interactions, companies must find new ways to ensure that employees strive to over-serve customers at every opportunity.'


According to Renno, to retain a customer there needs to be proper understanding of how they are being served. 'Our 'Undercover Shopping Program' offers clients the benefit of measuring the abilities of their staff and quality of the customer service they are providing. This provides the clients with the information to analyze the gap in their sales force's performance in order to enable them to make the necessary changes required for the benefit of their customers.'

Renno CG has over the past decade since its inception worked relentlessly to provide its clients with cutting edge communications solutions that are based on 360 degrees (Full Circle) tactics, which are designed to strengthen not only brand positioning but also ensure that the client's image is protected against any internal or external factors.

Renno CG's Customer Retention Program has been implemented in all the Agency's network offices and has already received a positive response from its clients throughout all sectors in the region.