SwBratcher's Posts

Companies can take four steps to assure their brand is delivered consistently to customers:

1. Provide multiple service channel options. Nowhere is the need for customer service options more apparent than when talking about generational differences.
   • Baby Boomers (1946-1964) like individualist interaction. They like the human touch and are likely to pick up a phone when they need help.
   • Gen X (1965-1980) needs communication to be direct and immediate. They are comfortable with booth traditional customer service and technology so will determine which channel will give them the best result and use it.
   • Generation Y or Nexters (1981-1995) are predicted to be the most challenging of all for us in the customer service world. They have grown up in an interactive, fast paced, technology-savvy, multi-tasking world using cell phones, voice mail and email. They are used to instant gratification. They prefer online resources (don’t forget chat) and want direct, to-the-point communication. Remember, this generation is driven by speed. Getting their loyalty means providing the fastest service – every time.
   The bottom line is that unless a company plans to serve only one generation, multiple channels are necessary for customer satisfaction.

Choose authentic rather than WOW experiences. Customer satisfaction is not earned with one interaction. Rather it is built over a number of consistently positive experiences. Many customer service departments work to achieve the uniqueness of the Zappos.com experience by creating a surprise or WOW moment. However, when it comes right down to it, the delight of the great Zappos customer experience is its consistency and authenticity! While the Zappos representatives work very hard to offer customer solutions, they do it without scripts and with very few boundaries. Each team member is encouraged to use his or her own style while focusing on the customer – which makes it authentic.

Measure your brand experience from the customer’s perspective. Many customer service departments mistake operational efficiency metrics for customer loyalty metrics. When asked about customer loyalty, they may recite their track record on response and resolution times. But, what if the most important part of the interaction for the customer is the first call resolution or the quality of the online portal? Focusing on improving the response and resolution times will make the department more productive, but that may not be enough for the customer to become a repeat buyer or advocate your company’s products and services. Savvy customer service departments know the top drivers of customer satisfaction and make those the priority for monitoring and improvement.

Engage your customer-facing employees. It’s no secret, happy employees make happy customers. And empowerment and company pride are two basic ingredients of happy employees. Highly engaged employees feel they are making a difference by doing what is in the best interest of the customer and are rewarded for those customer successes. Their basic values are in sync with corporate values. They articulate the service excellence that the company provides, feel the company is well managed and provides a high quality product. Of course, an engaged employee begins with good hiring practices. I heard a Nordstrom executive say it best – “Hire the smile; train the skill.”