Maypole Madness

Well, we’re living in topsy-turvy times – its the month of May and the weather has returned to mid-winter; there’s a drought but we’ve also had floods in the last week! Economically and politically times are tough too and all combined its certainly having an impact on many customer relationships too.

As a customer yourself, you’re probably looking for a better deal from your suppliers and perhaps you are taking a little longer than normal to make payments in order to improve your cashflow? Switch that around and perhaps these are the very same tactics your customers are adopting when dealing with you?

So what can you do to try and escape this Maypole Madness? Firstly be polite and actively listen to your customers; secondly be honest about what you can deliver for what price and always try offer a mixture of options and alternatives; thirdly ask your customers for their feedback about your proposals and hopefully you’ll manage to work together to achieve a positive outcome.

However, its also worth acknowledging that you may not be able to resolve your differences with some customers and you may be better off cutting the Maypole ribbons and going your separate ways.

Repeating Top Tapas (It’s not as bad as it sounds!)

A recent trip away has given me yet another great example of what happens when businesses get the ‘customer service thing’ just right and as we all know the mantra that it’s easier to keep existing customers than to obtain new ones, just what is it, that we need to do to keep achieving repeat business?

 

I’ve recently returned from a fortnight of sunshine and carnival in Lanzarote and on this trip my husband and I stumbled across a small tapas bar in the centre of our resort. There were only 6 tables centred around what I can only describe, as an indoor barbecue. It was run by 2 young guys – one was the chef and the other took care of the front of house. The menu consisted of a few standard tapas dishes, plus the day’s specials and some more substantial steaks and a select wine list. After an initial evening of tapas, we returned again several times during our visit and I’m sure many others did too. We also spotted local Spanish customers there too and doesn’t that just confirm to you that you’re in a good eatery?

So what was the key to their repeat business? Firstly they kept everything simple – tapas, steak and wine; they paid attention to the details – we could see the chef cooking each steak or tapas dish with great skill and care and his partner knew the prodigy of the food and wines which he happily shared with customers; both of them demonstrated great passion and enthusiasm for their work and were eager to share this with their customers. If customers were unsure, they offered a sample, so you didn’t have to commit to a dish without knowing what was coming. It was just a great place to eat and relax.

 

As you can see, nothing they were doing was exactly rocket science, but it was definitely working, so what could you be doing to apply this model to your business?

Flipping Heck!

Well its Pancake Day already – time to dig out those trainers, the apron, the frying pan and dash off to the race, flipping your pancake as many times as you dare! It always seem such a typically English activity to me. Anyway, for many Christians Pancake Day signifies the start of Lent, a time when they traditionally fasted, prayed and gave alms. All activities which your business can use to develop your customer service just a little bit more:

Let’s start with the fasting –

• Maybe some of your systems and processes have got a bit ‘fat’? Could you give some of them up, perhaps on a trial basis to see what happens? You can always seek feedback from your customer and team at the end of Lent to see what they think of the new streamlined system.

Then there’s the praying –

• Or perhaps in this context its better to think of it as the opportunity to reflect? Consider what is working well in your business and seek the views of customers and your team to identify the key activities required to deliver and maintain excellent customer service. (This would probably fit in well with the ‘fasting’ above).

Finally there’s the almsgiving –

• What could you give back to your customers, or perhaps the community that you work in? Is there some added extra you could offer customers that will really make them smile and maintain their relationship with you? Or, perhaps you could give some time and/or resources to support an event happening in your neighbourhood, at your local school or community centre? How about a Charity Pancake Race?

Go on, don’t be lemon – get tossing around some ideas and you too could be winning the customer pancake race!

P.S. I Love You

As we approach St Valentine’s Day I’ve been thinking about the ways we show gratitude and appreciation when we are on the receiving end of great customer service.

When you love the service that you receive, either as a one off, or on an on-going basis, what do you do to say ‘thanks’? When was the last time you made a point of recognising fantastic customer service – did you leave a tip, write a letter, send an email, pick up the phone, write an online review or recommend the organisation to somebody else?

Often it might just be the latter – that is we simply tell a friend or colleague and encourage them to use the organisation or service too. This is great by itself, self-converting custom is a good way to maintain and hopefully grow a business, but thinking about your own organisation, wouldn’t it be really helpful to told specifically what was great and what customers would like to see you do more of?

It can be easy to identify those things that customers don’t want, by say, spotting trends in complaints etc. However the themes identified are often common to many sectors and businesses, e.g delivery times, communication breakdowns etc. If you want to stand out you need to be doing more of the great things that differentiate you from other businesses and often it’s the little things that are delivered by individuals that make that difference. So if you’re going to encourage your customers to give you positive and specific feedback, perhaps a good way to start is by ensuring that you take time out to give credit where its due when you receive great service too?

Brrringing in the New Year!

I finally got around to reviewing my current mobile phone contract over the Christmas period and decided that I wasn’t getting the best deal and wanted to switch from my rather ancient handset to one which would allow me to do more whilst on the move. So why then, having spent 2 days, yes 2 whole days, trying to get through to speak to a person at my current provider did I eventually stay with them?

Well, to be honest when I eventually got through, the customer service advisor that I dealt with, a lady called Sue, did genuinely seem to care that I got a deal that would benefit me and came across as wanting to ensure I got a handset that would suit my purposes. Okay, the cynic in me recognises that it was in her interest to retain me as a customer and my husband was surprised that I’ve stuck with them, given the grief I gave him, whilst struggling to get through to them in the first place.

So, what does that tell you about human nature? I think it says something about the fact that as customers, we like to be treated as individuals, whose needs and wants are listened to and hopefully satisfied.

I have now received my shiny new phone and spent most of this afternoon trying to get to grips with a new operating system and transferring my contacts etc. Just one last question – why does it all seem to get harder as you get older…..or is that just me having just had another birthday and celebrated the New Year? Hope your’s is a prosperous one!

A Lonely Lemur Christmas Mystery

Did you see the news at the weekend? A lone Ring-tailed lemur was found abandoned on Tooting Common. His rescuer took him to the Blue Cross where he was treated for hypothermia. He’s now recovering at a specialist wildlife hospital. Eventually they hope to find him a new home too. Ahhh – but how on earth did he end up on Tooting Common? It’s a Christmas mystery!

It’s a Serious Business

The Daily Telegraph recently ran a story concerning the opening of a new Morrisons store in Salford. The article reported that 150 of the 210 staff had been sent for 3-6 months ‘remedial’ training in literacy and numeracy, whilst others attended customer service skills training at Salford College.

The issues this raises are complicated and controversial but surely it’s no bad thing that one of our biggest retailers is taking the recruitment and induction of new employees seriously? Perhaps if more organisations put more effort into their recruitment processes and invested more in customer service skills training, we’d all benefit and receive much better levels of service?

I sometimes wonder if its easier for smaller businesses to maintain higher levels, as all too often when businesses grow the number of systems and procedures put into place can get in the way of delivering great customer service. I’ve often heard anecdotes where a regular customer has struggled to get their supplier to be more flexible with them – say thay want 10 widgets, but these are usually only sold in packs of 20 and the sales office refuse to budge. If offered a discount the customer might just say yes, and remain a loyal customer in the future, but all to often ‘the computer says no’ and the customer ends up switching to an alternative supplier. Do your systems get in the way or do your team have the suthority and flexibility to adapt to the situation?

To finish on a more positive note some larger organisations do manage to get it right – whilst hunting down a number of Christmas presents this year I’ve made use of a number of the high street stores websites to reserve items, which I’ve then picked up later at my convenience, usually at quieter times of the day. So far, this has been a positive experience and the staff in store (particularly Argos) have been great ambassadors for excellent customer service, welcoming me with a smile, checking everything is as reserved and sending me on my way with cheery season’s greetings. Hopefully you are entering into the seasonal festivities too, so Merry Christmas and look out for our next posting in the New Year!

 

Sending Out a DIY SOS

In the past week I’ve had cause to visit 2 branches of the same DIY store and the reception I received in both, could not have been more different. At the first, despite numerous staff behind the customer service desk, finding someone to help me with a firework purchase was decidedly hard work. By way of contrast at the second branch today, within 5 minutes of entering the store 3 separate members of staff had greeted me with a ‘hello’ and a smile and enquired whether I needed any help. No doubt this national chain has customer service policies in place and would expect each branch to deliver a consistently good level of service, so my recent experiences have got me thinking about why this wasn’t happening in practice on their shopfloors.

For many organisations customer service relies upon teamwork – a salesperson takes the order, despatch sends the product, finance raises an invoice and after-sales offers on-going support to the customer. This means that if the customer is to receive excellent service, every single member of the team must understand their role and perform it to the best of their ability. Problems usually arise where communications have broken down between team members. For example, if despatch is unaware that the customer requires the product by a certain date, the goods might not be sent in time to reach them, or, if finance isn’t told of the special promotion currently being offered by sales, they might attempt to charge the customer too much. If one department starts to blame another for the problems encountered, this usually leads to more problems as everybody tries ‘to watch their own backs’ and becomes more reluctant to help out other colleagues and a downward spiral begins leading to worsening customer service.

To overcome such problems it’s important that everyone has a shared understanding about the levels of customer service expected and their role in achieving it. If they understand their colleagues’ roles too, this can lead to greater levels of co-operation and involvement. By encouraging the development of strong relationships between different teams, communications improve and individuals are more likely to offer assistance to each other when problems arise. This means they are resolved quickly and customers are left with the impression that your team worked well together for the customer’s benefit.

Back to the DIY chain – I wonder how much genuine teamwork goes on within the store where my customer experience was shoddy and whether this played a part in the much warmer welcome I received in the second store? Can teamwork really make such a difference – what do you think?

 

Measuring Up!

I have received several invitations in the past week or so, to attend various award ceremonies, most of which include at least one category focused upon excellent customer service. Although not nominated myself (boo hoo!) if you found yourself nominated this might reassure you that you’re delivering great customer service. However, the very best organisations often go to great lengths to ensure they keep up-to-date with best practice in order to maintain and develop their customer service delivery. They usually benchmark their performance against other organisations, both within and outside of their own business sector. They identify what the top performers are doing and where possible, transfer the best elements into their own organisations. They establish performance targets and monitor their progress against these targets.

In addition, many organisations undertake ‘mystery shopping’ activities to find out first hand what it feels like to be one of their own customers – how are they welcomed; treated by staff; what products and services are they offered; at what what prices and how are they delivered and any problems resolved.

None of these activities need be particularly costly and are not only applicable to large organisations. Any business that takes customer service seriously can use these methods to look for ways to raise their performance and who knows, if you adopted them it might just be you receiving that excellent customer service award next time around! Make sure you invite me to jpin you on the red carpet and no crying when you deliver that that acceptance speech!

Cordon Bleu Customer Service

I read an article in one of the weekend papers where a customer had struggled to obtain a cooker hob switch for their discontinued oven. Eventually they managed to identify the company that had taken over the original supplier and asked if they could help. Unfortunately they couldn’t match the missing switch, but they did forward a set of 4 new switches so the customer could have a matching set for the oven – all for free. Okay, its not the most glamorous of customer service stories,  but it certainly makes a change to hear of a business really placing the customer first and thinking beyond the standard transactional experience.

To be really successful you really need to ‘wow’ your customers every now and then and deliver service so outstanding it literally takes their breath away. To do this effectively you need to know and understand your customer base and in particular what they perceive as ‘added value’. It may be that a member of your team goes out of their way to hand deliver a product on the way home from work, thus ensuring your customer can meet a pressing deadline, or that you’re able to send a customer an apt birthday card or anniversary present, showing you care for them beyond the simple business relationship. Remember actions speak louder than words and going the extra mile to support your customers should ensure they are supportive of you when you need it too.