Claddagh: How Local Businesses Inspire Love, Loyalty, and Friendship

I’m marking St. Patrick’s Day with a good news story I hope you’ll share with your local SEO colleagues and clients for a little lift today.

I’ve got an old local business tale in a video short for you, more than a dozen inspiring examples of love, loyalty, and friendship between local businesses and their customers, and tips for removing barriers to forming lasting business relationships.

May today’s column spark your creativity for more meaningful community engagement so that your local brand can truly thrive!

In the Claddagh symbol, the heart is love, the crown is loyalty, and the clasped hands are the hands of friendship. I’d like to share seven incidents with you now that won these sentiments from real-world customers.

“David Mihm and I were driving from SMX in San Jose, and my car got a flat in front of an auto repair shop. We started fixing our flat when the manager of the shop came out and told us we couldn’t do that in his driveway. I drove the car on the wheel rim a few doors down to Dynamic Audio, where not only did they say it would be ok to change my tire in their driveway, they put the car up on a hydraulic lift and did it for free.”
— Andrew Shotland

“I cracked my tooth the day before Thanksgiving. Most pain I’ve ever experienced. Called my dentist emergency line at Gentle Touch Dentist in Everett, Washington, and he had me come in on Thanksgiving day to take care of my tooth.”
— Shawn Huber

“I've had COVID a number of times, and each time, my immunologist from Allergy Tampa called me every day from his personal cell phone to check on me until I had recovered. They aren't a concierge office; he's just someone who obviously really cares for their patients beyond the office visits.”
— Mika Lepisto

“The company that did our kitchen remodel took a piece of extra from our new center island countertop and made a custom cheeseboard for us as a gift. Super nice touch. Used it tonight.”
— Aaron Weiche

“I always love when businesses in my neighborhood are nice and welcoming of my dog! There's especially one place in our neighborhood, Maker House, who are always absolutely pumped when we come in with our dog, give her treats, and know her by name.”
— Hannah Waye

“My local health food store, Blasta, always go above and beyond. If you go in looking for something that they don't currently stock, they'll source it and order it in for you. I remember a few years back, I was looking for kala namak (black salt), and they sourced some and had it in that same week. I was actually in there yesterday asking about vegan sour cream, which they don't have, and it's not readily available, and they were happy to talk to me about alternatives such as vegan creme fraiche. It's just always such a pleasant experience in there!”
— Emilie Martin

“I used to go to this restaurant years ago near my old office called Ominvore quite regularly. When I was pregnant, the owner told me to call him once my baby was born, as he wanted to send us some food. We called him from the hospital, and they sent us a big spread. It was so thoughtful, and I'll never forget it!”
— Joelle Irvine

Studying these, we see a pattern emerge of customers praising businesses that:

• Help them in a crisis

• Go the extra mile to provide care and services

• Do something magnificent and unexpected

And it turns out, this kindness can be reciprocated when local business owners need it most!

Even the most successful business can suddenly fall on hard times or need support. These stories of customers showing up when things got tough are really inspiring:

• There’s the neighborhood that formed a human conveyor belt to help shift a hardware store’s inventory from its old location to its new one. It made major news in the UK.

• When a fire on Christmas Day damaged a martial arts studio in California, its loyal community set up a GoFundMe page.

• GoFundMe was also the response of a community in Ireland when a cherished local cafe had its equipment stolen in a robbery.

• And a customer got millions of TikTok views and created a fundraiser for an Oklahoma restaurant owner who had to close his business to take care of his little son, who had suddenly fallen ill.

• In thanks for all the community service a cafe owner had done, her customers showed up to help set up her business in a new location when she was forced to vacate the old one.

• And this community rallied around a respected local ice cream shop owner when he received hate messages.

The physical, financial, and psychological support customers can offer when they care about a local institution can be of immeasurable value in difficult times. This is the kind of reciprocity that makes a town or city into a real community.

These three common scenarios can stand in the way of earning the love, loyalty, and friendship of your customers. Fortunately, each of them has a solution you can implement to re-open clear pathways to forming genuine relationships:

1. Lack of employee training in company culture and standards damaging customer experience

65% of respondents to Moz’s large survey on the habits of review writers state that poor or rude customer service caused them to write negative reviews.

Some problems of this kind stem directly from the business owner, but very often, staff simply haven’t been given the training they need to represent the brand well. The more training you give your employees in how your business treats customers and how to manage and escalate complaint resolution on the job, the more you are doing to protect your patrons and the good name of your brand.

2. Inaccurate online information about your business misdirecting and inconveniencing customers

Unmanaged local business listings can accrue inaccuracies over time, leading to customers encountering wrong addresses, phone numbers, and hours of operation. Unfortunately, 52% of Moz’s survey respondents cite this scenario as a cause of their negative reviews.

Active management of your listings, whether manually or via a convenient solution like Moz Local, will significantly reduce the risk of customers developing a negative impression of your brand because they’ve arrived at your location after hours or are getting a “no longer in service” message on an old phone number.

3. Lack of response to calls for help

Sadly, the review databases of major online players like Google, Yelp, and Tripadvisor are awash with unheard complaints that never receive a response from the business owner. It’s an essential adjustment to realize that ignoring negative online reviews is analogous to having a customer approach you in your store to ask for help with something that’s gone wrong and then walking away from them.

Every review merits a response, and negative reviews should be your top priority. The good news is if your response effectively resolves a complaint, it will improve 67% of customers’ opinions of your brand, and 62% will give your business a second chance.

It’s really good to know that you are not powerless to remove some of these major blockers! And, in some cases, the goodwill you earn could have vital consequences for you and your business, as we’ll see next.

It’s been 300 years since the time of Richard Joyce, but here I am wearing his Claddagh design in honor of St. Patrick’s Day because it symbolizes human characteristics that stand for the best in us and also stand the test of time. I know we are surrounded by news these days about how robots, AI, and automation will replace all of us… but I think not.

Because I remember the time I was at a farm stand during a storm when the power went out, and the owner couldn’t process credit cards or open her cash register. She gave me an IOU on paper for my big bag of produce rather than let me go home hungry. And, of course, I came back to pay her on my next visit, and I continued to patronize that establishment until the farmer retired.

There are awesome local business owners like you exemplifying this kind of friendship all around the world, and whose fine human nature will continue to win the love and loyalty of their customers for the next 300 years. Honor to you for all that you do!