Download - Customer Experience Blog Book
Customer Engagement
Articles, Anecdotes and Observations asking
‘What More Can There Be?’
Quality in a service or product is not
what you put into it. It is what the
client or customer gets out of it.
Peter Drucker
Welcome
Paradigmantics is passionate about Customer Experience. It’s a subject
we’ve spent many years talking to organisations about and delivering
innovative training and development programmes on. We believe that an
‘Engaged Customer’ is evidence of the very highest and most effective
levels of Customer Experience being delivered by an organisation.
This booklet is a compilation of short articles, offering a sometimes light-
hearted look at the issue of ‘Customer Engagement’ from various
perspectives. They represent a combination of previously published articles
from our popular blog site* alongside some new material written to more
fully ‘round out’ the journey!
We hope you enjoy reading them.
*‘What More Can There Be?’ is our blog site and over the past couple of years we
have posted in excess of 80 articles on a variety of subjects which we have come
across within our training and organisational development work. If you’d like to read
more, please feel free at:
www.whatmorecantherebe.blogspot.com
‘What more can there be?’ is a
powerful question. Upon visiting a
CEO whom I hadn’t seen for some
time, I was delighted to find that
those very words were still written
on his office whiteboard from my
last visit... The atmosphere in the
organisation was tangibly
different’
Becoming an engaged
customer
‘Woo-hoo!’; I’m precious and
much sought after.
I’ve not felt this much in demand
since I owned the only football in
the playground. Shop assistants
grease around me and make
outrageous offers. They want to
be my friend on Facebook. I can
be in ‘the gang’. I’m even
‘valued’ (No, not like an
antique... Cheek!).
And how do I feel about this
adulation? ... I’m not bothered.
You see, they haven’t quite got it
right.
Don’t get me wrong I am an
engaged customer and have
been for some time. Every year I make a special effort to go to ‘The
Langbury’ at Blue Anchor Bay, this has got to be the best hotel experience
in the world and I’ve stayed in a lot. I recommend it to everyone, even hand
out their business cards.
If you want a bike then the only place to go is ‘Race Scene’ in Barnsley; my
bike supplier. I get beautiful Italian cycling products from highly
knowledgeable people; what more could I want? As I ride around the Peak
District I’m a moving billboard, resplendent in my ‘Race Scene’ jersey, shorts,
matching socks and water bottles. I’m not alone, there are lots of other
cyclists pounding the local hills in similar kit.
So how have I become an engaged customer?
Firstly, I engage rationally. Can I have what I want delivered to me in the
way I want? Are they easy to do business with, in the way I prefer?
Secondly, I engage emotionally, which is what makes the difference. Some
organisations achieve this naturally, some try to manufacture it and fail,
others work hard to become the sort of people I like. Once I have chosen to become an engaged customer you can be assured
that I will be loyal and rarely take my custom elsewhere. I will have no
hesitation in recommending your services to anyone who will listen. I’m
happy to give you feedback and let you know how I want to use your
service, knowing that you will listen and will accommodate my whims as far
as you can. Your organisation is mine, part of my lifestyle, part of my
identity.
Who knows, I might even go as far as showing my devotion by getting your
logo as a tattoo. Yes, that’s how much I love ‘Codraphenia’, my local chip
shop!
16% of customers will recommend
a company if they received
average customer service. If the
service was considered to be great
then 84% will recommend the
brand.
People Metrics 2010
Customer Experience -
What it isn’t!
It isn’t PR hype.
A colleague of mind recently bought a car from a company which has
proudly proclaimed in all its advertising and PR that they are better than all
the rest because of the experience they give their customers. Highly
laudable until she actually experienced what they perceived was great
customer experience. So many organisations make these extravagant
claims because they see it as a way of differentiating themselves from their
competitors. This would be great if they really understood ‘customer
experience’.
It isn’t what is written in a training manual.
My son has worked for two major financial organisations both of whom
make great play on their customer experience credentials. They even
publish figures to back up these claims. You only had to talk to him as an
employee to quickly realise that they are not talking about ‘Customer
Experience’, they actually mean ‘Service Delivery’ which is quite a different
thing. He talked about the length of time he was allowed to spend in
conversation with the customer and the methods his colleagues used to
deal with difficult calls. It was easy to spot that these organisations had no
real understanding of what their customers experienced, simply by listening
to the language used by their highly trained employees.
It isn’t apologising when things go
wrong.
An award-winning phone company
apologised to me on 15 occasions over
a six week period before they managed
to connect my home to a phone line.
Every conversation I had with them
started with ‘I can only apologise for
that Sir’. I spoke to operators, sales,
customer service, managers and even a
coach, all of whom failed to deliver the ‘bread and butter’ service of the
company. But they did apologise whole heartedly for the failings of their
colleagues on each occasion!
It isn’t surveys and data collection.
I had a very interesting conversation with a Regional Director of a major
parcel carrier. They were a very good organisation that had made brilliant
improvements in their service. When I asked him to prove to me that they
were good he quickly produced figures, graphs, measurements, and tables.
I was very impressed they had fantastic processes. My experience had
been in trying to get into their building to attend our meeting, just as any
member of the public wanting to make a collection would do. Poor
signage and staff who were happy to assume I knew my way around meant
that this was (to say the least) frustrating. They probably just needed
another graph for this.
What it is, is very simple...
As a customer-facing person use this test. Ask from which side of the
customer interaction are you looking; that of your organisation, or that of
your customer?
What is happening to your customer? Did you deliver? What does your
customer see? What does your customer hear? What does your customer
feel? What is your customer experiencing? That is their customer
experience. We’ve all been a customer; we all know what it is like to be a
customer, so it can’t be that difficult to understand your service from their
perspective.
85% of companies do not take
immediate action on individual
customer feedback
Aberdeen Group (2009)
The no.1 most important
aspect of customer
experience: Deliver!
When I’m talking with people
about what we mean by a
‘customer experience mindset’
they get very enthused about
improving touch points and forget
the most important aspect of any
customer experience. Deliver.
I didn’t spend my time, effort and
hard earned cash with you just to
have a great experience with your
sales assistant, call centre order
taker or your on-line shop. I want
your product, delivered on time and giving me what I expect. I don’t think
I’m unusual in this of course!
My seven sources of disappointment are:
1. It didn’t arrive: When you order a walnut tree it’s not the sort of thing
that is likely to go missing. When mine didn’t arrive as expected I made
a call and was told that the system said it had been delivered to my
address, on time. After searching everywhere anyone might put a tree;
including asking all my neighbours, I had to conclude that I didn’t have
a walnut tree. The parcel carrier made extravagant claims about my
delivery which didn’t change the fact that I had no tree. Once this was
established there was no hesitation in offering me another tree from the
nursery. Great. But it couldn’t be delivered for 12 months! I’d missed the
tree planting season.
2. It’s not what I ordered: My seafood pizza arrives with a great flourish. It
looks brilliant, but I ordered seafood pasta. Sending it back would
mean a long wait while they change the order and my dinner
companions will have finished their meal by the time it arrives. So I
accept the apology and eat pizza.
3. It doesn’t work: Imagine my excitement at the delivery of a new lawn
mower. Followed by the disappointment of returning it because it failed
to start. Exacerbated by the backache from having to cut the grass with
shears.
4. It doesn’t do what I believed it would (or not as well as I hoped): I’m a
little embarrassed to say that the ‘Ab Master 3000’ has not delivered the
six pack as modelled on the shopping channel. (Though, on reflection
this may not be the fault of the product).
5. Unexpected surprises: ‘You didn’t mention the add-ons’. ‘We thought
everyone would know that you also need to buy the stand, otherwise,
obviously Sir, it will fall over.’
6. It needs lots of work to get it going: Never buy a Lego castle. The toy
looks amazing in the picture on the box, which also helpfully states that
an adult may be needed to assist your child build it. My small boy lost
interest after five minutes; it took me nearly six hours hard toil to make
the thousand bricks look something like. It didn’t help that members of
my family (including my junior helper) constantly interrupted asking ’Is it
finished yet!’
7. Not good value: The sense that you have been ripped off doesn’t
incline you towards buying again from this supplier or recommending
them to your friends or family.
Once you can assure me you can avoid all the above, then give me a
great experience.
60% of customers describe
themselves as ‘satisfied’ just before
leaving a brand.
Bloomberg Business Week October
2009
Service Delivery Channels
I was behind a Staples (office supplies) delivery truck on the motorway
recently which carried the advertising strap line ‘Three ways to buy’, with
online, phone and in-store the options offered to me by the lorry. Since we
had ground to a halt in an M6 traffic jam I reflected that this was indeed an
interesting ‘stationary’ choice!
This is nothing new, think tea, loose leaf or in a tea bag which was first
marketed in 1904 by tea merchant Thomas Sullivan. There are many other
examples; the difference today is the range of options that companies want
to offer.
Most have recognised the need to move on from a ‘take it or leave it’
approach, (although this doesn’t apply to their automated phone systems)
to a ‘this is what we will offer you’ mindset.
Finding as many ways as
possible to deliver a service
to us is the challenge. Like
the razor-blade wars
between Gillette and
Wilkinson Sword, it appears
that organisations have to
find one more than their
rivals.
Is this what your customers
want? Have you asked
them? Is this really important
to people? Most importantly
is it worth the investment? Sometimes you need to try something new and
completely different to find better ways to serve your customers. I will be
eternally grateful to the banker who talked their bosses into developing
telephone banking. Internet banking on the other hand may offer benefits
but for me the convenience of telling someone what I want is far superior.
This is where we see the difference between those companies that ‘do to
their customers’ and those that give people the experience they want. A
subtle yet telling differentiator. Telephone Banking is the opportunity for the
bank to give me a personal experience, to connect with me, to involve me
in an interaction which is personalised. I can become emotionally attached
to their service. This is far more difficult to achieve with an internet
experience which is entirely functional.
Although ‘three ways to buy’ is a great idea, will I get three equally great
experiences?
80% of executives say their
company delivers a ‘superior’
customer experience. 8% of their
customers agree.
Bain and Company 2009
I don’t want to flash my
pants!
Once organisations have discovered that delivering what their customer has
ordered is the first step towards giving them a great experience, then they
are ready to take the next step. At this point they usually ask what further
services can be offered to potential customers to differentiate themselves
from their competitors; which quickly becomes a list of features and
benefits.
Let me give you an example:
This weekend, my son was
showing off his new phone.
It was the size and weight of
a brick. I suddenly realised
why there is a fashion
amongst young men to
exhibit the top few inches of
their pants (considering the
number of times Calvin Klein
and Dolce and Gabbana
waistbands have been
flashed at me and I hadn’t
realised why!). I postulate
that it is because their
phones are so heavy that
gravity is continually pulling
their trousers towards the ground! It’s nothing to do with fashion and
everything to do with technology. Keen to find out more I asked him to
explain why his phone was so much better than mine.
Apparently it can wake him up in the morning, when he can check Twitter,
Facebook and his e-mails before he gets out of bed. He can set off for
University guided by GPS all while accessing the internet, which considering
he cycles to lectures must be dangerous. Texts are no problem using the
tiny keyboard, and anything of visual interest can be attached as a photo
or video. He can even video-call me via Skype if I’m online.
Is this is what all new phones are like? Is this is what I am to expect when I
change my handset?
I started to hyperventilate. I only want to make phone calls! An answer
machine is useful but I don’t want all these other things. I want to use my
phone to talk; if I wanted to text I’d buy a typewriter. Most importantly I
don’t want the world to know that my underpants are from Asda-Walmart,
made by George!
To compound the issue, my phone provider recently offered me 300 free
texts per month. I told them I really only wanted a contract for making
phone calls, so they could knock off the 300 texts and do me an even better
deal. Alas, I was told they didn’t do this and I would have to have the
service, texts and all.
Often organisations fail to distinguish between customer service and
customer experience. They give their customer the service whether or not
they want it. They operate from their perspective rather than viewing the
interaction from their customer’s perspective. Only when they are able to
put themselves in my position and tailor what they can offer to what I want
are they attending to my customer experience. So a phone that is just a
phone... is this too much to ask for?
By 2014 Smart phone sales will
exceed 1.7 billion.
Jim Morrish: Analysys Mason 2010.
At this point nearly every man
woman and child in the western
world will have one.
Exactly what it says on
the tin...?
There is a great TV ad for Ronseal Woodcare products which has the strap
line ‘does exactly what it says on the tin’. If only that were true of all the
products and services we buy. How often do we fail to get the delivery we
were expecting, when we were expecting it and to the standard we
wanted? There is no way an organisation can work towards giving their
customers a great experience if they can’t do ‘exactly what they’ve said on
their tin’. This has to be the very bare minimum starting point for any
customer experience.
Yet this fact seems to have
passed them by. Take the
phone company who I
contracted to reinstall the
connection to my new home.
They took my order, arranged
the date and sorted a
contract. I had clearly told
them they would have to send
an engineer to fit a phone
socket because there was no
longer one in the property. A
few weeks later when they rang to check on my experience so far and to
make further arrangements, I was told that if the connection didn’t work at
the appointed switch on date then I could call them to arrange an
engineer’s visit. How would I know it hadn’t worked, I had no socket to
connect a phone to? I had asked for an engineer’s visit at the time I made
the contract with them and now I am told this could only happen if the
connection couldn’t be done from the exchange, which they wouldn’t
know until they switched me on. Why won’t they believe me when I tell them
it won’t work because I have no socket! My phone line would not be
delivered at the arranged time to any standard. I had a negative customer
experience.
It is easy to spot the customer focus of an organisation by playing a simple
game. We call it the ‘Blame Game’. All you do is listen to the reasons given
for the failure in delivery. Have a go yourselves, it’s a lot of fun. Here are
some examples to get you started:
‘The system’s down’.
‘We deliver in your area on a Thursday.’ ‘I’m not there on a Thursday’ I
reply. ‘In that case you will have to make arrangements to be there so
we can deliver.’
‘We are not authorised to tell you how to complain.’
‘It is not possible to tell you the name of our Chief Executive.’
‘‘They’ haven’t filled in the field.’
This tells you loud and clear that people are wedded to a process which is
far more important than you, the customer.
They have likely been given targets for implementing the process. They are
accountable for their role in the process - not for the way they help their
customer. Thus ‘the process’ is the customer experience.
So let’s have some honesty. Don’t talk about how focused you are on the
customer experience if you really mean your team is focused on service
delivery.
Let’s all understand that delivering ‘exactly what it says on your tin’ has to
be the very minimum standard for any customer experience.
‘The man who can smile when
things go wrong has just thought of
someone else he can blame it on.’
Robert Bloch, American Writer
Role Models
As a schoolchild I had
compulsory swimming lessons at
the local baths every week.
Being quite competitive, I was
determined to be in the top set
which meant the chance to go
in for the hard swimming
achievement badges. On the
day of group selection I was
horrified to find we had to swim
across the pool using front
crawl. I was a reasonable
swimmer but I’d never even
attempted front crawl I didn’t even know the rudiments of the stroke. All
seemed doomed to failure. Luckily a new girl had recently arrived in school,
she was American and was an amazing swimmer. She glided effortlessly
through the water using whatever stroke she wanted. I decided upon a
foolhardy, yet with hindsight, quite good plan. I would watch carefully what
she did and simply copy her technique. Which I did, incorporating a long
dive and holding my breath for the whole distance I managed exemplary
front crawl and learned some valuable lessons.
1. Always do the things with complete confidence, it gives the impression
you know what you’re doing
2. Technique is everything
3. Be prepared to take a risk, the worst thing that can happen is you will
drown
4. Find the very best people and learn from what they do
5. God Bless Americans
People hold the customer experience you get in USA as the role model for
customer service. I have had great service when visiting America; I have
also had quite the reverse. What you notice wherever you go is that you will
get pockets of great practice. If one person is brilliant then usually many are
brilliant. People follow a role model. They want to be like the person most
admired in the organisation.
Culture is contagious and self managing. Take the example of the fantastic
Italian waiter we had at a restaurant recently. He had the accent, the
mannerisms, the skills and the look of the other brilliant waiters. When you
heard him ‘off duty’ he had the broadest Yorkshire accent and had no
connections with Italy except that he served pizzas for a living. He probably
didn’t even realise that when he was at work he became Italian! The culture
he immersed himself in everyday meant he could give his best, indeed he
couldn’t give anything else.
Managers in particular need to be constantly vigilant of themselves. Their
team is a reflection of themselves, they are the role models. Their team want
to be like them. If they are not what you want them to be - then you need to
look to yourself. People learn by copying the actions of those that look like
they know what they are doing.
WARNING. This doesn’t apply to learning front crawl. If you want to become
a master swimmer, get lessons. If you use my technique as a model be
warned it could result in being humiliated at the public swimming pool as
the lifeguard pulls you from the water.
‘It takes 20 years to build a
reputation and only five minutes to
ruin it. If you think about that, you
will do things differently’.
Warren Buffett, Investor and
Author.
Becoming the
Disengaged Customer
My car is very clever in helping me look after its every need with interesting
bleeps and flashing lights. In this way I can put in fuel before we grind to a
halt, top up with oil, fill the washer and organise a service. We are both
happy with the arrangement. It works well. However it seems that
this isn't enough. All of a sudden the garage has discovered customer
experience.
When we arrived in the service centre car park we were met by no lesser
figure than the manager. He wished me a pleasant day and pointed
towards the reception area. He was being slightly too friendly. Rather
different from the last time I clapped eyes on his sharp suit when he offered
me peanuts in part exchange for my old vehicle.
The receptionist was brilliant, but then again, she always has been. I left for
home to wait for the mechanics to do their job.
As usual I received a phone call to tell me that my brake pads were 30%
worn and other stuff which would cost £3,000 to put right, including £30 to
unblock a windscreen washer
pipe. All of which I respectfully
declined.
When I returned to collect my car it
seems that under the new ‘customer
experience’ regime taking my
money was no longer enough. I was
urged by the manager to follow
them on Twitter and join their
’Facebook’ community if I was really
to have the best possible
experience. Not long afterwards I
received an SMS text inviting me down to the showroom to have a ‘special’
chat with their salesperson about a new car model. This was then followed
by a courtesy phone call asking if I was still OK because at my last car
service there was a blocked windscreen washer pipe that I declined to
have fixed; touching concern for my safety.
Why do I feel these are just marketing ploys? How come I'm left thinking
these are not genuine invitations to become involved? What makes me feel
like this is a new bandwagon which has my cash at heart and not my
welfare?
The Manager doesn’t get it. He sees this effort as a sales tactic to ‘make’
me a loyal customer. I was engaged by a genuine, skilled receptionist and
my clever car. Now I go to ‘my’ Kwik Fit for a better deal on servicing and
parts, and really genuine, honest people, who are interested in tyres and
shock absorbers, not Twittering about it.
‘There is only one boss: The
customer. And he can fire
everybody in the company from
the chairman down simply by
spending his money somewhere
else.’
Sam Walton founder of Wal-Mart
In Summary
We are all engaged customers in some aspect of our lives so we know
what it is to become engaged.
Engagement is rational and emotional. It has to be both.
The reward for having engaged customers is immense and should be
treated with respect by companies.
Always deliver. This is the very minimum level of customer experience,
but organisations should beware of putting their processes before their
customer.
Creating a wide range of ways to do business with your customers is
great. Each, however, has to deliver a great experience. One way
can’t be better than another. It’s also good if they all join up.
There is a distinct difference between customer service - which you give
to your customer; and customer experience – which is the way they
perceive your efforts.
It’s everyone’s responsibility, at all times, with all your customers and
colleagues to give a great service. People don’t engage when they
receive a great experience from some people, some of the time.
Facebook, Twitter et al are a means to engage, but they alone don’t
create engaged customers.
‘I now own a smart phone, it’s a whole new experience for me to make a
telephone call.’ Dave Bradley 2011
Only 38% of business leaders
identified ‘leading by example’ as
a key quality for a leader .
Grant Thornton Leadership Survey
2005
For every 26 people that
experience a problem with a
brand, only 1 will report it back to
the company.
TARP research
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