Customer Service
A Bad Customer Service Example Set by a Manager
Learning experiences are everywhere, and in customer service, you can learn from the bad experiences as well as the good. I had a bad experience the other night, while having dinner at a favorite restaurant. Even if you are not in the restaurant business, don’t stop reading—bad service can strike anywhere. Just consider the lessons here and…
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Customer Congruency: What Are We Promising Our Customers?
Customer Congruency: When what we promise and what the customer receives are thought to be the same. Lately I’ve been blurring the line between customer service and marketing—and customer service and branding. This article continues on that track. As a business, we try to get our customers to perceive us a certain way. In the end, the…
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Creating a 140-Character Brand Promise
Pizza Hut, in a recent search for a new social media manager, used a creative approach to put potential candidates to the test. Its advertisement noted that candidates would have 140 seconds to sell themselves in an interview. It seems like a short time—and it is—but in this digital age a social media manager needs…
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Is Your Customer Loyal to You or Your Price?
What would happen if you were just a little higher priced than your competitor? How would your customers react? Would your loyal customers continue to do business with you, in spite of your higher price? Unless your strategy is to always be the lowest price, one would hope the answer to the last question is, “Yes!” These…
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Why You Should Give Customer Service Guidelines, Not Rules
Two words that can drive me crazy are “company policy.” Policies are often used as unbendable rules that are not conducive to customer service and creating a customer-focused company atmosphere. Let me share a story with you to illustrate the point. It is filled with lessons about customer service, and I’m willing to bet that…
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What Lane Is Your Business In? Is It Customer Service?
There are some companies that are recognized for their customer service. It’s their focus, they’ve built their brands around it, and they’re good at it. You could say they “stay in their lane.” Some examples would be Ace Hardware (think helpful), Nordstrom and Zappos. Are these companies known for being the low price leader? No,…
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Customer Service Apology is Stronger with a Personal Touch
Every so often at the office we order lunch “to go” from First Watch, a restaurant that is open for breakfast and lunch. It serves up both delicious food and great service. But, as you know, even a great company can make mistakes, and unfortunately, twice in one week my lunch order was wrong. The…
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Laziness and Apathy are Customer Service Killers
I write about amazing customer service experiences that I encounter so others can learn from them. And bad customer experiences can be learning experiences as well—they are examples of what not to do. Two bad experiences recently highlighted the fact that some people refuse to be flexible because that’s not the easy way out. Such laziness is…
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Before You Can Be Customer Centric, You Must Be Employee Centric
“Customer centricity” is popular terminology in the customer service arena today, and it refers to a company-wide focus on the customer. Everyone in the company and everything the company does—every business process, every department—has the customer in mind at all times. It is a powerful way for a company to operate successfully. A similar concept would…
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Employee Engagement is the Key to Working Harder and Caring More
More than 2,300 years ago, Aristotle said, “Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.” If this were written in today’s terms, it would fall under the heading of what we now call “employee engagement.” This simple quotation is only nine words, yet it conveys a very powerful truth. Employees who are engaged in…
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