Yesterday I said I wanted to build the “anti-merchant account company.”  Now it is time for me to define what I mean by that.  So I am going to start writing about a single value each day that I am building into the DNA of this company from the very beginning.

I am going to start with the most important value, which is love.  I know this sounds a little funny for a businesses first value to be love, but why not?  I was first introduced to this word being applied to business when I read Love is the Killer App several years ago.  In this book the author, Tim Sanders, the former Chief Solutions Officer at Yahoo!, expounds about actually focusing on loving you clients and co-workers.  Since I read his book, the idea of loving clients has been in the forefront of my mind, nonetheless I have both failed miserably and succeeded greatly at applying his message.

As a result of trying to live this out I have learned a few things that have shaped my defenition of this value.  Here is what I mean by love as a value for this company:

• Seeing clients as people not just profit centers.
• Asking, from the very start, “how may I serve you?” and then actually listening to their answer.
• Going out of our way to create extra value for each client, no matter how large or small they are.
• Creating ways to share knowledge that will help our clients grow and prosper.
• Taking full responsibility when the sh** hits the fan; even when we did not cause the problem.
• Telling the truth, even when it hurts, even though we may lose a client.

Doesn’t this all seem like basic stuff?  This is just “golden rule” behavior and yet, surprisingly, I believe these types of actions make us stand out now and always will.  If we were to just focus on this value I think we would succeed at building the “anti-merchant account company.”  However, this is just the first value I am ging to write about as we set out to build one kick butt company.