Customer service is not a department; it is an attitude.
Ask any business owner if he provides great customer service, and chances are he will answer – without giving it much thought – yes. Most answers are sincere; some are true. But the reality is that few companies provide outstanding customer service. And while some are good, most are barely adequate.
I challenge you to think of the names of three businesses in Alachua County that provide exceptional customer service. Chances are you will struggle to come up with just one. On the other hand, you probably will not have a problem naming three companies that provide poor, even deplorable customer service (I’ll bet I made you think of the name of a bank, a restaurant, a post office or an airline.)
What I want to write about in this month’s article is customer service as a competitive advantage. And I believe it is worthy of discussion, because it is routinely one of the most overlooked strategic opportunities in business today—usually given only lip service by senior management.
Great customer service – the type of service that builds consumer loyalty – is difficult to achieve for several reasons:
First, by its very nature, the relationship is asymmetrical; the customer has all the power.
Second, the customer has more choice today than at any other time in consumer history. And not only do customers have more choices locally, but the internet has given them nearly infinite choices globally. The consumer is no longer shopping at the company store.
Third, with the rise of social media, customer service metrics are transparent and universally available, often in real time. A bad review or negative comment posted online will echo in the halls of cyberspace for months, if not years.
For these reasons, and others, customer service is more important today than ever before. What follows is what I believe to be the keys to developing customer service success.
1 Communicate your customer service goals to your entire team. Set the bar high and make customer service the key principle of your company, and a core habit of your employees. Imbue into the very DNA of your organization.
2 Define success as “going beyond customer satisfaction to a new level,” a level of “engagement.” Engagement experiences happen when you connect with your customer on an authentic level. This can be accomplished in many different ways, and it can be as simple as engaging your customer in sincere conversation or making eye contact with a genuine smile. Your goal is to turn transactions into meaningful, engaging experiences. Oftentimes, a simple tweak of attitude and vocabulary will do the trick.
One of my favorite examples of customer engagement happens often when I shop at my favorite supermarket. Recently, I was watching the cashier scan my items through the checkout line when she came to my oatmeal. “I love this stuff,” she said, “I eat it every morning.” She was sincere and I believed her.
These brief exchanges create an engagement experience that not only validates my purchase; they humanize an otherwise sterile, transactional experience and transform it into a bona fide customer engagement. Another interesting thing that happens when service personnel behave in this type of exceptional manner is that I find myself looking at their name tag. The humanizing experience becomes reciprocal.
3 Align employee incentives with customer engagement metrics. At Domino’s Pizza, we regularly solicit feedback from our customers. When a customer orders online, which is 65 percent of our delivery orders in Alachua County, we solicit feedback after the transaction. Then, we formulate the feedback using a point system based on how likely a customer is to recommend Domino’s. We call it the “ultimate question,” and store managers are rewarded financially for high scores.
4 PEOPLE. Hiring the right people is the key. When hiring, Domino’s looks for attitude first and smiles second. Our motto is: hire for attitude and train for skills. I believe the best customer service personnel – in other words: pleasant, optimistic, gregarious people – are born and not made. When you find these rare individuals, make sure they are appreciated.
5 Customer complaints. Sadly, 90 percent of complaints get ignored or fall in the procrastination bucket. Data indicates that customers who receive a negative experience with a business tend to share their experience with an average of 12 other people. Top-notch businesses that provide great customer service tend to handle complaints promptly and understand that a complaint is a customer giving you a second chance—and that the worst complaints are the silent ones. The customer just disappears.
6 Coach upper management to understand that profits are the applause you get from taking care of your customers. Consumers like to shop with companies that provide premium customer service, rather than those that give bland transactional service. Data also tells us that in the retail business, it is seven times more expensive to acquire a new customer than it is to keep a current one. Cheers to more ammo in providing great customer service.
I drive by three different dry cleaners on my way to my favorite customer service oriented-dry cleaning establishment. I drive by two other supermarkets on my way to “my” Publix. How many other supermarkets do you pass by on your way to your favorite?
Following these six principles is not enough. We still need to stay on top of changing customer service trends, like social media. This is the new factor in the customer service equation, and it is a game changer. Whether you are a small or midsize business, this applies to you.
Customers now communicate with each other with dizzying ease and speed – allowing negative comments to become magnified beyond all scope and reason. Social media has become a bully pulpit for the angry customer. In the past, marketers controlled the message; today the consumer controls the message. Providing great customer service is the only way to level the social media playing field.
In this age of extreme choice and communication, high customer service standards have never been more important. Ironically, customer service standards seem to be at an all-time low. Business leaders who recognize this gap – and are ready to take advantage of it by outperforming their competitors – will bank the applause of their customers. Customer service will continue to evolve and will always make the difference between a good business and great
one.
Freddie Wehbe is the owner of Gator Domino’s, a ten-store franchise serving the greater Gainesville area. Freddie is married to Daurine and has two children, Ronnie and Dany. For feedback or questions, email Freddie at freddie@gatorDomino’s.com.