Shep Hyken's Blog, page 222

Guest Post: Top 8 Reasons Why Your Customer Service May Be Failing

This week on our Friends on Friday guest blog post, my colleague John DiJulius talks about 8 reasons organizations may not be providing the customer service that they should. These are all important to creating Amazing customer experiences.   - Shep Hyken 

1. Lack of Executive Sponsorship - It is a proven fact that any big initiative, project, or revolution has to have the support of the senior leadership team. Otherwise it will be considered flavor-of-the-month ormanagement-by-bestseller. The senior leadership team has to provide the necessary resources to create long-lasting change. Customer service has to be as important as finance, sales, operations, and technology. It needs to be talked about at board meetings and strategic planning sessions, with leaders and everyone else in the company including front-line employees.

2. No CXL - Regardless of your company’s size, someone in your organization has to be the Customer Xperience Leader; the person in charge of the Customer experience for the entire company. I am not talking about the Customer service reps or call center. That person should not be the President, CEO or owner, but someone who reports directly to him/her.

3. No CX community - One of the most effective initiatives developed by our consulting clients is an internal Secret Agent Team, made up primarily of non-management staff, to support the Customer service initiatives and help gain momentum throughout the front-line employees.

4. No key metric - Companies need to see the impact that Customer satisfaction has on their key metric drivers (i.e., Customer retention, average ticket, re-sign rates, referrals, average contracts, frequency of visits). This demonstrates the ROI, as well as allows management teams to hold employees accountable for providing a great Customer experience at every level of the organization. Measurement tools can be anything from Customer surveys, third-party companies that measure Customer satisfaction, secret shoppers, to statistical benchmarks (such as the average ticket or the number of referrals. These provide a benchmark to measure the impact of the new systems and to determine whether they are being consistently executed. 

5. Your business is not special - If you ask 100 leaders why delivering superior Customer service is so difficult, you will hear the same answers over and over again: “Our business is unique.” “In our industry it is so hard to find employees, let alone ones who care about service.” “We can’t afford to pay enough to get quality people.” “We have a totally different Customer, it is much more difficult.” Every business is dealing with the same dynamics, trying to un-commoditize their service or product from all their competitors and not get sucked into price wars. 

6. Lack of hospitality training - On average, a company devotes more than 90 percent of its training to hard skills (such as technical and operational skills and product knowledge) and less than 10 percent to soft skills (such as hospitality, relationship building, service recovery, and experiential training). 

7. Low Service Aptitude - The quality of your Customer service comes down to the Service Aptitude of every employee you have. From the CEO to the account executive, sales clerk, call center, receptionist, corporate office support team, to every front-line employee — it’s all about Service Aptitude!!! No one is born with it; it is not innate. The vast majority of the workforce has extremely low Service Aptitude. It is not the employees’ responsibility to have high Service Aptitude, it is the company’s job to teach it to them.

8. Lack of purpose motive - Too many companies underestimate the power a purpose provides to front-line employees, which is critical for having high morale in a workplace.

John R. DiJulius III best-selling author, consultant, and keynote speaker, is the President of The DiJulius Group, the leading Customer experience consulting firm in the nation. He blogs on Customer experience trends and best practices. Learn more about The DiJulius Group or The Secret Service Summit, America’s #1 Customer Service Conference.

For more articles from Shep Hyken and his guest contributors go to customerserviceblog.com

The post Guest Post: Top 8 Reasons Why Your Customer Service May Be Failing appeared first on Shep Hyken.

Are your employees fulfilled, appreciated and understood?

Internal Customer Pulse Check

Forget once-a-year employee surveys. How about once-a-week?  That is if you even do employee surveys.

Many companies will survey their customers. The surveys range from simple questions, as in the Net Promoter Score type surveys to elaborate multiple question surveys. Some of the best companies also survey their employees, typically once a year. The leadership and management in these companies want to make sure that the employee sentiment is in line with the culture, vision, mission and philosophy of the company as a whole.

I recently had a chance to chat with David Niu, the founder of TINYpulse. His company created a simple software program that helps companies keep an ongoing pulse, as David calls it, on how happy, frustrated or burnt out their employees are before employee retention becomes a problem. The tool measures employee engagement by asking one question each week.

By getting the pulse of the employees, the leadership of the company can confirm they are in sync with employees or if they have issues to improve on, such as morale and communication. And in the process of getting this information, there is a very important by-product, which is that employees will feel more fulfilled, appreciated and understood.

David shared what some of the simple, yet powerful questions he suggests companies ask employees.

One a scale of 1-10, with ten being great, how happy are you at work?
Do you have all of the tools you need to be successful in your job?
Do you feel you’re progressing in your personal and professional development in our company?
If you were to leave our company, what would your primary reason be?
What is your favorite memory of working here so far, and how did it make you feel?

The types of questions you might want to ask employees are limited only by your imagination. You can ask for ideas and suggestions, such as:

What’s the best idea you have for saving money?
Do you have a suggestion about how we might improve… just about anything?

I think you get the idea. You can ask just about anything. But, what I liked about David’s process is that he didn’t suggest an annual employee survey. He suggested an ongoing weekly “pulse check” on his employees.

Whether it is once a week or once a month, consistently keeping in touch with your employees’ feelings, concerns, thoughts and ideas are crucial to maintaining your company’s culture. This brings me back to one of my favorite expressions: What’s happening on the inside of the company is felt on the outside by the customer. Tweet

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information contact (314)692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs go to http://www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

The post Are your employees fulfilled, appreciated and understood? appeared first on Shep Hyken.

5 Top Customer Service Articles for the Week of August 18, 2014

TOP CUSTOMER SERVICE AND BUSINESS ARTICLES

Each week I read a number of customer service articles from various online resources. Here are my top five picks from last week. I have added my comment about each article and would like to hear what you think too.

Top Brands That Rock at Customer Service and Tips on Keeping Your Clients Sweet by Lucy Hardaker

(Business2Community) Customer service has always been heavily related to retail environments, but that doesn’t mean us B2B types can’t learn a thing or two about client retention from our B2C cousins.

My Comment: Here is a very short article that features three great brands with three great tips we can all consider using to give our customers an amazing experience.

The Expert Guide to Building Trust Online by Jessica Merritt 

(Online Reputation Management) Building trust online is essential to developing a great reputation, whether you’re a corporation, small business, or ecommerce website. When customers know they can trust you, they believe that you’re credible, that you’ll do the right thing, protect your customers, and deliver on your promises. Without trust, customers may question your reputation and feel unsure about doing business with you.

My Comment: Many clients have asked me about how to create credibility and trust online.  It’s easy to create that trust in a person and even over the phone. Well, the best companies do an amazing job of creating trust. This excellent article provides some great suggestions that will help warm up any website – even if it’s not a website your using to sell. The more trust and credibility you can give your customers, the better! 

The Zendesk Customer Service Benchmark by Zendesk

(Zendesk) Unlike a survey or expert opinion, the Zendesk Benchmark is based on actual customer service and support interactions from more than 25,000 companies (across 140 countries) that opted to participate. It measures key metrics around customer support efficiency, customer self-service behavior, and levels of customer engagement.

My Comment: Our friends at Zendesk have released the 2014 Q2 benchmark study. They explore the correlation between customer service agent’s word choices and the affect it has on the customer and satisfaction ratings. Fascinating information!

Customer support should be everyone’s job. The why and how to make it happen. by Alice Default

(frontapp.com) Turns out though that Zappos, Amazon, Freshbook and all the other companies that share customer support duties throughout their whole teams don’t do it because it’s easier and more cost efficient. In most cases, it goes far beyond meeting demand. It’s about culture, commitment and getting as close as possible to their customer.

My Comment: For years I’ve said, “Customer service isn’t just a department. It’s a philosophy.” I’ve also been an advocate for leadership, management and others that aren’t exposed to the front line customer service, to spend some time there. This article takes it a step further, suggesting that every employee spend a little time on the front line. The benefits are many, as pointed out in this outstanding article.

Is Your Brand’s Personalization Really Customer-Centric? by Daniel Toubian

(CMSWire) True personalization gives brands the opportunity to be wholly customer-centric at every point of engagement. Rather than just increasing conversion rates, personalization involves a continuous effort to improve your customer experience so that visitors will return, purchase and become loyal.

My Comment: At first the title and the picture of this article/blog post caught my eye. I’m a frustrated musician and always wanted to be a rock star. While the suggestions and advice in this article won’t make you a rock star on stage, they will garner you applause in the form of happier customers, which means more repeat business, increased revenue and more. <!-- (<a class="twitter" href="http://twitter.com/maxymiser" title="Daniel Toubian on Twitter" target="_blank">@maxymiser</a>) –> </span></span></p>
<p style="color: #000000;"><em>Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information contact (314)692-2200 or </em><a style="color: #006b93;" href="http://www.hyken.com/" target="_blank"><em>www.hyken.com</em></a><.... For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs go to </em><a style="color: #006b93;" href="http://www.thecustomerfocus.com/" target="_blank"><em>http://www.thecustomerfocus.com</e.... Follow on Twitter: </em><a style="color: #006b93;" href="https://twitter.com/Hyken" target="_blank"><em>@Hyken</em></a></p>
<p>The post <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.hyken.com/customer-loyalty... Top Customer Service Articles for the Week of August 18, 2014</a> appeared first on <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.hyken.com">Shep Hyken</a>.</p>

Guest Blog: Can’t Buy Me Love or Superior Customer Experience

This week on our Friends on Friday guest blog post, my colleague Gregory Yankelovich writes about how customer satisfaction must be measured and examined in all departments of a company. I have always said that in order to provide an amazing customer experience, you must look at all of your internal customers. Shep Hyken 

Superior Customer Experience cannot be delivered without the well orchestrated cooperation of all departments of a company. Yet, this cooperation is very difficult to achieve. The primary reason for the existence of organizational silos is operational efficiency that allows companies to scale their growth. The opposite side of the coin is a lack of unified vision and, as a consequence, the inability to work toward a common goal. This problem has caused many calls for “breaking down the silos,” but I would like to discuss a more constructive approach. Revolutions rarely produce positive ROI for anybody, but their instigators.

There are two approaches commonly discussed to a solution of this problem – heroic leadership act of salvation or/and buying more technology. Neither approach is likely to yield a significant change, in my opinion.

Buying an exercise machine does not improve your health – change of your lifestyle will. Buying marketing automation or big data technology does not improve your company’s prospects for long term profitability growth – delivery of superior customer experience will. Change, before you have to.

Modern organizations are managed by metrics and the dreaded silos are so efficient because they are focused on measurement of isolated sets of results. To continue with the health analogy – measuring blood pressure will not prevent a heart attack unless, the patient is prepared to balance his diet and physical exercise. Similarly, measuring customer satisfaction will not prevent erosion of the company market share, unless the company is prepared to balance it’s operational KPIs and holistic customer experience metric.

The impact of each department within an enterprise on overall customer experience is often neglected and poorly understood. While each one has established metrics to measure its performance, only Customer Service/Support departments are obsessed with measuring customer satisfaction. However, even Customer Service rarely gets it right:

Their obsession is not about holistic customer experience, but about customer satisfaction with customer service.

Their operational KPIs are often cost efficiency focused, and in direct conflict with customer experience goals.

That makes Customer Support department metrics largely irrelevant to the other departments of the company.

A Customer Experience metric is a single measure of how customers perceived their overall experience with the company. However, there are multiple reasons why that perception has formed in their minds. Discovery and measurement of these underlying attributes of the customer experience offers an opportunity to link these attributes to those departments which impact the attribute scores. Below is a crude illustration of the concept.

Samples of verbatim used by the customers should be examined to make the linkage more relevant and accurate. Additional sources of internal relevant information such as product returns and customer support ticket volume/complexity would be critical for triangulation on the actual impact of the attribute on the overall customer experience.

This approach is not limited to B2C companies. Just ask your business clients to describe their experience doing business with your company. Let them do it in their own words and resist the temptation of introducing surveys or other company bias inducing formats. The analysis of their unstructured feedback could produce similar charts. The key is to record multiple experiences of your customer’s employees from different departments. Their experiences could be quite different about different attributes of your relationship.

Breaking the silos is an undesirable and unattainable goal. Alternatively, re-examination of operational KPIs of every department for their impact on delivery of superior customer experience will bring the change we seek.

Gregory Yankelovich has been involved with customer centric product management and marketing for over 25 years. He currently serves as Founder and CEO of Amplified Analytics. Their core competency is the extraction of Customer Experience marketing intelligence from social media, using proprietary opinion mining technology.

For more articles from Shep Hyken and his guest contributors go to customerserviceblog.com

The post Guest Blog: Can’t Buy Me Love or Superior Customer Experience appeared first on Shep Hyken.

Invite Your Customers to Review You

Social Media Policy

Recently I read an article about a hotel that had a unique social media clause written into their special event contracts. This hotel was built in the 1830’s and appears to specialize in weddings.  The property looks to be quite beautiful; however their social media policy is not.

It appears that the hotel is concerned about any negative comments that are posted via social media or any other Internet site.  An article from NYpost.com quotes the following online policy from the hotel:

“Please know that despite the fact that wedding couples love Hudson and our inn, your friends and families may not,” reads an online policy. “If you have booked the inn for a wedding or other type of event . . . and given us a deposit of any kind . . . there will be a $500 fine that will be deducted from your deposit for every negative review . . . placed on any internet site by anyone in your party.”

This tells me the hotel fears for their reputation, and fear can cause a loss of customer confidence.  Are they capable of delivering a great experience? And, why would anyone want to sign a contract with a hotel, or any business for that matter, that would require a guest to sign away their rights, and their guests’ rights, to their freedom of speech?

I’m visualizing the wedding invitation with a footnote that reads: We love this hotel, but you might not. So, if you don’t, please, please, please don’t post a negative review on the Internet. The hotel will charge us $500 if you do. Thanks in advance, and we’ll see you at the wedding!

Contrast this with the hotel I stayed at that has a sign at the front desk that asks you to leave a review on Yelp.  That tells me that they have confidence, which gives me confidence. If there is a problem, the staff will probably take care of it.  The hotel staff is asking to be reviewed, so they are going to do their best to get a good one.

Customers used to talk to their friends over the phone or at parties about their experiences.  Now they post on social media networks like Facebook, Twitter, Yelp and others.  They have a microphone and can be heard by many.

Certain businesses are more likely to be reviewed online, versus others whose reviews may come in the form of discussions with colleagues and friends. Either way, accept that you may be reviewed by the customer. But, even if you’re not going to be reviewed, perform as if you are. Treat every situation, opportunity and interaction as an opportunity to show how good you are. Tweet

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information contact (314)692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs go to http://www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

The post Invite Your Customers to Review You appeared first on Shep Hyken.

5 Top Customer Service Articles for the Week of August 11, 2014

TOP CUSTOMER SERVICE AND BUSINESS ARTICLES

Each week I read a number of customer service articles from various online resources. Here are my top five picks from last week. I have added my comment about each article and would like to hear what you think too.

The Value of Customer Experience, Quantified by Peter Kriss

(Harvard Business Review) What we found: not only it is possible to quantify the impact of customer experience — but the effects are huge.

My Comment: As the experts continue to define the differences between customer service and customer experience, this article further drives home the point. Furthermore, the experience is improved when you move from a transaction model that focuses on the immediate sale to a longer term/bigger picture model, focused on loyalty.

Online Customer Reviews : “Sorry – Your review didn’t quite meet our guidelines” by Steve Drake

(IJGolding) This post is a personal story that questions the lack of transparency that some retailers have with their online customer reviews, with potential unintended consequences for their brands.

My Comment: Companies who resist the opportunity to use social media to enhance their customer service are making a mistake. It doesn’t matter if you are B2C or B2B, monitor the social channels and respond quickly to all customer comments – not just complaints. There are some great tips and examples in this article.

Hand Delivered Love by Doug Sandler

(Nice Guy Blog) Arriving in your mailbox today is a stack of bills, a handful of newsprint style advertisements, the latest edition of People magazine and a thank you note. A hand addressed, rectangular shaped little treasure, full of hope and love and wonderful words about you. Don’t you get excited to open it?

My Comment: When I was a kid, about the time I could write just somewhat legibly, my mom had me start writing thank you notes whenever people did nice things for me. Today, people don’t write thank you notes. They sometimes don’t even say thank you. I believe that any sign of appreciation, be it a phone call, an email and even a text, is a positive touch point with someone you want to express appreciation to. But, the hand-written thank you note is most powerful. That said, I just received a beautiful pen from a friend. I wrote him a note, using the pen. In addition to saying thank you, I told him that even an expensive pen won’t help my terrible penmanship. Great article and a great reminder.

5 Ways Entrepreneurs Fail at Customer Experience Strategy by Jeannie Walters 

(Steamfeed) Things that didn’t seem to matter much before become vital components of a winning customer experience strategy. Here are some ideas on how to avoid disaster.

My Comment: Great article! You don’t need to be an entrepreneur to appreciate these tips. Any size company can benefit from at least one, if not all of these ideas. My personal favorite is the first one, which is focused on creating a customer service mission. It comes from the top and is delivered via the entire organization.

14 Small Business Customer Service Insights from the Pros by Adam Ramshaw

(Run Our Survey) I asked people who were either small business experts or customer service experts one simple question to really get to the heart of what they believe is important for small business customer service: What’s your personal, number one, customer service must do?

My Comment: Some excellent advice shared by some excellent and very smart people.  Fifteen experts from business and customer service share a tip.  There is something here for everyone – and every company.

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information contact (314)692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs go to http://www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

The post 5 Top Customer Service Articles for the Week of August 11, 2014 appeared first on Shep Hyken.

5 Top Customer Service Articles for the Week of August 9, 2014

TOP CUSTOMER SERVICE AND BUSINESS ARTICLES

Each week I read a number of customer service articles from various online resources. Here are my top five picks from last week. I have added my comment about each article and would like to hear what you think too.

The Value of Customer Experience, Quantified by Peter Kriss

(Harvard Business Review) What we found: not only it is possible to quantify the impact of customer experience — but the effects are huge.

My Comment: As the experts continue to define the differences between customer service and customer experience, this article further drives home the point. Furthermore, the experience is improved when you move from a transaction model that focuses on the immediate sale to a longer term/bigger picture model, focused on loyalty.

Online Customer Reviews : “Sorry – Your review didn’t quite meet our guidelines” by Steve Drake

(IJGolding) This post is a personal story that questions the lack of transparency that some retailers have with their online customer reviews, with potential unintended consequences for their brands.

My Comment: Companies who resist the opportunity to use social media to enhance their customer service are making a mistake. It doesn’t matter if you are B2C or B2B, monitor the social channels and respond quickly to all customer comments – not just complaints. There are some great tips and examples in this article.

Hand Delivered Love by Doug Sandler

(Nice Guy Blog) Arriving in your mailbox today is a stack of bills, a handful of newsprint style advertisements, the latest edition of People magazine and a thank you note. A hand addressed, rectangular shaped little treasure, full of hope and love and wonderful words about you. Don’t you get excited to open it?

My Comment: When I was a kid, about the time I could write just somewhat legibly, my mom had me start writing thank you notes whenever people did nice things for me. Today, people don’t write thank you notes. They sometimes don’t even say thank you. I believe that any sign of appreciation, be it a phone call, an email and even a text, is a positive touch point with someone you want to express appreciation to. But, the hand-written thank you note is most powerful. That said, I just received a beautiful pen from a friend. I wrote him a note, using the pen. In addition to saying thank you, I told him that even an expensive pen won’t help my terrible penmanship. Great article and a great reminder.

5 Ways Entrepreneurs Fail at Customer Experience Strategy by Jeannie Walters 

(Steamfeed) Things that didn’t seem to matter much before become vital components of a winning customer experience strategy. Here are some ideas on how to avoid disaster.

My Comment: Great article! You don’t need to be an entrepreneur to appreciate these tips. Any size company can benefit from at least one, if not all of these ideas. My personal favorite is the first one, which is focused on creating a customer service mission. It comes from the top and is delivered via the entire organization.

14 Small Business Customer Service Insights from the Pros by Adam Ramshaw

(Run Our Survey) I asked people who were either small business experts or customer service experts one simple question to really get to the heart of what they believe is important for small business customer service: What’s your personal, number one, customer service must do?

My Comment: Some excellent advice shared by some excellent and very smart people.  Fifteen experts from business and customer service share a tip.  There is something here for everyone – and every company.

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information contact (314)692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs go to http://www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

The post 5 Top Customer Service Articles for the Week of August 9, 2014 appeared first on Shep Hyken.

Guest Blog: 5 Reasons Why Outsourcing Your Customer Service Can Be A Smart Move

This week on our Friends on Friday guest blog post, my colleague Alleli Aspili talks about the challenge of companies providing excellent customer service and explores the option of outsourcing. - Shep Hyken

You’re a growing business and painting the best vision for your company. One of the things you want to achieve is to provide satisfying and convenient customer service to your consumers while keeping your costs low. Whether online or via the telephone line, you want your customers to have the flexibility to contact you. You swear to yourself that there’s no way you would have the old ringy-dingy call center that answers unattended phones. You target to meet customers’ needs in any way possible.

But the problem comes from your in-house staff doing your customer service. They aren’t highly-skilled and competitive enough to carry out the challenging task. So what on earth would happen now?

Should you outsource your customer service?

Customer service is an important aspect of any business. In fact, it can make or break a company, regardless of size and sophistication. In this age of relationship marketing, it’s vital to make every customer contact as positive and productive as possible.

One way to improve your customer service and win consumers’ loyalty is through outsourcing. Employing a third-party provider to manage your customer care operations can give you substantial and long-term benefits such as:

Cut costs and save BIG

Organizations running their own contact and fulfillment departments often experience higher costs. Outsourcing converts fixed costs into variable costs and allows you to budget effectively. No need to invest on employee training, or purchasing expensive technology. Outsourcing your customer service to a trusted vendor can help you save on the capital expenditure, time, and extra efforts.

Get access to skilled expertise

Professional outsourcing providers have dedicated teams to provide outstanding customer service which can give your business a competitive edge. These personnel have diverse expertise and skills across different industry and technologies that can help you achieve superior quality and unmatched proficiency in customer service.

Increase your efficiency and competitiveness

Outsourcing your customer service ensures your customers receive the help they need when they need it. This will make them happier and will leave you less stressed. Top service providers also have the capacity to absorb dramatic demand shifts, enabling quicker ramp-ups and ramp-downs than in-house centers.

Focus on your core business

In the face of competition, outsourcing your customer care also broadly enables you to focus on core areas of your business while concentrating on its long-term, strategic processes. This will allow you to have the advantage of progressing and staying ahead of the competition.

Get higher revenue

Lastly, customer service providers can work with you to generate revenue through your customer care operations by improving metrics such as first-call resolution, average handle time, customer satisfaction.

So now, have you considered outsourcing your customer service?

Alleli Aspili is a Senior Specialist for Business Development in Infinit Outsourcing, Inc., an ISO-certified BPO company that caters SMEs. She is responsible for maintaining Infinit-O, Infinit Contact, Infinit Healthcare and Infinit Accounting online brand and content. While out of work, you can still see her in front of her computer – learning more about marketing. She’s an internet and social media geek.

For more articles from Shep Hyken and his guest contributors go to customerserviceblog.com

The post Guest Blog: 5 Reasons Why Outsourcing Your Customer Service Can Be A Smart Move appeared first on Shep Hyken.

Invisible Customer Service: The Customer Must Be Reminded of How Good You Are!

Proactively Engage the Customer

When you go to a restaurant, a retail store, or your company has an ongoing relationship with a vendor, it’s easy to decide if you are receiving good customer service. You talk with people, employees or sales people help you, deliveries are made on time, you call for support, and more. Based on these interactions and the promises that are kept, you determine if you are receiving the level of customer service that you expect. However, there are some companies where the service may be less visible, if not even invisible.

Recently, my laptop computer, which I’ve had for almost three years, locked up. Good news. I had a three year extended warranty, which was still valid. When I called to get my problem resolved, I experienced an incredibly high level of customer service. The wait on the phone was minimal. The customer service agent was knowledgeable. They sent replacement parts out via over-night delivery.  I couldn’t ask for more.  As a result, I will always buy the expensive extended warranty for my computer.  But, what if the computer never had issues? What if I never had the opportunity to experience their service? They would be invisible. I wouldn’t have the appreciation for how they treat their customers. I might consider another computer company for my next purchase because I never experienced how good they are.

Health insurance companies are another good example of invisible customer service. Let’s say that you are young and healthy and have an individual insurance plan. You stay healthy for several years. As a result, there’s a pretty good chance that other than the ongoing premium payments, you never experience the customer service that the health insurance company has to offer. It won’t be until you are sick and need to take advantage of the insurance that you will find out if the company is going to offer you good service. How easy will it be for you to make a claim? How quickly will that claim be paid? There are many more questions that will confirm you made the right decision to choose this company, but until you make a claim, you’ll never know.

I recently had the pleasure and honor of working with AvMed, a health insurance company based in Florida. They are incredibly customer-focused. They care immensely about their customers, whom they call members, and their health. And, they want them to know it. They don’t wait for their members to file a claim to prove how good they are. They proactively pick up the phone and call them. They let them know how to take advantage of the services they offer. They suggest ways to save money and stay healthy. This is after the sale. This is to prove that the member made the right choice. They don’t let their customer service be invisible.

Here’s the lesson: Sometimes it’s easy to demonstrate you have amazing customer service. Other times you have to prove it or remind your customers. Click to Tweet  Be it after the sale or in between visits, appointments, etc. How can you show your customers that they made the right choice to do business with you, so that the next time they need what it is that you sell, they think of you? In other words, what keeps your customer service from being invisible?

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information contact (314)692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs go to http://www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

(Copyright ©MMXIV, Shep Hyken)

The post Invisible Customer Service: The Customer Must Be Reminded of How Good You Are! appeared first on Shep Hyken.

5 Top Customer Service Articles For The Week Of July 14, 2014

CUSTOMER SERVICE AND BUSINESS ARTICLES

Each week I read a number of customer service articles from various online resources. Here are my top five picks from last week. I have added my comment about each article and would like to hear what you think too.

10 Ways to Convert More Customers Using Psychology by Gregory Ciotti

(Help Scout) This resource includes 10 studies that reveal such insights into the minds of your customers.

My Comment: Love this article! Here are solid suggestions, using psychology, to deliver a better, value-added customer experience.

A Well-Trained Staff Shows at Marriott Courtyard Pioneer Square by Adam Toporek 

(Customers That Stick) Now, I’ve stayed at a number of Marriott Courtyards over the years, but none have ever stood out for sheer service excellence like the Pioneer Square location in Seattle.

My Comment: This is a great customer service story. The initial communication (a reservation) was a good enough experience to get the business. However after that, it was how the entire experience that came from multiple employees in varied responsibilities that garnered the accolades in this article. Had one person in the chain of events or interactions not delivered at the same level, it would have potentially destroyed the entire experience.

The Inseparable Connection Between Customer Service and Sales by Ian Altman 

(Grow My Revenue)  Every situation is a learning experience. Here are 4 key takeaways you can apply to interactions with your customers.

My Comment: I’ve always believed that everyone is in customer service. It’s a philosophy, not a department. Some job responsibilities are more “customer-facing” than others. Sales is one of those extreme customer-facing responsibilities. My mantra is to “Sell with Service.” Customer service doesn’t just happen after the sale. It also happens before and during the sale. The four ideas shared in this article, while focusing on a call center agent’s desire to retain (or sell) the customer on staying with the company, can be applied to just about anybody trying to promote a company or a product.

Measure The ROI Of Customer Loyalty Marketing With These 5 Key Metrics  by Lauren Licata

(Business2Community) Today, digital customer loyalty marketing platforms make it easy for us as marketers and business owners to attract and retain loyal customers and to understand their value.

My Comment: The saying goes, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” Customer loyalty has been difficult to measure for many businesses because there isn’t just one way to do so. This article shares five ways to measure loyalty with a simplistic explanation. (And, I like simplicity!) While not all five may apply to every type of business, at least one or two will.

7 Tips for Getting Good Customer Support on Twitter by Rafe Needleman

(Yahoo Tech) Here’s Frank Eliason’s advice on how customers — you and I — can use Twitter effectively.

My Comment: While this article is written for a customer who wants to tweet about a problem, complaint or question, it shows just how important and powerful Twitter is to the customer service world.  More and more customers are recognizing that social media channels are a way to be heard.  A company would much rather avoid public recognition for its flaws.  Perhaps this will cause more companies to not only monitor the social channels, but also improve their customer service to avoid the public embarrassment for delivering a poor experience.

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, professional speaker and New York Times bestselling business author. For information contact (314)692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs go to http://www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken

(Copyright ©MMXIV, Shep Hyken)

The post 5 Top Customer Service Articles For The Week Of July 14, 2014 appeared first on Shep Hyken.