Graeme' Book "Big Hearted Telephone Customer Service"

For information on Graeme's book "Big Hearted Telephone Customer Service", click here.

IT Customer Satisfaction

I spoke this week at the Australian Computer Society September forum and mentioned a quote from Gartner.

"More than 50% of users will be dissatisfied with the slow rate of IT change in their enterprises by 2013, up from 30% in 2008" (click here to see the whole article)

My point is that this statement, like many others in the history of the computer industry, can be proved wrong. This will only happen if there is commitment between IT people and users.

My question is, " is Gartner correct that the current level of dissatisfaction 30%?" What is your experience as a user or IT professional? What would need to change for this to be reversed?

Making a difference when the economy is slower

The economy is slowing. Everyone knows it. On Tuesday the RBA reduced interest rates by .25% as predicted and the experts say there's more to come. Various commentators are offering their thoughts about how businesses will cope during the economic correction. Now it's my turn and I invite your comments.

I read an article written by journalist Frances Stewart on Tuesday, the same day as the interest rate reduction. The article addresses the need for franchisees and franchisors need to work together to get through this adjustment. Franchisees are obtaining additional working capital and are going to the banks to obtain it. Have a read of Frances' article by clicking here.

I was particularly interested in the sustainability of the approach Fracnhisees will obviously need to increase revenue to fund this or else reduce profitability while they “ride it out”. The question is how!

I think the answer lies in making a difference. A working knowledge of the emotionality of customer service excellence will be essential for customer retention and business growth. Consumer hesitancy, (and "buyer remorse"), to purchase can be overcome if businesses understand the psychology of customer engagement.

Last week I was speaking at a franchisor award dinner. They had a clear focus on making a difference for their customers by excelling at customer service - I guess that's why I was speaking there. It was a priviledge to share with them on that occassion.

What will you be doing differently to make a competive advantage during the tougher times?

Communicate, communicate, communicate

This is a key to customer service excellence especially when things go wrong. QANTAS has been in the news lately and not for the best of reasons. The latest was an incident involving at 767 travelling to Manila that had to return to Sydney because of a hydraulic leak.

Until recently, I have been a bit of a fan of QANTAS keeping their customers informed about delays and when things go wrong. However, QANTAS has gone off the boil on this one recently. My own experience a couple of weeks ago was on the “midnight horror” or “red eye special” that is scheduled to leave Perth just after midnight and arrive in Sydney just after 6am. The flight was finally cancelled at 3am (O joy!) because of a bird strike in engine 1 on its final approach into Perth. We were left in the dark on a number of occasions when we were told nothing! At times we were told we would be updated on the latest status at certain times but no announcements were given when expected. Management of customer expectations is the key to customer service excellence. In my case, there was only the emotion of anger. In the case of QF19 on August 2, passengers would have had the emotion of fear. Customer emotions must be managed, especially in times of customer stress.

A number of passenger comments were recorded by the Sydney Morning Herald in their report on August 2. Click here to read it.

Here’s the question for you and your organisation. What documented policies and procedures do you have in place to communicate with your customers when things go wrong to manage your customers’ expectations?

Happy New (Financial) Year

Can you believe it? We're half way through the year. A new financial year has just begun and you've got, in NSW away, 131 shopping day until Christmas if you don't count weekends! Execpt we now have weekend shopping so its more like ... Oh you work it out!

What does the next 6 months of business hold for you. What are you going to do to make your customers' experiences memorable?

Here are a some simple ideas and I invite you to add your own.

1. Don't wait for your customers to ring you. Ring them but make sure you have something of value for them, it's not just a chat; your customers are busy.
2. Follow up after you've delivered them a great experience. That way you can demonstrate that you really care.
3. Share with a colleague a difficult call you've had and discuss how you managed a difficult situation or if it went pear shaped, how you might do it better next time.

Together we can do more than anyone one of us can do by ourselves, (this is known as Gestalt psychology); so let's help each other.

The ultimate customer service question ...

There’s a fair amount of ‘buzz’ around customer service circles about using Net Promoter Scores to assess customer satisfaction.

The Net Promoter Score, (NPS) was designed by Fred Reichheld of Bain & Company and is obtained by asking the following simple question –

"On a scale of 0 – 10 (lowest to highest) How likely is it that you would recommend to a friend or colleague?"

The NPS is calculated by the following formula:-
% of Promoters - % of Detractors = Net Promoter Score (NPS)

• Promoters are defined as those who score the question in the range of 9 or 10
• Neutrals are defined as those who score the question in the range of 7 or 8
• Detractors are defined as those who score the question in the range of 0 to 6

There are a number of recent articles that have been written on the subject. Genesys in conjunction with Callcentres.net has some information you can download.

In 2006 Associate Professor Mark Ritson,of the Melbourne Business School did some research into NPS in Australia. If you’re interested in looking at his research, click here.

The main purpose of this blog is to stimulate some local discussion around NPS. Feel free to comment on articles you’ve read or any other contribution. I’m keen to hear from anyone who is using NPS and the benefit it’s adding to your business. Maybe you have a contrarian view. Great let's hear it I’ll be making some further comments later myself.

Is sales manipulation?

It's time for a discussion on ethics. Is sales manipulating people to buy goods and services they don't need?

According to dictionary.com 'manipulate' means to manage or influence skillfully, especially. in an unfair manner.

Is that the art of selling? A google search of sales and manipulation results in over half a million hits.

What do you do when you sell to your customers. If you don't manipulate, what do you do. I'll come back later in the month with a suggestion of an alternative to manipulation.

In the meantime - what do you think?