Smile

There is nothing better than seeing your child smile for the first time. A genuine smile from someone can feel as refreshing as a sunrise or like waking up on Christmas morning to presents under the tree. It’s a shot of dopamine straight to the heart. Justin Bieber squeaked about it, Nat King Cole suggested it and Barry Manilow can’t do it without you.

According to Bright Spring Health Services, smiling can improve your health and even help you live longer. Smiling can help improve your mood, lower blood pressure, strengthen your immune system, relieve stress, enhance relationships and even ease pain.

Smiling is contagious. By smiling you are influencing how other people perceive you. Studies have shown that when you smile, you appear more attractive and confident to other people because the physical act of smiling affects the part of the brain that regulates your emotions. In customer service, smiling is the most powerful tool to use when wanting to establish trust and care at the first contact point without saying a word.

So how do we do that, with a mask on? The struggle is real. For many service providers working in public, customer facing roles - it certainly is a challenge to convey friendly, genuine and caring emotions while wearing a mask. Aside from the obvious muffled dialogue that sputters out, the mask hinders much of our ability to physically express these emotions, (for now) but it doesn’t have to - not entirely. 

It’s called a “smize.” Smiling with your eyes. The face we present to the world is constantly changing as different combinations of its 42 muscles contract and contort it. Humans can produce thousands of distinct facial expressions – including 19 different types of smile, according to research by the American psychologist Paul Ekman. However, only one of these is a “genuine,” smile. Enter in: the Duchenne smile.

Discovered by French anatomist Duchenne de Boulogne in 1862, the key difference between this “real” happy smile and a “fake” happy smile lies in the orbicularis oculi – muscles that wrap around the eyes. It occurs when the zygomaticus major muscle lifts the corners of your mouth at the same time the orbicularis oculi muscles lift your cheeks and crinkle your eyes at the corners. With a Duchenne smile, your cheeks will rise, and your eyes will have natural crinkles that will project a genuine smile.

Lightbulb Moment
This can be achieved behind a mask. Although the mask hides some of our expressions - the eyes say everything. Brief eye contact and a genuine, Duchenne smile (even underneath the mask) will support you in conveying to your customers that you value and appreciate them. What you see back from your customers will be an expression that signals to you, true enjoyment – even from behind a mask.

Luminary Learning Company helps teams enhance the quality of their customer service and experience by providing customized training & consulting that when put into action, ignites opportunities to increase revenue, inspire employee development and create extraordinary customer experiences.

 There is nothing better than seeing your child smile for the first time. A genuine smile from someone can feel as refreshing as a sunrise or like waking up on Christmas morning to presents under the tree. It’s a shot of dopamine straight to the heart. Justin Bieber squeaked about it, Nat King Cole suggested it and Barry Manilow can’t do it without you.

According to Bright Spring Health Services, smiling can improve your health and even help you live longer. Smiling can help improve your mood, lower blood pressure, strengthen your immune system, relieve stress, enhance relationships and even ease pain.

Smiling is contagious. By smiling you are influencing how other people perceive you. Studies have shown that when you smile, you appear more attractive and confident to other people because the physical act of smiling affects the part of the brain that regulates your emotions. In customer service, smiling is the most powerful tool to use when wanting to establish trust and care at the first contact point without saying a word.

So how do we do that, with a mask on? The struggle is real. For many service providers working in public, customer facing roles - it certainly is a challenge to convey friendly, genuine and caring emotions while wearing a mask. Aside from the obvious muffled dialogue that sputters out, the mask hinders much of our ability to physically express these emotions, (for now) but it doesn’t have to - not entirely. 

It’s called a “smize.” Smiling with your eyes. The face we present to the world is constantly changing as different combinations of its 42 muscles contract and contort it. Humans can produce thousands of distinct facial expressions – including 19 different types of smile, according to research by the American psychologist Paul Ekman. However, only one of these is a “genuine,” smile. Enter in: the Duchenne smile.

Discovered by French anatomist Duchenne de Boulogne in 1862, the key difference between this “real” happy smile and a “fake” happy smile lies in the orbicularis oculi – muscles that wrap around the eyes. It occurs when the zygomaticus major muscle lifts the corners of your mouth at the same time the orbicularis oculi muscles lift your cheeks and crinkle your eyes at the corners. With a Duchenne smile, your cheeks will rise, and your eyes will have natural crinkles that will project a genuine smile.

⁠Lightbulb Moment
This can be achieved behind a mask. Although the mask hides some of our expressions - the eyes say everything. Brief eye contact and a genuine, Duchenne smile (even underneath the mask) will support you in conveying to your customers that you value and appreciate them. What you see back will be an expression that signals to you, true enjoyment – even from behind a mask.

Luminary Learning Company helps teams enhance the quality of their customer service and experience by providing customized training & consulting that when put into action, ignites opportunities to increase revenue, inspire employee development and create extraordinary customer experiences. Connect with me today and we will practice smizing together.