Holding Customer Service Training Programs for your staff is an excellent idea and the best way to reinforce the customer service mindset for your organization. But don’t lose sight of a crucial truth…… Establishing Superior Customer Service is a PROCESS, not an Event.

Customer service is the lifeblood of your business, no matter what product or service that you offer. Customer service situations need to be reviewed at every possible opportunity, preferably a staff or unit meeting. Focus on a few issues at each meeting.

When looking at situations that did not go smoothly, review them and look at other ways it could have been handled. Has the initial problem been resolved? Do you need to educate your customers regarding new procedures? How can this situation be prevented in the future?

Pay particular attention where things went well. What made it go so well? Was it the particular employee or customer? How specifically did they address the situation? Did they have a special technique to listen to the customer? Are there other areas that you can apply these same techniques to?

In both cases, learn from the situations and find ways to carry that learning over to other areas of your organization.Other articles you might like:

• Remember What You Control (And What You Don’t)
• Always close the loop
• Focus on what you control. Don’t worry about the rest.
• Better customer service means staying in the game
• Customer Service Toolkit Now Available

Somehow this message hasn’t sunk in because customers are having a harder time than ever getting service from the companies they do business with, regardless of how much they spend, how long they’ve been a customer or how profitable they are.  There is a fever pitch from customers using the power of the internet to make their pain known.  Websites such as www.ripoffreport.com, www.planetfeedback.com and www.gethuman.com give customers a place to gripe and navigate their way to companies who can serve them better.  And they are doing it actively, loudly and in great numbers. However, as internal leaders of each silo report and recommend customer actions separately, CEOs react to the random issues landing at their feet, rather than focusing on key issues eroding customer experiences, loyalty and customer profitability.

How to Inspire and Drive the Very Best Customer Experiences and Customer Service
10 Actions that Won’t Cost a Thing but Your Personal Passion

Inspired customer leadership in the very best companies on earth came from the heart and soul of the impassioned leader of the organization who had an instinct on where to take the business for customers, and absolute clarity on how to inspire the organization to make it happen.  These companies all started small, and it was the personal mission of the person at the helm who inspiration drove the business to where it is today.  Lands’ End, for example, when it began started in a humble walk up building in Chicago’s sailing hardware district – and it was Gary Comer’s personal vision that moved the company forward.  In fact, even as we grew, he pulled us back to our roots, saying “Think small, think one customer at a time…the rest will take care of itself.” And it did.

Customer leaders have two traits that set them and their companies apart – they have gut and guts.  As taken from Chief Customer Officer:  Getting Past Lip Service to Passionate Action, here’s what they have and what they do:

Gut leaders know the higher purpose they want to have for their customers.  They have sharpened radar for seeing what’s right and wrong and what’s getting in the way.  They have a clear line of sight for where they want to take the company which they’ve thought about it, stewed about it, and suffered over it.  Their idea of what and how they will define themselves in the marketplace is so well understood that they become a lightening rod for the company.  There is an internal compass inside their head that guides reactions to ideas and proposals.  They use that skill like a sculptor, chiseling out the company’s customer relationship by steering and driving decisions throughout the company.

Leaders with guts will absolutely take the hill to get there. They will make the customer agenda a priority of the organization.  There will be no settling for mediocrity.  They’ve got the chops to stick their neck out and will do it to make things happen.   They will push the company and push back on the company until they get it right.  Customer priority and issues will be known, understood, and thought through at all levels.    Customer leaders need the guts of a salmon.  Think about it.  The salmon goes head first against the current.  It pushes on to its destination, unscathed by resistant forces.  The salmon leader turns the company from facing itself to facing its customers.  Salmon leaders use business meetings to guide and challenge people to understand how what they’re doing affects the customer.  Salmon leaders constantly ask if the tactics being served up are connected across the organization.  Salmon leaders are not afraid to trade short-term profits for long-term gains with customers.  They know how to explain the commitment to the board and the company so that they can transfer this clarity to everyone else.

Taking a page from the actions of passionate customer leaders, take these ten actions to put your personal stamp on your relationship with customers:

1. Take the time to know absolutely what you want to be to your customers. Your business otherwise will continue to run on auto-pilot, the functions of each of your operating areas (service, support, marketing, operations, sales, etc) churning out what they do – without much real conversation about what it all means to customers, and how it affects them.  Like the leader with gut, take the time to stew about it and gain the clarity of how you want your customers to think of you and what greater purpose you are performing for them.
2. Communicate that purpose for your business. This may sound obvious, but it’s amazing how many companies have every part of their company defining what they do separately – the parts don’t add up for customers.  For example, one emerging home builder changed his mission from ‘building contractor’ to ‘delivering on the American Dream.’  That was as much for his internal team (probably more) than for customers.  Do this litmus test to see how connected your company is in knowing the higher mission they all collectively serve for your customers. The next ten people you speak to, simply ask them; “What’s your job?” and “What’s our collective job?”  You’ll be surprised at the varied answers you’ll get.  No wonder – if you haven’t been the beacon for them telling them where you’re headed, they’ll chart their own course.  They’ll decide on their own where they’re taking your company for customers.  
3. Establish your own set of guidelines for how to treat customers. Consider the various dimensions of your business and make a set of statements about how each one of them should show up to customers.  Be clear about what the frame of reference should be in people’s minds for making decisions about each dimension and what your standards for customer treatment are.  
4. Listen to the Front Line and Talk to Customers Regularly. The frontline is talking to your customers every day.  On a regular basis, sit yourself down in the center of them and ask them what the key issues are.  But don’t just listen.  Write down the issues and get someone assigned to taking care of the major ones.  Then personally reach out to customers to understand at a greater level of granularity just what is happening so you know what to do about it.  Then fix the issues. This is simple, it works, and it puts your skin in the game.  When you let your company and customers know of your direct understanding and involvement in resolving these issues it will have an impact and it will set a standard and an example people will emulate.
5. Track and trend complaints and do something about it. Beyond the conversations you have with the frontline, give them some sort of tool to track and trend those issues.  By doing this, you have an immediate “hand on the throttle” management device for steering your company.  As you track this feedback month after month and year after year, the trends will help you understand in more detail what your customer needs are.  Most importantly, this type of discipline will let you take “real time” action on resolving issues that may be sending your customers away.  I know that everyone wants to survey their customers – but really – we’ve exhausted our customers with the mass that goes out with no apparent action that follows.  If you must survey to get that statistical data we all crave, you will find that it validates what you will have already found out by trending and tracking customer complaints and issues.  In fact, if your survey is telling you new things you don’t know – you’re just way too distant from your customers – and in a most precarious position in your relationships with them.  
6. Know your customer segments and how their needs vary. Especially where resources are tight, you will want to cluster your customers by how much revenue they generate and their profitability.  From these clusters, you should identify commonalities in what they need from you.  The intention is never to under-serve those with lesser profitability potential – but you must absolutely be aware of those power players on whom your livelihood may be most dependent.  Once you know these clusters, you can come up with creative ways for serving them – allocating resources in sync with financial outcomes.  For example, you may have a wide number of smaller customers who, rather than sending out an individual to call on them separately, can be brought together for a networking event that benefits them all and reduces your cost for servicing them.  
7. Give the front line the training, support and tools to do their job. The frontline is the company to your customers.  This is not the place to cut costs.  Ensure that you allocate ample resources to ensure that they have what they need to give your customers what they need.  This means ample communication from you (that won’t cost a thing), but also the right training, skill development and technology resources.  There’s nothing worse, for example, than putting a customer through watching their sales rep struggle with slow response time or inadequate support materials, or listening to a service operator struggling with a system to find customer information.  
8. Conduct a quarterly or monthly customer loss review meeting. This is a potent profit management technique you can begin today.  To prep for this meeting, compile the data on customer defections so that you know which customers you lost and why.  In addition, assign your key lieutenants to make outbound calls to up to ten customers who have left during the month or quarter to find you why they left.  There’s nothing quite as compelling as a customer speaking right to someone who has accountability for making something happen.  Customers are often so amazed by the effort that they consider trying the company again.  After the calls have been completed, convene the meeting to discuss what’s happening with your customers and what is driving them away.  In that meeting get alignment on how to prioritize the issues and assign accountability.  Use subsequent loss review meetings to track progress on resolving issues, continuing the process of calling customers who defected.  
9. Keep track of your customers. You should know the flow of your customers in and out of your business. It’s the easiest way to make customers in terms of a ‘score’ people can follow and you can constantly keep top of mind.   Find a way to figure out how to constantly track, actively discuss and manage these five things about your customers.  These are called “Guerrilla Metrics” in my book, Chief Customer Officer:  Getting Past Lip Service to Passionate Action, because they help you power the customer onto the agenda of your business. For example: a business to business company was counting the number of customer accounts but not the flow or the quality.  The sales team was led by an ex-fighter pilot who sent off the sales force on what they actually called “speed kills.”  They were fired up to get as many customers as they could, as fast as they could.  But they weren’t keeping track of the difference in the value of business each new customer would bring.  To them, one unit was one unit:  customers had become widgets.  Each speed kill carried the same weight on the tote board used to measure success.  The sales team exceeded their goal for new customer accounts that year, but sales became a drag on profits, which actually declined. This is because they didn’t focus on the profitability of customer accounts, just the number of them.  And no one actively identified, prioritized and eliminated issues driving profitable customers out the door.
10. Prove it with your actions. Finally, take the actions that are good for your customers.  Make clear decision decisions that put the customer first – then let EVERYONE know what they are.  Your customers, your suppliers and most importantly, your company all need to know that you are taking action and listening to the feedback that is coming in daily from your customers through inbound calls, through the web, and through conversations.  This is what people are looking for – to see if there’s more behind the customer commitment than lip service.  You need to prove that there is.  You need to market hope. When you do this – you’ll see – the tide will turn.

Other articles you might like:

• For More Loyal Customers, Manage Your Points of Experience
• Four Things Airlines Can Do to Improve Customer Service
• You are your company’s brand
• Twitter is a business owner’s best friend . . . really!
• The Secret of Barack Obama’s Success

Customer Experience Management has been a hot topic around our company lately.  You have been giving us many motivational talks about it, and there have a been a few “Customer Appreciation” programs, but there is something that would really help us out – leading by example.

You serve as a role model to us. If you disregard the customers, focus only on the business and not the customer driving it, or don’t walk the talk, how would we know to do otherwise?  We really need you to practice what you preach. You are our business role model and set the expectation by how you relate to our customers.

To excel at managing the customer experience, we need the leadership to set the example and it will trickle down throughout the entire company.  When you set the tone for improving customer service and to delight our customers, we will then follow suit. Leadership needs to be on the same page and be consistent in their message for us to truly understand how to deliver the
service you expect.

There are many instances where top level management talks about improving the customer service within the company, yet they themselves treat the staff as cogs in the wheel and punish, demean, and treat the internal customers with very little respect. How can they be treated in such a manner, yet be expected to deliver excellent service to the external customers? It’s a more
natural response to treat people well when you yourself are treated well.

We want to be treated with the kindness that you want us to display to the customers. We’d like to see you problem solve in our best interest, much like you’ve instructed us to do with the customers we serve.

We’ll treat our customers the same way that you treat them, and even us.

We want to make sure that the ideals that you are holding us to are not just merely mission and vision statements that hang on the wall in our lobby.  We want to embrace the customer centric culture we promise and to live it each and every day.

Thanks for listening,

Your staffOther articles you might like:

• Customer service is everyone’s job
• What might happen if you treated everyone well?
• To Improve Customer Service, Find a Role Model
• A lesson on changing your organization
• The link between customer service and customer loyalty

During one of the trainings, Jack introduced a success pie chart that had a huge impact on me. It originated from Jim Bunch. (If you don’t know about Jim, look him up!) The chart shows that 50% of success comes from your environment, 40% from your mindset, and only 10% from skill.  If 50% of success comes from creating environments that support your goals, how can you upgrade your workplace environment to attract and retain more long-term customers?  As I looked at the weight that environment plays on success, example after example sprang up based on our year of interviewing successful people.

50% of success comes from your environment, 40% from your mindset, and only 10% from skill.

One example comes from Sky Lakes Hospital. Its customer satisfaction scores raised from the 41st percentile to the top 10% in the nation after a three year customer service culture change. Custom Learning Systems was hired to give the leaders at Sky Lakes tools to support service excellence. One wonderful tool that Sky Lakes adopted was the “Six Foot Rule.”

Every employee, hospital-wide, is required to look up, make eye-contact, and say something pleasant when  they pass within six feet of anyone – a patient, visitor, or even a fellow employee. This rule has changed the environment at Sky Lakes. The expectation was non-negotiable. People were held accountable. What happened? For some, the workplace got a whole lot friendlier and much more enjoyable. Unfortunately, for some of the Sky Lakes staff, this new rule was intolerable. In fact, some of the employees actually quit their jobs because they didn’t want to follow the new rule. It didn’t match their cynical dispositions. The upside? This new environment organically weeded out those who didn’t fit the new service excellence culture.

This serves as a great illustration of the power of your environment in creating success. Just imagine being an employee of this hospital. Let’s say your name is George. You’re not great with customer service but it’s okay because your particular job doesn’t require customer contact. According to Jim Bunch’s pie chart, your environment counts for 50% of your success. Put in an environment where there are no expectations that George socialize, he won’t. However the Six Foot Rule changed the expectations and the environment. The environment George works in now calls forth a new degree of interpersonal warmth and connection. His coworkers are his internal customers and are positively effected whenever George looks up and greets them. This rule improves his coworker relationships and delights the occasional patient that he passes in the halls.

Brian Lee, the President of Custom Learning Systems explained that the moment you take your eye off of customer service, it reverts back to the way it was. When he first told me that, I felt some resistance to his statement. But then I started thinking about it from a personal standpoint. You don’t just put gas in your car, shower or eat a meal once. You do it on an ongoing basis, monitoring your levels of fuel, cleanliness, or hunger, and taking action to keep things running effectively. You don’t just organize your office once, you need to keep your eye on it, or it won’t take long for it to revert back to chaos. Are you keeping an eye on your workplace environment? Is it supporting all the time, money, and training efforts you’ve invested in service excellence?

If 50% of your success with customers comes from the environment, what can you add to it, and remove from it, to draw out the best in yourself, your coworkers, and staff? Here are three quick tips to upgrade your environment. Please feel free to add your tips to this blog entry. Your contribution may just impact the way our readers approach their workplace environments.

1. Observe your workplace. Walk through your company as if you had absolutely no ties to it. As a customer, what would make you want to do business with this company? What might push you away? As an employee, what would make you want to get up in the morning and come to work each day? What might be hindering your enthusiasm?

2. Be accessible – consistently. Create an environment that encourages management to communicate with staff. Make a habit of walking around on a regular basis, specifically to create opportunities for casual conversation with your staff. Offer a customer service box that employees can use to leave anonymous messages to management. Set specific time aside to ask your employees what’s working and what’s not working. Encourage them to share what might be helpful to them as they do their jobs.

3. Set expectations and make every department accountable for their service excellence scores. You get what you measure. Whether you use a secret shopper, an outside customer rating system, or your own internal reviews, make sure your people understand what you expect from them. Spend time focusing on what they are doing right. Clear expectations combined with a positive focus draws the best out of all concerned.

What do you think? What can you do – right now – to enhance the customer service environment at your workplace?Other articles you might like:

• 5 things your customer service training should cover
• Customer Service Quote for June 2, 2009
• For Better Customer Service, Affirm Your Company Values
• Black Jack Pizza Should Win a Customer Service Award
• 23 Ideas to be a better boss

1. Know what your customers want.

The first thing is to make sure you really know what your customers want. I know this sounds too basic to even talk about. But I’m continually amazed at how many organizations make assumptions about what their customers want without asking them.

An example of this is when Magic Johnson opened a theater in partnership with T.G.I. Friday’s. As they stocked up their food inventory they ordered the usual number of hot dogs. This theater was in the city but the manager was used to suburban theaters. Customers in the city were different than suburban customers. As Magic explained, they didn’t go to “dinner and a movie, they had dinner in the movie”. So they bought more hot dogs than customers in suburban theaters did. The manager thought he had enough hot dogs for one month. They all sold in one night.

The theater manager thought he knew what his customers wanted. He made an assumption. He was wrong.

2. Get everyone involved.

Too often, management does not get enough people involved in finding solutions and addressing opportunities. They think they have (or are supposed to have) all the answers. Or they give lip service to employees but they never really involve them in any process of improvement.

Shari Ballard, a top executive with Best Buy talks about this. She calls it “making the math work”. Her example is Best Buy itself. They have 4,000 people at their corporate headquarters. They could rely on just these people to find solutions and opportunities. But they don’t. Because they also have 140,000 other people throughout their company. And these people are closer to their customers. By getting these people involved they increase their success ratio. They know they’ll have more answers, more ideas, more opportunities and more solutions.

3. Help your customers accomplish what they want.

Like #1 above, this seems too simple to even mention. But as customers, we see companies breaking this rule every day. This happens when we focus on selling rather than helping. It happens when we make suggestions before knowing what our customers want. It happens when we push products or services on customers because of our quotas or commissions.

Any time employees are focused on selling products or services because management tells them to, they are NOT focused on helping their customers. You help your customers by learning what they want to accomplish and then fitting your offering to their situation.

Anything else is self-serving. While there is nothing inherently wrong with being self-serving, don’t expect it to create loyal customers. It won’t. If your customers know you will always focus on your needs then they will treat you accordingly. You will not be a high priority for them because they are not a high priority for you.

But if they know you will always do right by them, they will treat you like someone they can trust. And they’ll come back more often.

Ask yourself how well you do these three things now. Is there room for improvement? If so, what might your first step be?Other articles you might like:

• Google’s strength is offering value, engaging customers
• Customer service means making good on your mistakes
• Get everyone involved in customer service
• Deliver better customer service by being prepared
• Plan your customer service improvement for 2010

There are a couple ways to do this. The two I like best are fundamental, not overly complicated. I call the first one: “Show me the money!”

This goal here is simple. Connect better service to return on investment (ROI). Show people how improving service to customers can lead to better retention, increased repeat business and more referrals. The better you can make the business case, the more the numbers-driven people will buy in. And if you get the “numbers” people on your side, that’s a big plus.

Here’s an example.

A retail store manager measures both customer service and repeat business for a period of time. He sees a link and then documents it enough to make it real to the higher level people. He didn’t even have to show a specific ROI. The corporate management people did that. All the store manager had to do what prove the link between their better service and more customers coming back.

You could do the same thing with referrals which makes a strong case because it’s new business. Then you get support from sales and marketing because they love new business.

A second method is to appeal to their ego.

We know when you do a better job serving your customers, you improve the overall quality of your organization. You have to, or any gains from customer service improvement will not last. So, connect customer service to quality. Then piggy back on existing quality measures the company uses.

Here’s an example where this worked very well.

A franchise business historically scored very low on the annual metrics used by the franchisor. And their model benefitted greatly from customer referrals. So the sales manager worked with the operations manager to tie their customer’s experience (through direct feedback) with the operations review done every year by the franchisor. They both saw how interconnected these two were. This helped motivate the operations manager to drive improvements that would help them score better on the annual review. While the sales manager made sure these improvements gave their customers a better experience.

The result was better service for customers, which drove more referrals. And the company scored better on their annual review with the franchisor.

Amazing customer service is a team sport. It takes everyone on the team to be committed to delivering a great experience to their customers. And when it happens, everyone wins!Other articles you might like:

• Match your offer to the person you’re offering it to
• Never Ask for Referrals
• Cowbell Sandy
• Event notice – Live Webcast: Ten Secrets for Successful Customer Service
• Do you stand behind your employees?

Recently, another Minnesota car dealer made a good start writing a different kind of book. This one might be called: “How to drive customers away by the busload.”

This article in the StarTribune would make a good first chapter. It tells how this car dealer has dealt with a customer over what appears to be the car dealer’s mistake. (According to the article, they undercharged her by $7000.)

One of their tactics was to sue their customer. (But it’s not clear she did anything wrong other than unwittingly get a very good deal on the car she bought from them.)

We all know newspaper articles never have all the facts. But if the basics of this story are true then this dealer made a costly mistake in how they chose to resolve a problem. The bad publicity alone has run way past the value of the mistake they made.

Fighting with your customer is never the answer. It’s even worse when the company is at fault and they resort to bullying tactics to fix their mistake.

When a company does that they send a powerful message:

“You cannot trust us to look out for you.”

They might be fine if there are never any problems with your transaction. But if the going gets tough they will not be there to help you. They’ll look out only for themselves regardless of who’s at fault.

That’s what this behavior tells customers.

As a customer, how does this feel to you? Does it make you want to do business with them? Other articles you might like:

• Work with your customers, not against them
• Survey Coaching Can Ruin a Good Customer Relationship
• T-Mobile vs. the customer: Round five (the wrap-up)
• Is your luggage getting treated better by airlines?
• Top 10 things you should NEVER say to a customer

Remember, the three requirements of an Amazing customer experience are:

1. Treat me well
2. Help me accomplish what I want
3. Offer me value

As a customer if you routinely violate the first rule then you’re part of the problem. Being a customer does not give you permission to be rude, discourteous or less than civil. No matter who you are, the same standard applies to everyone: Treat everyone well.

I see this in my business every now and then.

A person will email or call me asking for a proposal. I send them the information they want.  (This takes time and is an interruption but I do it because it’s part of my job.) Then I hear nothing back from them. They never say “thanks”. They fail to respond if I email or call them. Often I never even know if they got the information I sent them. Once they get what they want, they disappear without another word.

Because, in their world, customers have the right to be rude.  (But they really don’t. No one does. )

If you want to deliver consistently Amazing customer service, make sure you treat everyone well all the time. Playing nice with some people and not others will come back to haunt you.

And, as you do business with others, watch how they treat their employees and vendors. If they treat customers like royalty and everyone else as a second class citizen then avoid them.  They’re really only looking out for themselves. They’ll treat you well only as long as they need something from you.Other articles you might like:

• Be a better customer
• What might happen if you treated everyone well?
• Be unusually good every time
• Bad manners are bad for business
• Why customer service matters in SEO and Internet marketing

Don’t let automatic customers become invisible customers

And here are some additional thoughts on this topic…

At some point we are all automatic customers. Whether it’s a fitness club membership, an insurance policy, a banking relationship or a cell phone account, we all have companies that expect us to show up every month.  Whether by contract or inertia, we continue to do business with them every month until we take action to stop.

It’s easy to let automatic customers become invisible customers. Because the customer has to take action to leave, it’s often easier for them stay. So we count on them being there month after month.  But this can lead to existing customers getting less time and attention than they should. They can get ignored. They can become invisible.

This happens when companies focus more on attracting new customers and keeping those who want to cancel, than they do on serving their existing customers.

One way to spot this is by looking at how often you connect with existing customers compared to new potential customers and those who want to cancel. Who gets most of your attention?

Another is by the words used in your company. If the terms “customer acquisition” and “customer retention” get more airtime than “customer service” then you might be making your automatic customers invisible.

Who gets the higher priority in your company?Other articles you might like:

• How to Prevent Invisible Customers
• Eliminate invisible customers
• Let your customer lead
• Does your company have invisible customers?
• Referrals increased by over 100%

After sharing my “wealth” with lots of different retail stores, I found a neat little boutique.

I tried on several pairs of pants (because god knows I need more) and found a fabulous pair that fit me like a glove. After I bought them, my friends and I quickly realized that we had overextended our stay and needed to hightail it to the airport – or we would be staying yet another day in “the wonderland.” Neither my pocketbook – nor, for that matter, my marriage – could sustain another day of that. We made it, and the rest, as they say, is history. I woke up the next day and put on my new fabulous pants, only to discover that the security tag was left on the leg of them. To say I was angry was an understatement!

I immediately called the salesperson who sold me the pants and expressed my unhappiness. Her reply was: “I’m sorry. Send them back and we’ll take care of it.” I am in Florida and she is in Chicago. There’s no better way to make me happy? She couldn’t think of one, so I told her I would send them back for a refund. But still I thought about the pants and how nicely they fit. When you are over 40, things like this are important.

My next call was to the Nordstrom department store here in South Florida. I asked the saleswoman if they had the pants in stock and explained the situation. She checked and said yes, they did, but she made another suggestion that floored me. “Why don’t you just bring the pants in and we will take the security tag off for you? Then, you won’t have to send them back at all and you can wear them right away!” “No, no, no – I didn’t get these at the Nordstrom in Chicago; it was at a small boutique,” I quickly explained. “Yes, I understand that. But wouldn’t it be easier to just bring them in here?” Not quite sure of all this but wanting to take advantage of this before she catches on, I took the pants with me and, after work, I went to the store.

“Is Judy here?” I asked, because she told me to ask for her. “Actually, she’s not, but (looking at the bag in my hand) are you Greta?” Like a deer in headlights I answered, “Y-y-yes?” “Oh, Judy explained the situation. My name is Phyllis and I can help.” I gave her the pants and she called their loss prevention department. Someone came down and whisked my pants away. While I was waiting, Phyllis showed me the pants in other colors that made me look so good and asked if I wanted to look at any other colors. Why not? I was standing there anyway.

Loss prevention came back to say that this was a different type of security tag than the one they use and it wouldn’t come off. Disappointed but appreciative, I said thank you and was on my way when Phyllis said: “Let me make a call.” She took my pants and said she would be right back. “Where are you going?” I said with confusion. “Oh, I think Saks has this type of tag, so I am going to see if they can take it off.” “What? Wait a minute. You remember I didn’t get these here?” “You still need it off though, don’t you? So let me take it and I will be right back”

And she did! Holy customer service! Do you think I will continue shopping there? Do you think I will question pricing? Do you think I will tell others? I’m telling you aren’t I?

Gee, I wonder if this helps them sell?Other articles you might like:

• No one wants our business
• Some people just know how to serve
• How can you help your customers?
• President Obama offers useful customer service lesson
• Be unusually good every time

1. Be personable and gracious toward all customers
2. Treat every person with dignity and respect.
3. Listen to the customers’ needs and point of view.
4. Provide customers with everything they expect and more.

Then implement these principles in corporate missions and goals. Train people for a day on how it works and BAM! Instant happy customers, right? Well no.

Customer service is so hard because we run our companies by customer service myths we do not question and are not true:

Myth #1: All customers are the same.

Myth #2: The customer is always right.

Myth #3: The customer is always wrong.

Myth #4: Good customer service is about having high-quality products.

Myth #5: Good customer service is just plain common sense.

Myth #6: The term “good customer service” means the same thing to everyone.

Myth #7: Ethics, pride, and altruism are all reasons for providing excellent customer service.

Myth #8: If you learn how to “put up with customers,” business can be great!

Myth #9: Taking care of the customers you have is more important than getting new customers.

Myth #10: Unhappy customers tell their stories to more people than happy customers do.

Myth # 11: Unhappy customers are a part of doing business. If you handle a customer complaint well, the offended customer will be
even a more loyal customer.

Myth #12: Customers don’t care about great service; they just want the lowest price possible.

Myth #13: Customers need to be patient. They can’t expect a company to fix all complaints overnight.

Myth #14: Forget about good customer service; people buy from those they like.

Myth #15: Some people are naturally good at customer service.

Myth #16: Comment cards and customer surveys accurately measure customer service.

Myth #17: Customer service systems should focus on troubleshooting. If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.

Myth #18: Companies achieve good customer service by under-promising and over-delivering.

Myth # 19: You can satisfy all of the customers all of the time.

Myth #20: Roll Your Own! What is the myth that guides your view of customer service?

Customer service is hard because it is not what companies say it is and almost never the same from customer to customer or time to time. Customer service is only what a customer says it is in a particular instant on a particular day. The customer view is determined by

1. The level of satisfaction that an individual customer plus
2. Feels each time they use the product or service plus
3. Each time they interact with the company rep or web site

It is a constantly changing, perpetually moving target.

scxsThe key is to ask yourself, what would you want? Think Dirty Harry: How can I make your day better? We define “BAM!-good!” customer service as the attitudes and actions to help a customer feel more satisfied each time they interact with the company.

How do you define it?Other articles you might like:

• Thank your customers for complaining
• This is Going to Hurt. (A Lot.)
• How much more would you pay for great customer service?
• Customer Service IS a Profit Center
• Getting back to basics (of customer service)

I learned this because millions of others were having the same experience. Because many of them were discussing it online I was able to conclude that it was a software malfunction that would soon be fixed by the software vendor.

What I find shockingly sad is the company that makes the software was silent throughout all this. They posted nothing on their Twitter account. I saw nothing from them in Google News. Nothing on the company blog or forum. Eventually (this morning) I found a post on their support site. I had to dig to find it.

We live in a world where this should never happen. It’s too easy to communicate with our customers to not do so.

This company should have posted to Twitter, FaceBook, their blog and relevant forums about what was going on. Because their site was being hammered with traffic, they should have posted announcements elsewhere like Posterous, Tumblr and Blogger. They could have done a short video on YouTube.

Because so many people were affected by this, just a few posts to these social media sites would have gone viral.  They would have given people the information they needed when they needed it. A response like this would have held back much of the negative buzz which has damaged their reputation.

In fact it might have produced a wave of goodwill by showing the world they really care about their customers. It would have positioned them as a company that works hard to give their customers the best experience possible, even when things go wrong.

If your customers are on the Internet, they expect you to be there too. You have no excuse for not communicating with them using Web 2.0 tools. If you fail at this you risk losing your customers to those who do it better.Other articles you might like:

• Twitter Beats Customer Support at Comcast
• How Do You use Twitter for Customer Service?
• Do Your Customers Use Twitter? (How to Find Out)
• What’s Your Twitter Customer Service Story?
• When Customers Tweet – Do You Listen?

-Fred RogersOther articles you might like:

• Customer Service Quote for May 5, 2009
• Here’s how to “wow” your customers
• Customer service jobs on the rise
• The Gas Tank Theory of Serving Others
• Lessons from Groundhog Day

The last time I got an email from my library it was about an overdue book. The email arrived a couple days AFTER the book was overdue. It also explained how I owed a fine for not returning the book by its due date.

Every month, about 3 days BEFORE my payment is due, my credit card company sends me a reminder of my due date.

My credit card company is telling me they care about me. They want me to avoid late fees and other penalties. (Even though they make money from late fees.)

My library is saying they don’t care about me or their due dates. They are telling me overdue fees are most important to them.

My credit card company will get my loyalty. My library will get ignored.

What messages are you sending? How will your customers respond?Other articles you might like:

• Credit Card Customers Finally Get Heard
• JPMorgan Chase Backtracks on Fees After Firestorm of Feedback
• Customer loyalty requires honesty from the start
• Respond to every customer every time
• Don’t Make It Hard For Customers To Spend Their Money

And here are some additional thoughts on this topic…

I keep seeing companies use language I find offensive. It’s not vulgar or even indecent. But it’s inappropriate in how it’s used. It’s manipulative. It’s intended to produce a certain emotional responses based on a situation or relationship that does not exist.

For example, at Target, I’m no longer a customer. I’m a “guest”. This is supposed to make me feel more welcome. Maybe they hope I’ll stay longer. But, we all know I’m not their guest. If I was I wouldn’t pay. And I’d call before I drop in.

Another example is a local chamber of commerce that no longer charges a fee for their annual dues. Now it’s an “investment”. This is supposed to make members feel they’re getting more for their money. But it’s phony. If it really were an investment then I’d want a monthly statement showing the value. And I’d like to know the rate of return and cash-out options.

If we want to serve our customers well, we need to be honest with them. The language we use is either honest and genuine or it’s not. If we dress it up too much we sound phony. We sound manipulative.

And that’s not how we build trusting relationships with people.Other articles you might like:

• Customer Service – “Be Our Guest”
• Scripts can ruin a business
• JPMorgan Chase Backtracks on Fees After Firestorm of Feedback
• Should you pay employees for better customer service?
• How to make customer service a priority

And we understand it’s okay to expect companies that will work WITH us as partners rather than adversaries.

Companies that ignore this will end up just like “Mr. Advertising” in this video: alone and wondering what happened.

Other articles you might like:

• Here’s how to have real customer loyalty
• Use faith and frustration to improve
• Social Media helps Dave Carroll tell his customer service story
• Don’t multi-task when helping your customer
• What are you really doing for your customers?

When you do business with someone observe how they treat everyone. Watch how they deal with employees, vendors, customers and others.

The most successful and sustainable companies treat everyone well. They know (and their actions show) there is no second class.

But we all know this is not the norm.

As customers we see it when others get a lower price, a table with a nicer view, a more comfortable  seat or a greater selection of products. We see it when new customers get the “special offers”. Long-time customers get ignored.

As vendors we see it when customers get a friendly greeting with a smile. We get a grunt. We see it when our invoices go unpaid, our meetings get canceled and our phone calls go unreturned.

As employees we see it when some employees get to ignore policies and procedures that everyone else has to follow. We see it when some employees always seem to get the short end of things and others always seem to get the corner office, even if they have not earned it.

It’s not okay to pick and choose who gets treated well. Not if you want a healthy business.

When you do this you send a message that says you value people only if they can do something for you. It’s no better than someone marrying for money and then divorcing when they discover their new spouse is actually broke.

If you want loyal customers and engaged employees, treat everyone well. If you want a healthy, sustainable business, treat everyone well. Send a message that, in your organization, there are no second class citizens.Other articles you might like:

• What kind of customer are you?
• Bad manners are bad for business
• Customer Service IS a Profit Center
• Get everyone involved in customer service
• 23 Ideas to be a better boss

Customers are more important than cash registers

And here are some additional thoughts on this topic…

Today’s “Daily Dose” is about as fresh as it gets. It happened today at lunch.

As I walked up to the hostess stand I noticed it was empty. But, not far away was a server standing at a cash register. She never looked up. Never stopped what she was doing. Never gave me the slightest indication she knew I was there. (I felt myself quickly becoming an invisible customer.) After what seemed like hours, she finished up, grabbed some menus and greeted me as if I had just arrived that second.

She seemed to have no clue what she had just done. But I did. Her actions spoke clearly: “My current task is more important than you”.

I’m not suggesting a server leave a cash drawer open so she can seat a customer. But I am proposing that she give the customer some attention while she’s wrapping up her transaction. A simple “Hi, I’ll be right with you” is better than feigned ignorance. And its easy to do.

No matter what you’re doing, always find a way to acknowledge a new customer’s presence. And then serve them as soon as possible. Or get a co-worker to help. When you do this you show your customers you care. And you tell them you’d like them to come back.Other articles you might like:

• Pay attention to everything
• Recognize your loyal customers
• Give customers your complete attention
• Ask customers why they are leaving but don’t hold them hostage
• Put customers before tasks

-John Mackey
Author of: Passion and PurposeOther articles you might like:

• For More Loyal Customers, Focus on What You Do Best
• What is Leadership?
• To improve customer service: Understand your purpose
• Stop lowering your prices. Raise your customer service
• RIAA Trial – Big Mistake or Not?

-Frank F. WarrenOther articles you might like:

• Do you feel lucky today?
• Customer Service Quote for June 25, 2009
• Customer Service Quote for September 11, 2009
• What is Leadership?
• Improve customer service by putting yourself in your customer’s shoes