“It’s very difficult to reason with someone if their hair is on fire.” ~Seth Godin

Tags

Customer Experience, Customer Service, Seth Godin

This customer service summary from Seth Godin is right on target. We have all, way to often, experienced the opposite of what he is advocating for here. It seems the be the norm, just based on the customer service calls I make.

These suggestions are pretty basic, it doesn’t take long to learn them or teach them.

It’s very difficult to reason with someone if their hair is on fire. Customer service (whether you’re a school principal, a call center or a consultant) can’t begin until the person you’re working with believes that you’re going to help them put out the fire on their head.

Basic principles worth considering (are you listening, Verizon?)

The first promises kept are hints that you will keep future promises. Putting people on endless hold, bad voice trees, live chat that isn’t actually live, an uncomfortable chair in the waiting room, a nasty receptionist, unclear directions to your office, bad line management… all of these things escalate stress and decrease trust.

Don’t underestimate the power of a good sign, a take-a-number deli machine and a thoughtful welcome.

Don’t deny that the customer/patient/student has a problem. If they think they have a problem, they have a problem. It might be that your job is to help them see (over time) that the thing that’s bothering them isn’t actually a problem, but denying the problem doesn’t de-escalate it.

Leave the legal arguments at home. It’s entirely possible that your terms of service or fine print or HIPA or lawyers have come up with some sort of clause that prevents you from solving the problem the way the customer wants it solved. You can’t do anything about that. But bringing it up now, in this moment of escalation, merely makes the problem worse.

The goal is to open doors, not close them. To gain engagement and productive interaction, not to have the customer become enraged and walk away.

Empathize with their frustration. It’s entirely possible that you think the patient’s problem is ridiculous. That the customer is asking for too much. That you’re going to be unable to solve the problem. Understood. But right now, the objective is de-escalation. That’s the problem that needs to be solved before the presented problem can be solved. Acknowledging that the person is disappointed, angry or frustrated, and confirming that your goal is to help with that feeling means that you’ve seen the person in front of you. “Ouch,” and “Oh no,” are two useful ways to respond to someone sharing their feelings.

One minute later, then, here’s what’s happened:

You were welcoming and open.

You didn’t pick a fight.

You saw and heard the problem.

Wow. That’s a lot to accomplish in sixty seconds.

Do you think the rest of the interaction will go better? Do you think it’s likely that the person at the airplane counter, the examining table or on the phone with you is more likely to work with you to a useful conclusion?

Source: Seth’s Blog: First, de-escalate

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“Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.” ~Donald Porter

Tags

Customer Experience, Customer Service, Recovery, Temkin

We can continuously learn but none of our efforts are perfect.

There is lots of data to suggest the power of service recovery. Here is an overview from the Temkin Group.

• The power of service recovery. It’s undeniable that a good service recovery after a bad experience provides excellent results. When the service recovery is very poor, 63% of consumers cut back their spending while only 2% increased their spending. If the service recovery is very good, there’s a 10x improvement in consumers who increase their spending and more than a 39 %-point reduction in consumers who reduced their spending.
• The limitation of service recovery. The advantages of service recovery really kick in when the company reaches at least a “4” on our 7-point scale of goodness. But it takes at least a “6” on the scale to have as many customers increasing their spending as decreasing their spending. That’s a pretty high hurdle.

So how do we know about recovery opportunities? After customers have a very bad or very good experience with a company, they are more likely to give feedback directly to the company than they are to post about it on Facebook, Twitter, or third party rating sites. Customers are also more likely to share positive feedback through online surveys and share negative feedback through emails. Compared to previous years, customers are more likely to share feedback over Facebook and Twitter, and these channels are most popular with consumers who are between 25- and 44-years-old.

Here is a model for recovery.

• Communication (clearly communicate the process and set expectations)
• Accountability (take responsibility for fixing the problem or getting an answer)
• Responsiveness (don’t make the customer wait for your communication or a solution)
• Empathy (acknowledge the impact that the situation has on the customer)
• Solution (at the end of the day, make sure to solve the issue or answer the question)

“Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.” – Donald Porter

What is more important, advertising or amazing customer service?

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Advertising, Customer Experience, Customer Service

How important is the experience that customers have with you? Before you answer, consider this:

• 40% of people began purchasing from a competitive brand because of its reputation for great customer service.
• 55% are willing to recommend a company due to outstanding service, more than product or price.
• 85% would pay up to 25% more to ensure a superior customer service experience.
• 82% have stopped business with a company due to bad customer service.
• 95% of customers have taken action as a result of a bad experience. Of those, 79% told others about their experience.

The Internet has amplified the ability for news to travel and instant speed, especially bad news. Many customer service management software providers focus on developing more effective tools to help you stay on top of managing your customer experience and ensuring that your customers are getting good customer service from your staff, all of the time.

The fine folks at Zengage, the Zendesk blog put together a fantastic infographic outlining the importance of customer experience and the impact that it has on getting new customers and keeping your customers happy.

Source: Customer Experience Is More Important Than Advertising (Infographic) – Business 2 Community

How Smooth is the Path for Mobile Customer Support?

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Customer Service, Mobile, Mobile Apps, Text Message, Web Chat

Consumers who are inseparable from their smartphones and apps increasingly represent the average customer across industries, placing pressure on companies to deliver excellent mobile experiences. ComScore reported Americans spend the majority of their time consuming digital media within mobile applications.

Apps account for seven out of every eight minutes of media consumption on mobile devices and when broken down between smartphones and tablets, they account for 88 percent and 82 percent of usage, respectively, according to the study.

What if you have a number to text for help in your store or predominantly on every page on your website? Would that allow for faster customer support and responses? While some will call a 800 number, more and more customers like to text.

Web chat is taking off but is still fairly sparse on many sites. Do you have a plan to enable web chat.

How easy is it to contact you with your mobile app itself?

We need to think through all the new ways we can support and service customers. Think mobile all the time. That is what customers prefer.

Source via Smoothing the Path for Mobile Customer Support.

Mobile Devices

Are we disillusioned about what customers really think?

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Customer Service, Listen, Research, Uncategorized, Voice of the Customer

The Digital Executive is so passionate about Customers that they live for executing a strategy that creates value for the “bottom line”. The goals and strategies they come up with are foundational to success. The Digital Executive refuses to live in a “fool’s paradise”, not knowing what Customers really think of their company (or nonprofit). They go to great efforts to understand customers, listen to them and act on common issues that take away from great experiences. 

Customer Management Illusion – Living in a fool’s paradise. Research regularly proves the chasm that exists between what senior executives believe customers think of them and their companies versus what customers actually think. An Accenture study highlighted that 75% of CEOS’ believed that their organizations were customer-centric yet 59% of customers said customer service was somewhat to extremely dissatisfying. (NB: Customer Service is not customer management or customer experience – it is only 1 attribute of a customer-centric business). In a study by the CMO Council 50% of CEOS believed their organizations were extremely customer-centric. Less than one tenth of customers agreed. 

Source: The Challenges of Implementing Customer-Centric Strategy – What creates the problem? | CustomerThink.

Here are the key ideas:

• Understand the key issues that detract from a great experience
• Listen to customers through a variety of ways including direct conversations
• Implement action to improve the overall experience

 

What I remember about the experience is the main thing. Or is it?

Tags

Customer Service, Experience, Memory, Remember

The customer experience

Is what I experience the most important thing? Perhaps it is what I remember.

What I remember is the thing. I may remember it different than how I experienced it. In fact, evidence shows memory doesn’t correspond to experience.

In the world of customer experience, we need to focus on what people will remember, not the experience itself.

If I experience bad customer service AND you fix it for me, I will remember you fixed it for me. I can forgive you because you cared enough to make it right. I will remember you made it right. That is what is important.

What doe the future of customer service look like?

Tags

Customer Service, Emotions, Plan B, Video

There is a huge emotional component to great customer service.

In an American Express Service Survey, when 1,620 consumers were tested under laboratory conditions, 63% said they felt their heart rate increase when they thought about receiving great customer service. For 53% of those tested, receiving great service triggered the same cerebral reactions as feeling loved.

Consider that globally in 2013, 66% of consumers switched brands or business due to poor customer service, a 4% increase on the previous year. Some 82% of those who switched said the brand could have done something to stop them. (Source: ACCENTURE GLOBAL CONSUMER PULSE SURVEY, NOVEMBER 2013)

All products have limitations. We need to see that in our own offerings and have a Plan B. Consider BMW’s giving Electric car owners get access to petrol vehicles to ease ‘range anxiety’. When BMW launched the electric i3 vehicle in October 2013, they announced that i3 owners would also get reduced rate, on-demand access to a gas-powered car. BMW partnered with car rental service Sixt to offer i3 owners a 20% discount when hiring a BMW car through Sixt. The BMW i3 has an approximate driving range of 160km, and the Add-on Mobility service is intended for motorists planning a trip beyond that range.

Are you thinking video support? Millions of consumers worldwide have had enough of ineffective virtual ‘assistance’ by web or phone. What’s more, they’ve been enjoying on-demand face time with their friends for years now. The tech exists – why can’t brands catch up? Now, forward-thinking brands are finally doing just that: by providing webcam-enabled face-to-face interaction with their customer service representatives – as and when consumers need it.

The takeaway? When it comes to customer service, it’s not about what consumers think. Great service is about feelings.

via trendwatching.com | THE FUTURE OF CUSTOMER SERVICE.

Can one simple oversight bring our stock price down 8% in two weeks?

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CMO, Customer Service, Facebook, Twitter

Social Media

It is easy to underestimate the new power that consumers have in the digital world. Don’t let it happen to you. Will it take a disaster to get our attention. Let us hope it isn’t so. Now is the time to obsess about how our customers may point out our vulnerabilities.

Transparency is no longer debatable. We are no long in control of the message. Consumers are generally more in control than we believe. What we know can be dangerous. What we don’t know can be even more dangerous.

I have to ask myself, do I really feel like rolling the dice and risk being brought down by not paying attention to this? What will my staff think? How will my Board react? Will investors turn and run?

Almost five years ago, I was sitting in the conference room of one of the world’s largest insurance companies, trying to push the idea of social customer relationship management to their corporate marketing team. I showed them the power of Twitter and Facebook, and painted pictures of how they could get closer than ever to their customers with these then-new touchpoints. Roughly 4 hours and 45 slides later, the CMO stood up, shook my hand, and told me how he realized going social and “being there” for his customers was important. And then he added that he just didn’t have the bandwidth for it. He explained why his company was just not ready to go social, and why he believed it would be far too risky to allow his customer service onto public forums or leave his brand open for user generated debate. About six months later, a tweet from an angry customer went viral and brought the insurance giant’s stock prices down by 8%. In a mere two weeks! 

Read more: The Customer Support Hierarchy of Needs – Vikram Bhaskaran – Harvard Business Review

Why is marketing integration critical to the digital experience at the contact center?

Tags

Contact Center, Customer Service, Marketing, Voice of the Customer

Marketing

We know we have silos. We know they are not useful. As leaders, we must insist the customer service (the contact center) and marketing align their functions.

As call center agents are on the front lines and make their living speaking to customers and prospects, they know first-hand which words and phrases resonate. Efficiency of interactions is critical for agents, and as such they are keenly aware of what works and what does not when trying to explain products and services over the phone. It is an art form, and experienced agents are masters at their crafts. We all know this.

So how do you integrate this talent within the corporate marketing functions? Start small, but think big. 

Begin with a complicated message and then help marketing simplify. Reps are uniquely qualified to breakdown complex concepts and deliver it in such a way that it is easily digestible. They know what works. Why? Well for one, they are often graded on Average Handle Time (AHT) and, whether you agree with the metric or not, is fodder for another time. The issue is reps know how to get it done and get it done quickly. For example, what slogan did Nike choose? “Just do it”; not “Have you thought about taking action to accomplish your goal?”

Make your marketing colleagues heroes. You can streamline their discovery process, tighten their deliverables and reduce reliance on untimely research processes like focus groups and brainstorming sessions, which are expensive as well.

The symbiotic contact center: Marketing – You talking to me? Shared by Mktg Optimization

What’s the Future of Customer Service? Ask Salesforce

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CRM, Customer Service, Mobile, Salesforce.com, Social Media

What is the state of customer service? How you doing with customer service via mobile devices? What about you ability to respond via social media? Have we enabled self-service?

Customer expectations are changing fast. We need to change fast as well. If we don’t, customers have options.

It isn’t all about the technology however. How empowered are our customer service agents?

Do you offer your clients a mobile app? Then to stay competitive, you better offer them service through that app as well. So says Salesforce.com.

How does it know this? Other than, that is, its outsized presence in the CRM market?

Salesforce has begun surveying users of CRM applications through a third-party company to understand the industry’s best — and not-so-best — practices. The above finding, plus others, comes from that survey and is part of a report it just released called the State of Service.

Source: What’s the Future of Customer Service? Ask Salesforce

What should you do to start the journey of constituent experience?

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Business, Business Services, Customer Experience, Customer Management, Customer Service, Digital, Nonprofit, Social Media

The effect of everyone jumping on the constituent experience bandwagon is a slowdown in the maturation of this new business discipline. Confusion abounds as does disbelief. Reasonable questions surface around does improving the donor experience really pay off now and in the future. It is important to know whether it works or not.

Customer Journey Experience

No one wants to risk exposing their constituents (and their job security) to new engagement practices that might increase instead of decrease frustration and churn.

However, the growing confusion opens unique opportunities. Here are a couple of strategies to start action plans around.

• Creating a disruptive mindset by reimagining your business and constituent relationships in a digital world.

• Making trusted content as the center of your business strategy and constituent experience.

• Infusing social constituent experience across all business functional and digital touch points.

• Repeatedly measuring and proving the financial results.

If you haven’t begun the journey, now would be the time to start.

“Lithium’s blueprint is in direct response to customer requests for advisory and insight services to help them make their social customer experience strategy a reality.” He defines social customer experience as “unlocking the passions of your customers in the digital world in a way you can capture those insights, measure them and empower your organization to bring your customers along.” ~~Rob Tarkoff, Lithium Technologies President and CEO

Customer Experience Isn’t Just About Customer Service

Tags

Customer Experience, Customer Service

Customer Service

Customer service is not the same as the customer experience. Customer service is one interaction, usually on one channel, out of many.

Taking the holistic view is important. What does the whole experience look and feel like?

One great customer service experience, in and of itself, will not make up for ten bad product failures.

What, then, is customer experience? In its simplest definition, it is (a) the sum of all the interactions that a customer has with a company over the course of the relationship lifecycle and (b) the customer’s feelings, emotions, and perceptions of the brand over the course of those interactions.

via CX Journey™: Customer Experience Isn’t Just About Customer Service.

Is your contact center focused on the experience?

Tags

Contact Center, Customer Experience, Customer Service

Customer Service

Is your contact center loyalty focused and focused on the experience of the customer? As a consumer, I do have to interact with contact centers. I would say that most of my experiences are horrible.

One of the trends I am seeing is that as companies more fully understand the link between customer experience and loyalty, especially with customer service, they are increasingly viewing contact centers as value-creators and not just cost centers.

Some of the effects we are seeing is less focus on average-handle-time and other productivity metrics, more focus on the customer experience,  customer feedback and quality metrics. There is more on-shoring of previously off-shored interactions, and more investment in agent training and coaching.

Consumers that are satisfied with customer service interactions are more than 4 times as likely to repurchase than those who are dissatisfied.

Interested in a Voice of the Customer Program? First build executive support

Tags

Customer Experience, Customer Management, Customer Service, Voice of the Customer

Interested in a Voice of the Customer Program? First build executive support. Those who have gone through the process all say it is critical.  It is also consistent with research showing that executive support builds a foundation for VoC success.

Executive support helps Customer Experience pros put key building blocks in place, such as adequate tools to collect and analyze data and processes to systematically act on it.

How do you build support? Prove the value of the program by demonstrating tangible business value. Track the results of service recovery efforts to save unhappy customers and aggregate the results of improvement projects initiated by VoC-collected data.

So, get started fast but make sure the C-suite is on board.

5 questions to ask about your customer focus

Tags

Customer, Customer Acquisition, Customer Management, Customer Service, Loyalty

Loyalty

Whether you are a business leader of a department or the CEO, these questions make sense to ask and get answers about.

Asking the right questions is most of the job some days. Thanks to Peppers and Rogers for their insight into these questions. They have been at the customer focus for a long time now.

1. How many new customers are you attracting and what is their value?

2. How many customers are you losing; why and what is their value?

3. Why are your continuing customers loyal to you?

4. What is the profitability of each customer group?

5. Are your customers vouching for you?

Read more: Customer Strategy | Making Customers an Asset of Your Business

What is the Customer Experience Index? Why should you care?

Tags

Customer, Customer Experience, Customer Experience Index, Customer Service, Digital, Forrester

Is it ok to your investors to ignore money on the table by providing a mediocre customer experience?

Kerry Bodine, Vice President and Principal Analyst at Forrester Research, discusses what Forrester’s Customer Experience Index is and what it means for you.

The Forrester Customer Experience Index (CxPi) is calculated as an average of the indexes that came from consumer responses to the following three questions from their online survey:

Customer Experience

1. Thinking about your recent interactions with these firms, how effective were they at meeting your needs? (This question drives the “meets needs” index.)
2. Thinking about your recent interactions with these firms, how easy was it to work with these firms? (This question drives the “ease of working with” index.)
3. Thinking about your recent interactions with these firms, how enjoyable were the interactions?  (This question drives the “enjoyability” index.)

Consumers selected responses along a five-point scale — ranging from a very negative experience (1) to a very positive one (5). The individual indexes were calculated by taking the percentage of consumers who selected one of the top two boxes (4 or 5) and subtracting the percentage of consumers who selected one of the bottom two boxes (1 or 2). The correlations between CxPi and NPS were calculated using the sum of the consumer responses to the three above questions that make up the CxPi, yielding a range of 0 to 15, and the respective answers to the NPS question asked in the survey

Correlations above 0.8 are actually considered bad because they imply that you simply measured the same thing two different ways. This makes the second metric redundant — unless it is significantly cheaper or easier to collect than the original.

Forrester based this assertion on findings that for 11 industries recently studied, the correlation between CxPi scores and “likelihood to recommend to a friend of colleague” on a five-point scale ranged from a low of 0.61 (which is still quite high) for retailers to a high of 0.70 for TV service providers.

What is the future of customer surveys in our brave new world of customer experience?

Tags

Customer, Customer Experience, Customer Service, Market research, Marketing, Voice of Customer

What is the future of customer surveys in our brave new world of customer experience?  As more companies thirst for customer feedback, the number of surveys has escalated. But there is a limit to customers’ willingness to complete surveys. I know, as a customer myself, that I am growing weary of completing the long, almost narcissistic surveys. 15 to 30 minutes.

As completion rates get more difficult to maintain, companies will become more efficient with the questions they ask, target questions at specific customers in specific situations, and stop relying as much on multiple-choice questions and surveys that take a long time to complete.

Further complicating the landscape is the decline in the traditional phone number with fewer and fewer land-lines.

Tidbit: When the Tempkin Group asked large companies with Voice of the Customer programs about the changing importance of eight listening posts, multiple choice survey questions were at the bottom of the list.

How do you turn bad customer service into a win-win?

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Amber Schaub, Customer Experience, Customer Service, Education and Training

Customer service isn’t always easy. No product or service is perfect. Customers get frustrated. There are some basic principles that executed consistently can turn bad customer service into a win-win.

Here are some very good ideas from Amber Schaub, founder and CEO of RuffleButts, an online retailer specializing in clothing for toddlers, offers a few tips on providing excellent customer service based on her five years’ experience as a small-business owner:

• Always respond promptly. Even if you don’t have an immediate solution, customers like to know their complaint has been heard. Offer a tentative time frame if possible, or let them know you’re working on a solution.
•  Carefully choose employees. Employees who will be working in the customer service department or handling any customer interactions. “They are ultimately your voice,” says Schaub.
•  Make it personal. Include a handwritten note or a personal follow-up call.
•  Follow the golden rule. Treat your customers as you would like to be treated in a similar situation.
•  Use the Wow factor. Wow them. They will never forget it.

via How to Turn Bad Customer Service Into a Win-Win : topic :: American Express OPEN Forum.

How can you turn a problem into an opportunity? Great service is the key!

Tags

Customer Experience, Customer Service, Expectations

Customer Service

We all experience problems with products we buy or service we receive from companies. We know it happens and can to some extent deal with it.

What we can’t deal with is a lame effort at resolving the problem. This is a great story on how to set up service to handle the inevitable.

Expectations mean a lot. We can ignore them but it won’t be good for our business.

Customers expect great service all the time but great customer service shines through mainly when something goes wrong. And despite their best attempts, organizations will face circumstances when their customers are unhappy with their experience.The trick, and what differentiates great brands from the rest, is how they recover from these roadblocks. I recently purchased a highly discounted cardigan from one of my favorite companies, the flash sales site Ideeli. When the item arrived, I noticed that the belt that was supposed to be included was missing. I quickly emailed the organization to explain what happened and ask whether they could send me the missing belt.

Read the rest here: Great Service Turns Problems into Opportunities – Think customers: The 1to1 Blog.

How much does it cost you to get one new customer?

Tags

Acquisition, Business Services, Consulting, Customer Experience, Customer Service, Customer Value, Seth Godin

In the world of marketing and the customer experience, there are two things worth knowing. The Digital Executive knows the answers “dead cold” and knows why it is important to know them.

Do we know the answers? If not, we should. Seth Godin nails them both.

Two things every business and non-profit needs to know:

• How much does it cost you to get one new customer?
• On average, what’s that customer worth over the relationship you have with her?

The internet revolutionizes both sides of the equation.

For more, read Seth’s Blog: Lifetime value of a customer/cost per customer

“In 2013, 66% of consumers switched brands or business due to poor customer service, a 4% increase on the previous year.” ~Accenture

Tags

Accenture, Customer Service

Customer Service

This is stunning but as consumers we all know it. We all have horror stories of not just bad, but downright aweful customer service.

And it is not getting better. It is in fact, getting worse.

Want to stand out? Want to renew more of your customers?

Here is a key. Be obsessed about amazing and stunning customer service. Consumers will forgive you. There is something you can do about it.

Make an investment in the stunning. Get on board now.

Globally in 2013, 66% of consumers switched brands or business due to poor customer service, a 4% increase on the previous year. Some 82% of those who switched said the brand could have done something to stop them. ACCENTURE GLOBAL CONSUMER PULSE SURVEY, NOVEMBER 2013

What is the single most important digital business trend?

Tags

Customer, Customer Experience, Customer Service, Data integration, Digital Disruption

What is the single most important digital business trend? I think it is fair to say we have entered the age of the customer. Customers have amazing choices (and technology) at their fingertips. From a competitive point of view it can be disruptive. It can mean the difference between thriving economically or failing. As digital executives, we must lead the way. 

In an age where customers are so empowered by easy access to information, they are taking control of processes companies are used to controlling. Hard wired strategic plans are going out the window as we are forced to become more flexible and nimble. So some things to think about:

• Are we customer obsessed?
• Can we master the customer data flow when existing data integration projects have failed?
• Will we provide new services quickly based on emerging customer needs?
• Is the “technology side” of our business ready to partner with business teams to remove complexity and create lean, nimble solutions?

Hard questions but our customers expect no less since they have so many choices.

Are you a customer-focused or operations-focused company?

Tags

Customer Focus, Customer Service, Employee Engagement, Empowerment, Hiring, Leadership, Operations, Training

I want you to focus on your customers

There are differences on how to approach your business. You get to decide. How conscious is that choice? Has inertia taken over?

It is important to think through, plan and execute around creating a better customer experience.

Some companies really understand customer service. They know how to hire for it, train for it and deliver it. Other companies claim to give customer service, but in reality, they are grounded in an operations mentality with rules and policies that allow for little flexibility, preventing them from being anything more than just average or satisfactory. 

via Six Differences Between Customer-Focused Companies and Operations-Focused Companies.

Here are some ideas to focus on:

1. Empowerment – employees can make decisions in the best interest of the customer
2. Hiring – bring people on who fit the customer-focused culture
3. Training – spend time and money on soft skills like relationship building
4. Leadership – create a vision and mission that is focused on the customer
5. People first – employees and their engagement make a difference
6. Customer service – service comes first, no matter what