Setbacks and Customer Loyalty

They say it can take a setback in your business to know where true loyalty lies with your customers. This past week I was able to witness the truth in that statement. I had to take a week off due to a personal issue and found myself almost helpless in my mindset about not being able to devote even a small bit of time to my business, especially the creative aspects of it. The few orders that I did receive, I was able to pull together and deliver locally. It was those few customers, those few conversations, those few orders that gave me a renewed sense of hope and encouragement. The reason I think it did, was, as a small business owner you do feel like your never doing enough on many fronts. As those few kindly customers pointed out, you have done more than you think merely by the kind of customer service you have shown us. Is this not the most important aspect of running a business? Whether you have thousands of followers or just a few, a brilliant web site or a simple one your still learning on how to improve, building customer care and loyalty can get you through even the most difficult setbacks.