One Critical Question to Ask Yourself Every Day
What happened to the old saying, the customer is always right? I'll bet every one of you reading this article has a "customer service nightmare" story to tell. My most recent nightmare experience took place recently when my business partner and I went in to a wireless phone store to purchase two new pda wireless phones. We told the young man who greeted us that we had only one question: is this phone compatible with the database software we intend to purchase? "I don't know," he said, "Most customers do the research on this before they come in." We politely requested that if he didn't know, he find the answer. He told us we could call the company ourselves, that he didn't have time to be put on hold with them. As you can imagine, we left without spending what we felt was a significant sum of money. And of course we've told at least 10 other people about the disappointing service at that particular store. So here's a question to ask yourself every day: how does our business need to look and act in the way the customer needs it to look and act? What would happen if you thought through and walked through every step of the process from your customer's point of view? Here are a few thought-provoking questions for you and your employees to consider: - What does our customer need, not just in terms of our product ? what kind of experience does our customer need? - What is it like to be our prospective customer? - What do our customers see, read or hear about us? - What are other customers saying about us? - What experience our customers have when they call our business? (By the way, women hate layers of voice mail, they want a real person. And there's nothing worse than reaching the voice mail system that asks you to enter "the first four letter of the person's name." What if you don't know the name of the person you need to speak with?) - What if our customers' first experience with us is electronic, through our website or email? What impression do we make? - What is our customers' first meeting with us like? Are they comfortable, are they made to feel welcome? - Do we ask questions to try to understand their needs before trying to sell them something? - Are we asking about their expectations or making assumptions about what they want? - What is our process for giving them a proposal? - How long will they wait for an estimate? - Will the project be ready on time, as promised, and at or under budget? - Is it easy, relaxed, and efficient to do business with us? - Is it frustrating? Where are the points of irritation? - What does our customer experience once they become a customer? - Is it predictable, reliable, rewarding, convenient, and consistent? - What is not just adequate but over the top spectacular? How does that look and feel to our customers? I invite you to play this game in your business?pretend you're a customer. Get your employees, friends and customers involved. See what your customers experience from their eyes. Or better yet, survey your customers and ask them what it's like. And ask yourself this one critical question every day?how does our business need to look and act in the way our customers need it to look and act? Let me know what you discover! © Copyright 2005, Darcie Harris Darcie Harris is co-founder of EWF International®, an Oklahoma based firm providing peer advisory groups for women business owners and executives. EWF International® franchises are available throughout the Southwest. View this article and others at http://www.ewfinternational.com.
Related News
|
 |
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
It Is All About Customer Service!
In this day of terrible customer service, it should come as no surprise that serving your customers, also known as visitors to your web site, must be a top priority. Forget about return on your investment, how your site looks, keywords, meta tags, and the like. Are they important? Yes, of course. However, they mean nothing if you cannot attract and retain visitors to your site.
11 Ways to Get What You Want - Be a Clever Customer!
We all want great service, whether we are buying our weekly groceries from a store, or want a billing hitch resolved at our local utilities provider. Whether it's getting our car fixed, or a great meal in a restaurant. So we can holler and complain about how poor customer service and satisfaction has become - or we can do something about it ourselves, when we have those one-to-one opportunities with a real person.
Creating the Right ?Viral Reputation?
Unless you are brand new to business, or have been under a rock for quite some time - one key marketing technique (which isn't new) - is called 'Viral'.
Everyone talks in code!
How often have you left a meeting with a customer or your boss telling yourself he likes my ideas. Only to find later that you didn't get the sale or your boss has told everyone that you are crazy.
I Wont Tell My Lawyer but I Will Tell You
A general counsel of a large international consulting firm told us about his experience talking to an interviewer who had called to discuss his satisfaction level with his outside law firm. He had been using the services of a "high end, expensive" law firm out of New York.
Find Out Where Your Firm Stands in Today?s Customer
Looking For Ways to Improve Sales and Customer Relationships?
Hook Me Up With A Human
Oh, what has happened to the carbon-based organizational interface? Many organizations have digitized humans ? aka carbon-based units - out of existence in their customer service operations. Now, I love digital technology as much as anyone, but it is time to bring the people back into their appropriate customer service roles, don't you think?
Wholesale Buyers Versus Retail Customers
Are wholesale buyers and retail customers really different? Frankly, there are two answers to this question: yes and no. Yes, because they are different from the buyers and those selling to buyers' point of view and no, because the principles that apply are the same for both types of buying.
How To Boost Your Bottom Line With Two Little Words
I hate to sound like one of those cheesy get-rich-quick commercials, but this week I am going to let you in on a little secret that is so powerful that it will immediately change the way you do business.
Customer Service: Everyone is Fighting Their Own Personal Battles
Relationships... Money... Health..The Past...Failure..Mental and Spiritual Battles..Time Constraints...Professional pressures..
Carpet Cleaning in Surrey
Like any business, carpet and upholstery cleaning requires excellent customer service and great value for money.
There are a number of ways in which one can obtain these.
People have studied the art of customer service for many years, striving to find the right balance between giving hte best service they can, while still making a profit large enough to survive on.
Customer Service Has Moved Toward Customer Care
As I waited for an answer to my VCR inquiry from a stereo company, the recording stated a "customer care" representative would be available shortly. At that moment, I realized it's finally catching on everywhere. With aging baby boomers, world events and additional pressures in today's society; it is "customer care" that has evolved in our economy. We have moved from a manufacturing economy to a service economy and are currently leaning towards a "servicecare" economy. As we live in a high tech-high button touch environment, many personal contacts have been decreased making each customer interaction more important than ever to corporate imagery. For example, if you call for computer tech support, the representative often makes it a point to address you by first name. If it's the bank credit card company, they may ask "How are you doing today?" This makes the customer feel less like a number and more like a human being.
5 Golden Online/Offline Business Rules To LIVE Or DIE By
Whether online or off, if you plan on running or maintaining any type of credibility within your business, there are some guidelines that are safe to say any existing or potential customer expects if they are to do immediate or future business with you.
Marketing as a Spiritual Practice
"Marketing as a spiritual practice." It sounds contradictory ? how can sales and promotion possibly be considered spiritual? But the secret is, once you truly understand that marketing isn't all about struggle, jargon, tricks or gimmicks, spiritual practice is the very root of success.
Passing the After-Sales Test
Some time ago a major UK food retailer decided to branch out into non-foods. Well, they all do it now, but in those days it was unheard of. Alongside the fruit and vegetables, meat and tinned foods they sold refrigerators that they had purchased at very low cost from an eastern European company (these were the days when East and West Europe rarely traded with each other).
These fridges were very cheap ? and they worked! The retailer passed on much of this low cost to grateful customers who purchased them in great numbers.
What the retailer didn't consider was that fridges ? unlike tins of beans ? occasionally need spare parts. They sometimes breakdown or are damaged. What the retailer forgot was AFTER SALES.
It was entirely understandable the customers would make the assumption that the retailer would have this in hand. Trouble is, they didn't. The parts - and the engineers who knew who to fit them - were in Poland. So, to many customers, what seemed like a bargain turned out to be a problem. This retailer is now very successfully selling non-food goods alongside food products and I am sure they did the decent thing by refunding their disgruntled fridge customers of many years ago.
Not all companies are so good with their customers. Some will sell products as a one-off transaction and will not be interested in what happens from the moment the product has been sold. "We don't do repairs and we don't sell spare parts. Contact the manufacturer." This is not a lot of good if you live in the U.S. and the manufacturer is in Shanghai, for example.
Of course, some products and are not designed to be repaired or refurbished. The manufacturers simply expect them to be thrown away at the end of their life, even if that life is relatively short. An example is the microwave oven. Who fixes yours? Nobody, I suspect. They are usually repairable, but rarely is one ever repaired. No, they just end up in landfill alongside many other goods that are also thrown away rather than "made good". No wonder many countries around the world are introducing legislation to limit the extent to which such goods can be tossed away so casually.
So, next time you are considering a purchase, especially the purchase of an expensive product or a mechanical product, consider the following tests:
1. Is it built to last?
2. Does it come with a guarantee?
3. Is there evidence of the product's durability?
4. Is it designed to be repaired?
5. Are spare parts available?
Remember also, that repair is better for the environment than replacement. Of course, old products do need to be replaced eventually, but why replace prematurely just because you have purchased a product that failed the tests above?
One group of products that pass these tests with flying colors is Insect-o-Cutor Fly Killers. Have a look at www.flykiller.net and you will see them there.
Let's put them to the above tests:
1. Insectocutor Fly Killers are made of steel. Their solid construction is one of their best selling points.
2. They come with a 5-year guarantee
3. Go to any restaurant or commercial kitchen and you will see Insectocutor fly killers that have been there for 20 years ? and still going strong!
4. Insectocutor fly killers are constructed in a logical way making repairs straightforward. Insectocutor also provides support for repairs.
5. Insect-o-Cutor sells a range of spare parts for all of their fly killers ? even for models that are no longer in production. And their best UK distributor, Arkay Hygiene ? at www.eeeee.co.uk - is always happy to provide these spares as well as replacement u.v. lamps and glueboards
After sales is just as much about the customer as it is about the product. Making a sale is not the end, it is just the beginning. Insect-o-cutor is a good example of a company that demonstrates its concern for it customers through the long-term support offered for its range of products. Just think on that one when you are next down the municipal dump with your broken down microwave!
Is Your CRM (Customer Relationship Management) System Doomed To Fail?
"Right, People. Let's blast out that mail campaign we've been planning for so long."
Customer Service Is Dying - and Im Not Feeling So Good Myself
Have you ever called a company and been greeted with the phrase "Hold, please"? How do they know you can hold? They don't even know who you are. Maybe you can't hold; maybe you have 10 seconds of juice left on your cell phone and your hair is on fire. Then you finally get someone on the phone, only to be told, "I can't actually help you; I'm just paid to apologize, and I'm really sorry about that."
The Added Value - Is YOU!
If there was a restaurant in your town that was physically attractive and clean, had a pleasant variety of entrées on the menu, served food that was prepared in an attractive manner, and the service was outstanding--the maitre'd greeted you by name, remembered which was your favorite table, stopped by later to inquire about your needs and satisfaction, the waiters and waitresses bent over backwards to make your dinner a pleasurable experience and always treated you as if you were their most important patron--would you be willing to pay a little more than other restaurants charged?
DONT Give Your Customers What They Want!
One of the mantras we hear repeatedly in business is "The customer is always right." I'm here to tell you that if you want to build a thriving business you need to forget that saying, and take note of Payne's Law #1 "The customer is always right- some of the time." I'll explain why in a minute.
The Marvelous World of Metaphors
Recognize metaphors from every angle and round up more
insight into your own innovation. Nobody can do it better than
you can!
|