When it comes to customer advocacy, customer service training is a must. Many retail businesses including restaurants and hotels make huge mistakes of not investing in the proper development of their employees, thinking it will be an easy way to save money and time. In reality, this misconception leads to significantly higher costs in lost revenue due to lost customers, not to mention employee turnover. Think of the expense of customer acquisition or the cost of employee replacement. The estimated cost of recovery of "lost souls" (customers) is $750. The average cost of employee hiring and training of a line-level employee is $2,000. The sad thing is that both the customers and the employees were the businesses, to begin with, and the proper training, particularly exceptional customer service training were not in place. Therefore, the culture of providing customers an outstanding experience never really existed. If you invested in developing any of your departments in your operation to its full potential, it would produce huge returns to your bottom line. Contact Mark Beaton and Associates for ideas of how to turn around your business so customers want to do business with you time and time again.