Customer service guru, Seth Godin left an interesting post on his blog recently about starting over with customer service.
He makes a bold statement – “Customer service is broken.”
He’s right.
It’s a great post and many companies should do themselves a favour and take a few minutes to read and digest it. The point he makes I’d like to pick up on is about companies being on the defense because they don’t understand what is required for this new era of service.
Let’s examine this for a second. I think companies are going even further than that by doing subtle things which dissuade the customer from pursuing the complaint further. Things such as what I like to call “The Telephone Key-press Labyrinth”, where a calling customer has to work their way through a veritable maze of telephone keypad options before they get through to the right or sometimes invariably wrong department. Or the “On Hold for the Bank Manager” problem you get when you walk into your local branch with a simple issue which you are told can only be dealt with by the manager, who by an amazing coincidence isn’t available until the 29th Feb – next time leap year comes around.
These are dissuasion techniques in action where companies would rather confuse/frustrate their customers into not complaining because it’s easier if you don’t have to deal with them directly.
A simple thing like being able to ring up and speak with a customer representative immediately keeps customers coming back, and not only that they’ll spread the word too about how great your customer service is.
Don’t be frightened of talking to your customers, after all they are the ones that are buying your products.
3 comments
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March 1, 2007 at 5:00 pm
Julian
sure, some companies may actively seek to dissuade complaints by putting in place barriers.
For many i suspect that it’s more about having the wrong processes.
For example, in one organisation we’ve worked with there was a rigorous and seemingly correct process for handling complaints. It was a fully audited paper trail that filtered up from initial contact to branch manager, to area manager, CS director and MD.
In reality branch managers usually rang the MDs PA because they knew that everyone else in between was unable, unempowered, disinterested or unwilling to make a decision. The impact on the customer was being passed off between six people, with the branch mangaer being in the line of fire.
In this instance the faulty process was rectified by common sense, but how often is this not the case? It’s not that the organisation wants to be unhelpfull, they just over engineer the solution. Perhaps it’s about pushing decisions down the chain, rahter than control from the top.
March 2, 2007 at 9:48 am
timclague
Most companies pay bonus for sales, not for loyalty. This is short term investment, not long term. At the moment most companies are so short term that anyone in it for the long haul does well.
March 2, 2007 at 6:16 pm
Sarah
Customer Experience is big on the agenda at the moment.. and highlighted by a trip to the bank today to pay in a cheque which frustrated me no end… I had to get to the bank…. had to wait in a queue… then the advisor tried to talk to me about a mortgage despite my protests that I’d just taken one out… aaarrrgghhh!
Compare this to the experience a friend had when selecting the caterer for her wedding (ok a bit different but still…). One of the first companies she tried arranged to come to her house, to cook the menu for her and her partner…. they served canapes and champagne and presented alternative starters and desserts and cooked everything in my friends kitchen. She booked them that night, even though they were the most expensive…. and this was a year in advance.
It is possible, but because it’s becoming increasingly harder to do each experience has to be unique, appropriate and personal.