By Julian Rowlandson, sales director, Expand International (GB)
The advent of social networking has brought another major reason, both positive and negative. For example, HSBC found out the hard way when they decided to charge students for over drafting their account. Within a matter of a day the Facebook page created challenging the decision, had thousands of very vocal members. Very quickly HSBC was forced to reverse their decision. The world of the tweeting, blogging and status update has brought customer power back into focus.
What are the benefits of good customer service? Clearly there is a financial one, stress levels tend to be lower, staff retention tends to be higher and working with customers can be a lot of fun.
Jan Carlzon learned the lessons of customer service and satisfaction as CEO of SAS airlines. When he joined the company in 1981 it was losing $17 million a year and was bottom of the league tables for customer service and punctuality. Within a year he had turned the company around, it was heading the league tables and had made a $54 million profit. He did it by focusing on the customer. Well known for developing the thinking known as “moments of truth”, Carlzon saw this every time an employee of the company came into contact with a customer. He estimated that within his organization there were 50,000 "moments of truth" each day, opportunities to shine or stumble. He also saw the importance of giving staff the authority to act to resolve difficulties. He said “Problems are solved on the spot, as soon as they arise. No front-line employee has to wait for a supervisor's permission”. Research shows how right he was in that 95% of people who complain will do business with you again if you are able to solve their issue on the spot and on average they will tell 5 other people about how well your organization handled the problem.
It is not just about how you manage problems, it is about how you cater to your customer that contributes to the total perception of your organization. At Expand we work very hard to try and deliver the very best customer service in our industry. We try hard to understand the needs of the customer, and often more importantly, the needs of their customer. We have been known to put people on trains to make sure that goods get where they need to be when they need to be there. In six years I can only think of three occasions when we failed to meet the needs of our customers. We do not have problems we have challenges, we look for solutions not barriers and remarkably we normally find them.
My favorite story relates to a client who called us up one morning at 9.30 am asking if we could help supply some of our 3 meter (10 foot) high Expand MediaScreen XL stands. Their courier company had lost their existing units and they had an event that night. I reassured her that we had the units in stock and as long as I could find a printer to turn the graphics around in time it would be fine. I made a few calls, found a printer to do the graphics and called the customer back. It was about this time that things took on a more challenging aspect. “Where do we need to deliver the stands to”, I asked. “5th Avenue New York. The event starts at 7.30” was her reply. I took a deep breath and said I would call her back. Time differences worked in our favor and a couple of phone calls later I was able to confirm that we could deliver. The stands got to the venue at 6.50pm that evening. We never know what can be done until we try. Winston Churchill said: “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”
So what does all this mean for our businesses? Clearly we must focus on our customers. Here are some of my thoughts of simple things we can all do.
1. We need to give our customers personalized attention. We all like to be treated as individuals. A simple customer relationship management program can help hugely in this area. Talk to our customers find out what is important to them. What frustrates them? What could we do differently to make the relationship with us easier? Don’t forget, it is not always about price. If customers see that the way you deal with them saves them time, effort and stress that can be as good as a discount.
2. We need to make sure that our teams display positive behavior towards all our customers. We need to show them respect, consideration and appreciation. At the end of the day, it is our customers that are paying our salaries and generating our profits.
3. We need to make sure that we understand them, how they feel, the facts of the situation and what is going to provide them with the best solution.
4. We need to be as helpful to them as we can. If we need to give them bad news, let’s already have thought through possible implications and solutions. I was with a customer yesterday who was telling me of a telephone conversation he had just had. He had been called to say that an email he wanted had been sent. The caller went on to say that while he had sent it, he thought it was wrong. Of course this was not very helpful to my customer. Why did he not make sure it was right before he sent it?
So two key strategies that we can use; We can manage the relationship and we can manage the transaction.
In order to manage the relationship the first thing we need to do is take the initiative. We need to be proactive not reactive.
- At Expand one of the first questions we ask is “What are you trying to achieve?” If we are able to understand what our customer wants to do, we are in a far better place to deliver a solution. We have been able to provide some stunning solutions which are very different to the customer's initial “What I want is...”
- Secondly, we need to be positive. Once you have taken the initiative and have taken the decision to act positively, then you put the psychological pressure on your customer to react in a positive fashion. Remember when customers are being difficult, the odds are, you’re not the target you just happen to be in range.
- Finally, we can make the customer feel special and make them feel important.
Managing the transaction involves listening and understanding. We need to focus on the customer, we need to think like a customer and understand their need. Good questioning skills are essential here.
We need to be helpful. We have all experienced the situation where, as a customer, every barrier appears to be thrown in our way to doing business. As Carlzon found, there is no better way to exceed customer expectations than to give staff the authority and responsibility to solve problems immediately without needing to refer to a higher authority.
Finally we need to recognize the uniqueness of each situation. Every customer interaction has the potential to be unique and give us the opportunity to provide a service that the customer will value and not forget.
The Jewish Philosopher Hillel the Elder said, “If not you then who? If not now then when?” To me this sums up a lot of my attitude towards customer service and satisfaction. When the financial arguments are clear, we end up earning more. When the personnel implications are clear, we retain our staff longer and they have a more enjoyable experience in their roles. Can we really afford not to give this aspect of our business the priority it deserves?
