1. Break Down the Limits. (Bad Karaoke, Great Beer, Bill Murray, and Massages From a Nun.)

The St. Paul Pioneer Press said this about the St. Paul Saints experience: “It's like going to a ballgame but not being limited to going to a ballgame.” That's it. That's what I want for my business. I want to break down limits. But what did that mean for the St. Paul Saints?

So there's a baseball game going on, and the team is fun to watch. They're a good team, and the game is, of course, the core of what's being offered by the St. Paul Saints. Beyond the game, though, is this incredible experience that acts as a megamagnet for the legions of Saints fans. It is, as the newspaper said, not limited to a ballgame.

I encourage you to check out the website saintsbaseball.com to get at least a taste of what the experience is all about. From my perspective as a customer, here are just a few of the things that caught my attention at the season-opening game and made me think about the experience that I create for my own customers:

• a brand spanking new, knock-your-socks-off, state-of-the-art stadium;
• the incredible food and craft beer choices from the friendliest, most customer-focused vendors that you can imagine;
• haircuts available from “Mr. B”;
• Sister Rosalind Gefre, the nun who wanders the stands offering shoulder massages;
• the Bill Murray sightings (he attends the games when he can and has been known to act as a ticket-taker for the fans as they enter the ballpark);
• the PA announcers who are as funny as any comedy team anywhere;
• the pig—this year it's Pablo Pigasso—who delivers the game baseballs to the umpires before the start of the game;
• and my favorite, the Bad Karaoke singing between innings from “A Real Japanese Guy” (the night I was there he led the stadium in singing “Feels Like The First Time” by Foreigner). He was off-key and truly a pretty bad singer and more fun than you can imagine.

So what does any of this have to do with your business or mine? Simply this: Do you want your customers to love doing business with you? Of course you do. So do I. The customers of the St. Paul Saints love them. They love them because they get much more than you'd ever expect from a baseball game. The normal limits and expectations have been exceeded.

Do your clients or customers get much more than anyone would ever expect from a business like yours?

I want to have my own version of the Bad Karaoke guy in the sense that I want to offer something beyond my core product that my customers will love, remember, and want more of. I want to be on my customers' “favorites” lists. And most of all, I want my customers to talk about me and create a positive word-of-mouth buzz like the Saints' customers create about them.

2. Hire Great People and Get Out of Their Way

At the game, I got to spend some time with Mike Veeck. I asked him about what made this whole magnificent organization work. He talked about the people in the organization and what they try to accomplish for the fans. He summed it up with, “Hire great people and get out of their way.”

If I had gotten nothing else from Mike, that simple idea was enough to justify the trip. Of course it's basic, but like most basic, great ideas, few people have the wisdom to follow it. Mike understands that if you lay the foundation of a great culture, built on the right values, then you can turn it over to the people in the organization and they'll do the right things.

In my ballpark conversation with Mike, he gave all the credit for the success of the Saints to his employees. I recommend that you read Mike's book Fun Is Good, in which he makes it clear that it's all about the players on the team. Not just the players on the baseball team, but the players throughout the organization who organize, manage, maintain, and most important, entertain for the benefit of their customers.

As I talked with Mike, his co-owner Bill Murray sat a few seats away obviously enjoying the game and everything around him. Murray takes great delight and pride in the St. Paul Saints, and his appreciation for their employees is obvious. In his interview with Minnesota Business Magazine, Murray gave an example of how the employees make the Saints the success that they are. “There's one person who works for us, Annie Huidekoper, and she's the most passionate, enthusiastic person we have,” Murray said. “She's committed to the fans' experience and that legitimizes the whole enterprise.”

3. Fun is Good

“Fun is good.” This is the philosophy of the St. Paul Saints, and it's what drives just about everything that Mike Veeck does in his business and his life. In his book Fun Is Good Mike wrote about that philosophy:

You don't have to own a baseball team to benefit from Fun Is Good. In fact, anyone who gauges the business success of our baseball teams by our promotions is missing the point. After all, everyone in minor league baseball relies on cheap theatrics because we have no big-name ballplayers to promote.

What makes us successful—and what I would argue makes any company successful—is not necessarily a superior product. (Heck, we have an inherently inferior product: minor league and independent league baseball.) But we succeed on a level where our bigger, well-heeled brethren in the major leagues do not. We do so by providing superior customer service and creating fun in the workplace.

It's a simple formula, but one applied not nearly enough in American business.

The “fun is good” formula is indeed one that can be applied to any business. Mike and his team are taking it to businesses of all kinds through their “Fun Is Good” presentations and workshop sessions. The idea is that “When Fun Is Good, Performance Gets Better! A Different Way To Bring Fun, Employee Engagement and Profitability Into The Workplace.” Check it out at funisgoodteam.com.

4. It's All Word of Mouth

The final wrap-up idea that Mike Veeck had for me about the key to success was this: “It's all word of mouth.”

The St. Paul Saints are one of those businesses that have figured it out. If the work you do is good enough, the work itself becomes your marketing. Your customers' satisfaction becomes the fuel that drives the most powerful business marketing power ever known: word of mouth.

Here's your challenge and opportunity—to follow the example of Mike Veeck and the St. Paul Saints in finding your version of going beyond the traditional expectations of people or businesses who do what you do. Redefine it. Expand the idea of what you can be and mean to your customers.

Creating, as Bill Murray said, a “most spectacular experience” for your customers doesn't mean you have to be loud or showy about it. It's not about hyperbole. Quite the opposite. Your version of the St. Paul Saints kind of magnetism may be quiet and calm, and just as effective at creating something spectacular for your customers.