Good-enough customer service just isn't good enough. If you aren't delivering excellent customer service, your customers will go elsewhere. The Customer Experience Impact Report by Harris Interactive shows 86 percent of consumers quit doing business with a company because of a bad customer experience. That's up from 59 percent just four years ago and clearly indicates customers have higher expectations.
Businesses can get customers to walk in the door, but they can just as easily send them right back out to their competitor. While businesses invest heavily in branding and advertising, they often neglect to integrate a real service-centric culture as part of that brand, creating a bigger gap between what they promise and what they can deliver.
As consumers, we all know what it's like to choose to do business with a company and then have an experience that grossly falls short of our expectations. If enough customers lured by compelling marketing walk away disappointed, it can have a devastating effect on business. According to the White House Office of Consumer Affairs, a dissatisfied consumer will tell between nine and 15 people about their experience. About 13 percent of dissatisfied customers tell more than 20 people.
Quite simply, the number of unacceptable moments results in customer attrition and poor sales. Customers have a choice. In this economy, it's time to get back to Customer Service 101 to proactively attract and retain customers.
Businesses need to ask some important questions: Do we have a service culture with clearly defined and adhered-to values? Are we attracting the customers we want? Do we have the right people interfacing with our customers to deliver our service values? How well are we managing our customers' expectations and experience? How do we know?
Strategic Leadership
Consider how Southwest Airlines continues to keep their minds wrapped around experience. They have a strategy that keeps their planes in the air more than on the ground. They don't charge for checking two bags. They stay true to their workforce in the face of diversity and their brand permeates through their operation, right to the front line. They have more "Yes" messages and stay away from conveying "No" or "We can't."
As a leader, there are strategic steps that need to be taken in an organization to ensure it can deliver excellent customer service:
Know who you are and what your capabilities are.
Address branding and marketing systematically.
Research and survey employees and customers. Be brave, listen and respond.
Seek congruence between what you promise and what you deliver.
Dare to test all facets of your operation that affect both employee and customer experiences.
Model the way. People are watching you and will follow suit.
Engage employees and customers in conversation; know who they are. Involve customers in improving your performance. Reward customers with what they value.
Define standards of service excellence. Refer to them when hiring, coaching, training, promoting, or reviewing performance, and share them with customers. This will help achieve positively framed accountability.
Since customers and circumstances are not all the same, it is vital to consult with each customer to determine the best way to proceed with helping them. This ensures the experience is well managed, congruent with expectations, and successful for all involved.
Here are some examples of what a customer may value and need that can be discovered through the consultative approach to service:
Attitudes-Manage the customer's state of mind. You can make their day.
Accuracy-Precision, safety, security, information clarity, error prevention.
Fast-To what degree is time critical?
Cooperation-Make sure people are helpful.
Budget-Understand to what degree costs must be contained.
Action on the Frontline
Giving your frontline employees-the ones who interact directly with your customers-the right tools and training is essential. You need to commit to standards of service excellence. This is your playbook:
Ask customers "How are we doing?" Use comment cards, provide online survey links with purchase receipts, make follow-up phone calls, and/or hire a third-party survey service. According to Lee Resource Inc., for every customer complaint, there are 26 other customers who remain silent. Commit to conversation. No news is not good news.
Define measurements of good service. Employees can drive these, such as tips earned, number and frequency of visits, or number of referrals.
Convey positively framed, action-oriented messages rather than the things you can't do.
Say "Welcome," "Thank you, " "Look forward to seeing you next time," and "Have a great day."
It's time to reignite the customer's expectations. Define what outstanding customer service is and leave good-enough service behind. Go beyond delivering the basic and expected experience. Create a favorably unanticipated experience that says you delivered not only what your marketing said you would, but more.
Deb Titus is president of Human Capital Solutions, LLC, a firm that assists businesses in achieving growth goals through building a more competent and engaged workforce in leadership, sales, service, communication and process improvement. For more information, visit www.humancapitalsolutions-us.com or contact Titus at 603-434-4042 or dtitus at humancapitalsolutions-us.com.