Customer Service That Astonishes

When was the last time you re-evaluated your value offering?

When did you last sit down expressly to think about the value you offer to both your customers and your employees?

What does your organization offer that sets you apart from your competition? And remember competition is not just others who offer the same service — but others who compete for the same dollars.

Value is the real heart of why people buy from you. And regardless of the economy, if you have a real and compelling value proposition, they will continue to buy. That’s why some companies continue to do thrive and grow — regardless of the economy.

A good example of this is restaurants. When restaurant spending declines by 20%, it doesn’t mean that everyone’s business declines by 20%. It means 20% (or more) of restaurants disappear and the balance keep or grow their business because they have a better value offering. When people make choices, they choose the organizations that offer the best value.

Spend some time with your employees. Ask you customers. List all the things they place value on, then list them in priority.

Lastly, figure out what you can do better than your competition — and then take it to the next level. Be outstanding!

My Perspective: Deliver real value every day — be outstanding in ways that are relevant to your employees and customers. And regardless of the economy – your business with thrive.

Here in Toronto, our public transit system — the TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) is currently the focus of considerable negative attention by the public. The public is lashing out at the union as well as management — pointing fingers and making suggestions about how they should each do things differently.

General discontentment was smouldering because of a fare increase earlier this year, but their outrage escalated when a picture was posted on Twitter which showed a ticket agent sleeping in their ticket booth.

The public was rightly outraged.

The senior union official chastised the public for assuming the person was sleeping and not having medical difficulties (he was sleeping). His focus is on protecting his members — regardless of the issue.

Management is focused on having trains running on time, on budget. Noble objectives — but only part of delivering customer service.

No one seems to be focused on understanding or delivering good, consistent customer service.

The issues here are complex, but one fundamental truth is at work. People within the organization are not aligned with a focus on the customer.

The problem isn’t with either the unions or the management. This organization needs a complete change in culture and no one seems to be willing to work together and make the hard decisions to change the current culture.

They need to start by getting aligned around a common goal — defining and delivering an exceptional customer experience.

Once that happens, the various combative elements can begin to start focusing on the common goal instead of their individual goals.

My Perspective: Regardless of our business, we too often get caught up focusing on our department goals and forgetting the overall organizational goal which is serving customers.

By creating this common focus we break down our silos and start working together towards a common goal.

These are 2 of the most powerful words in the English language — they are equally powerful in any language. They express our gratefulness for the benefits we have received, either in personal or business relationships.

This past weekend was Thanksgiving here in Canada so I wanted to share a thanksgiving story about one of my clients — PRO-TAX, headquartered in Charlottesville Virginia.

I have had the privilege to work with this organization since 2008 and they have consistently demonstrated their values and commitment to delivering an exceptional customer experience. And they are working every day to improve and make it better.

This story occurred after a recent trip to their corporate offices to conduct customer research. We spent time talking with customers to better understand their emotional and business needs.

When I returned home I received a hand written Thank You note from the President.

How often do you receive a Thank You note from your clients?

I often speak about the power of a Thank You, but usually when referring to thanking our customer/clients for their business or employees for their efforts.

What a remarkable example of truly living your values.

Thanks to the great group of folks at PRO-TAX for reminding us that we should be thanking all the people in our lives who enrich and add value — not just the ones who pay us money.

My Perspective: Who has contributed to your business or personal life that you haven’t thanked recently. Make a point to do so this week.

Plus, I want to offer my thanks to everyone who has contributed to making this past year so great. Whether as clients, colleagues, readers, contributors or the many bright and engaged people I have had the privilege to meet — thank you for making my life richer.

Seth Godin wrote a great post “All I Do is work here” last Thursday and fundamentally I agree with him — I’m sure he will sleep better knowing that . However, I would have approached it a bit differently, but that’s because I view things through a slightly different filter.

Seth recounts his poor customer experience with various people within the organization. He rightly links the brand and the people who make up that brand as being the same in the customer’s mind. His closing comment was “If you’re not proud of where you work, go work somewhere else. You don’t get the benefit of the brand when it’s hot without accepting the blame of the brand when it’s wrong.”

However, this implies there is a distinction between the brand and the people who deliver it. This underestimates the linkage between the brand and employee behaviour.

My view is that the brand experience changed because the people inside changed first — not independent of their behaviour. People stopped caring. Senior management stopped holding themselves and everyone in the organization accountable for living the brand vision that made the brand great in the first place.

The customer is just now seeing the result of this internal condition.

The people Seth is talking to in his example are the symptom — not the cause. This problem started right at the top, and it probably wasn’t a couple months ago. Systemic changes in attitude like this are a result of longer term indifference. These people act this way because they are allowed to.

My perspective: Employees own the brand. If the brand is faltering, then senior management needs to refocus the vision and hold everyone accountable for delivery. “All I do is work here” and “It’s not my job” are simply unacceptable.

If you’re not proud of where you work — change it by becoming an internal leader. Then if you can’t — go work somewhere else that shares your attitudes and beliefs.

Recently we had a very poor experience with our local dry cleaners — poor enough that we have stopped using them after years of patronage.

My wife took my daughter to have a dress altered for her Grade 8 graduation formal. A little tuck on each side.

When my wife picked up the dress she was told this small alteration was $50.00 — much higher than she was led to believe when she dropped it off. The owner indicated that he would adjust the price accordingly. However, the entire time my wife was in the shop, no explanation for the increase was offered — in fact, the seamstress didn’t even acknowledge her.

When my daughter tried on the dress we discovered it was significantly too small. The zipper would no longer close by approx 4 inches.

At this point, my wife was very upset and my daughter almost in tears because she thought the dress which we had purchased in Florida during March Break for her special evening was ruined.

After my wife’s poor experience, I decided to take my daughter and the dress back to the Dry Cleaners to address the situation. When we arrived the seamstress had left for the day, but we were able to speak to the owner who apologized and assured my daughter that she would have her dress for the evening — even if it meant they had to purchase another one. He readily agreed that the alterations were incorrect and he requested that I bring my daughter back with the dress when the seamstress was there and he would personally see that the appropriate alterations would be made.

When we returned, we had the dress marked and altered by the seamstress and my daughter was able to wear the dress to her formal — however, the seams down the side were now off-centre because the material that was cut from the initial alterations needed to be “found” by pulling some of the pleating from the front of the dress.

In the end my daughter’s dress was saved, but my wife and I were not interested in returning because of the poor treatment by the seamstress and we have never been back to the Dry Cleaners.

Some key elements were;

• the owner immediately apologised and assured us that the situation would be resolved
• the seamstress did not offer a sincere apology
• there was no offer to compensate us for our inconvenience (5 visits vs. 2)
• the Owner admitted that the seamstress was not an employee (I assume she rented space) and therefore there wasn’t much he could do about her attitude
• every employee or contractor counts towards your impression

My Perspective: Because “everything counts” you must be careful about your associations. In this case the Dry Cleaner had allowed someone who didn’t share their values to impact on their customers. Resultant, her poor attitude ended a relationship the owners had worked hard to nurture. When we had such a bad experience — even when it wasn’t their core business — we never returned.