Failing to make good on a make good that is a make good for failure!

A former colleague and dear friend copied me on an email to a renowned baby diaper brand that had frustrated him beyond belief. He wanted wise counsel to know if he was truly justified to feel completely put off by the brand’s empty promises.

His story has the makings of the Nigerian soap operas popularly known in these parts as Afro Cinema and has the fine scripting of a dramatic Mexican telenovela. It pains me to not name and shame the brand for behooves a good investigative journalist to get a 360 degree view before exposing the perpetrators.

And so here’s how the story goes…………

My colleague – let’s call him B, attended a Baby fair about two weeks ago with his wife who is expecting and toured the various stall. They were impressed by the presentation and offer by the diaper brand, let’s call them Diaper and bought two big packs. They were very pleased to get an instant reward offer of a bib, a bag and two discount vouchers valid at any Nakumatt Supermarket outlet.

On their way home, they stopped at the supermarket and picked up four more packs of new born diapers and were thoroughly embarrassed at the till when the discount vouchers were declined.  Mr. B then expressed his disappointment on twitter and Diaper’s twitter handled referred him to a Customer Service desk out of the Country. As he didn’t have the time or patience to call out of country he found the feedback page of the Baby Fair organizers and emailed them.

 After two days he received a call from a representative who appreciated his feedback and apologized for the situation. She then proceeded to offer a make good gift and requested that he pick it up after two days. The same day in the afternoon he received another call from a sister company and a different person apologized for the same situation and went on to tell him that they wish to send an apology basket to and requested his home address. She also took the opportunity to advise that they have a home delivery service for diapers, and Mr. B who was pretty excited to hear this promptly let Mrs. B know.

He then sent a message to his first caller to let her know that yet another caller had called and that he would now not go to pick up the basket as caller two would have it delivered. Caller one thanked him and wished him a good day.  He also received a pleasant apology email from a different person representing the brand that took responsibility for the error and informed him that they had righted the voucher situation.

Let’s just say that this is where the excellent customer service took a nose dive!

Mr. B subsequently followed up on five different occasions and received varying feedback ranging from the contact person is on leave, is busy – please call back later, will call him back( and never did) and wasn’t available to take his call.

This got him thinking varied thoughts; one that the apology had been taken back; two that the offer of a gifts was to bamboozle him; three that they had taken a stance to ignore him until he goes away; four that they thought he was absolutely wasting their time; five that they thought he’s not patient enough for their taste; and lastly that they thought he’s nagging them and wished that he would just leave them alone!

He further inferred a couple of things: one that it was by far the worst apology he’s ever received; that their wish to ignore him until he went away was granted for he’d decided to leave the matter alone; that they would scour the market for another diaper provider; that if they’d rescinded their apology that was alright – he’d donate the diapers bought and look for a substitute; if he’d done something to warrant the mal treatment he’d apologize and still go away; and that he was duped by the nice apology until the real colours of the brand showed up after!

He took the time to let them know all this in the email that he roped me into.

Being the customer service enthusiast that I am, I marveled at this service failure wonder and also took the time to respond to the brand reps to let them know that this made fantastic fodder for a case study of a brand chasing away customers at top speed into the laps of their competitors. I also took to social media to let the brand and the world know that it is indeed quite the phenomenon for a make good to failure to materialize as a make good for a make good situation. This by any customer service standards is the rock bottom.

Mr. B and his wife felt embarrassed, frustrated, bruised, battered and trampled upon by the brand. How can a brand succeed in eliciting this level of emotional disengagement from a customer? At the very least the customer should feel disappointed right? Should a brand surely cause a customer embarrassment????

Let’s just say that after that email – someone miraculously appeared in Mr. B’s office with a gift hamper which he promptly turned down. It was never about the gift he emphasized. The regional headquarters has also immediately responded on Twitter requesting that they are really apologetic about the matter and would like to see what to do to resolve it. The local office also quickly got in touch to have a further conversation where the CEO himself has promised to have a meeting with his staff and get in touch with Mr. B.

The questions that abound as always are

• ·         Does it have to get this bad for brands to respond to customer needs?
• ·         Don’t brands appreciate the need to respond immediately to service failure to turn it around?
• ·         Does the customer need to be left with such an acrid taste in their mouths to then shout to feel heard?

What will it take for brands to realize that their biggest and most effective brand and marketing tool is the voice of a happy customer. And even more so the louder voice of a customer whose issue has been resolved and has been turned into a raving fan?

To all out there in the customer service fraternity – we have our work cut out for us!

For now, I wait to see what the ending to this Afro-Cinema/Mexican Soap will be so that we may pen in the script ending……………………

The Power of 'YES?'

This is not an inspi-motivational call to action to have you say YES we can or whatever other positive mantra goes with the thoughts that accompany such calls. Far from it………. It is a call to action to NOT say YES to customers.

A colleague who runs a very popular African restaurant at the new departure terminal at the airport shared yesterday about a South African gentleman who came into her restaurant early the previous morning. As he approached the counter, she greeted him and asked how she could serve him. His first exasperated exclamation was “Why can’t everyone be like you? How is it possible that two adjacent eating facilities can be so different?!”

On further enquiry, what had infuriated her customer was that at the neighbour’s eating house he’d first gone to, the person at the counter on his arrival there had looked up at him and said ‘YES?’

Now………….

Whilst this may not seem catastrophic, and many a person will think her customer, let’s call him Mr. Yes had overreacted, it actually represents a very big customer service no –no. I personally have such a pet peeve against being greeted/met/accosted/hit with the word YES. I have in fact taken to saying NO right back anytime a service provider behind a counter, booth or shop table says ‘YES?’ to me. What is ‘YES?’ What is the customer supposed to respond once you ask them ‘YES?’ For it is unfailingly used in questioning form.

Good customer service dictates that we must greet our customers as an opening line. Good morning/afternoon/evening or hello, or greetings, or hi, in as far as the prevailing circumstance orders and depending on the formality of the situation. It doesn’t matter what is going on or not going on, greeting the customer first we MUST.

I’ve analysed this ‘YES?’ that service providers are fond of saying on first contact and it directly translates to ‘What do you want?’ and in some instances it translates to ‘Next?’ especially where there exists a queue. Why would you want to greet your customers like this? Why would this be the first thing that comes out of your mouth to a customer and we know only too well that first impressions count and last forever?

I get so irked by this ‘YES?’ business that after I proceed to tell whoever’s assaulted me with it( ok I exaggerate, but isn’t that just what it is?) ‘NO’ in response to their ‘YES?’, I further proceed to deliver a quick lecture on the atrocity of their belting out ‘YES?’ to customers. And yes, my friends and family get quite annoyed with my insatiable need to deliver these lectures all the time and often implore me to let it be. But no – the customer service enthusiast in me refuses to sit still and let the YES sayers carry on.

And so back to Mr. Yes story. So delighted was he with the greeting and welcome he received, that he had one tiny cup of English tea that cost round about Kshs. 200/- and left my friend who was his waitstaff for the day a tip equivalent of Kshs. 5000/-

Fancy that? How about this incident as a true example of the power of greeting? It behooves us as service providers in whatever enterprise to inculcate a greeting culture in our establishments. If for nothing else, it is good manners and has the direct potential to contribute to the institution’s bottom line.

Yes go ahead and ditch the ‘YES?’ and greet the customer standing in front of you………. It pays J

Great Brands Thrive on Service Excellence

This article first appeared in Management Magazine September 2014- a Publication of Kenya Institute of Management 

Management and service experts alike have for a long time believed that customers define brands. But things have changed. According to Shep Hyken, customer service expert, business speaker and New York Times bestselling author “Customers may define your band, but employees are your brand.”

Powerful brands are so because they consistently keep their promises to their customers. And very simply put - that’s what customers like – unfailing consistency. That they will beyond any reasonable doubt find the same product they have always found or the same service they have always enjoyed in the same way every time.  That's what customers get emotionally attached to. The UK Intellectual Property Office, charged with keeping custody of brands’ rights, indicates that a brand is much more than a trade name, symbol or identity, but can also be a ‘promise of an experience’ that conveys to consumers a certain assurance as to the nature of the product or service they will receive and also the standards the supplier or manufacturer seeks to maintain. 

The common thread running throughout all these definitions and statements revolving around brands is that consistency and maintaining standards is the name of the game; service excellence consistency and service excellence standards – and there’s no doubt about that. It therefore follows that the all-important question to be answered  is  - What  would it take towards purposefully and intentionally creating a winning brand on service excellence, that would have an organization’s name associated with the value its customers derive from it consistently?

Formidable brands are created by people.

Brand promise delivery is through excellent customer service. A promise is made and customers’ expectations are raised, that the particular product or service will deliver on this promise. What’s relevant to a customer isn’t what the organization values about its products or services, but what the product or service can do to solve the customer’s problems. Understanding customer needs, anticipating their objections and exceeding their expectations are the key tenets around which exceptional service excellence revolves. Dynamic brands that have latched onto this formula think about their customers as the center of their focus and rally their product development and service enhancement teams around delivering first class experience. Many an organization has succumbed to the folly of reflecting  inwards to provide to customers  outputs based on what they think the customer wants or  needs to know, rather than packaging their givings as winning ‘solutions’

·         Emotional decision making 

“What people want is the extra, the emotional bonus they get when they buy something they love”  This quote by Seth Godin - author, entrepreneur, marketer, and public speaker  points directly at the  irrational thoughts that make brands what they are. Warm feelings towards brands are created by; the people that deliver the brand promise; actualization of the brand messaging that promises to provide the customer the solution for which the brand was created; and interaction with the values that the faces and hearts behind the brands epitomize. Winning brands get that way by decidedly worming and working their way into the hearts of their customers. They aim for the effect that when the brand name is mentioned, it evokes a feeling of friendship, warmth, value and partnership. The 2013 research ‘From Promotion to Emotion’ by The Corporate Executive Board Company reveals that despite our(customers) attempts to make purely rational decisions, we are primarily driven by emotional motivations. Dynamic brands have tapped into servicing these emotional needs with excellence.

·         Customer centric processes and systems 

A brand’s continuous improvement is dependent on customer feedback that directly feeds into innovation and dynamic structuring and restructuring of business procedures, policies and practices. Listening to the voice of the customer (VOC) and using the inputs to tweak operations is the secret ingredient to successfully delivering service that wows the recipient. Wow service produces great brands.

Apple-Apple Inc. - the world's most valuable brand in the Omnicom Group's "Best Global Brands" 2013 report declare “We are at our best when we deliver enriching experiences. What we tell our staff: Approach customers with a personalized, warm welcome: Make sure customers are greeted by a friendly smile, Probe politely to understand the customer’s needs (ask closed and open-ended questions), Present a solution for the customer to take home today, Listen for and resolve any issues or concerns: By truly listening and acknowledging the needs of your customers, you make your business an oasis of encouragement, empowerment, and excitement. End with a fond farewell and an invitation to return: There is a direct correlation between how people feel when they leave your business and how likely they are to return or recommend the experience to someone else.”

Tucked into this philosophy is a clear customer focused system to listen, understand and act accordingly. The process for handling customers has clearly been outlined to staff who know the what, where, how, when and why enriching experiences need to be created. Walking in the customer’s shoes spurs system audits to observe the customer experience whilst interacting with the organization. If customer excellence temperatures are measured at each customer touch point in the customer journey as they engage with the brand, it is inevitable that enhancements will be made to optimise the experience.

Tied closely to this is the emphasis that international quality management systems place on the customer. The most popularly implemented 1SO 900:2008 Quality Management System has an entire chapter clause 5:2 dedicated to focusing the organization’s quality processes towards serving customer needs.

“Quality is never an accident, it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives”. William A. Foster

Is "Pain - Free" The New Excellent?

“Sue them!” I recently advised one of my clients who has a constant complaint about the service levels from his bank. After listening to his latest ‘Agony Aunt’ lamentations that I thought I‘d just about had enough of, I felt that indeed it was time to take action. The bank handles his organization’s account which in my view qualifies him as a priority customer based on the transaction levels and amounts.

In this particular instance the bank’s money wiring system had some ‘technical’ problem that had taken two days to sort out. This had grossly interfered with his ability to wire salaries to his staff in the region. And him being CEO of a company that’s takes pride in honouring payment dates, was loathe to explain to his people that a technical hitch would delay their pay. The only practicable solution necessitated that he and his finance officer, go into the bank, withdraw the entire amount and deposit each staff’s salary individually into their accounts to ensure these were immediately reflected.

Listening to his annoyed proclamations, mulling over the inconvenience of abandoning our strategy session and the thought of the impending exercise that involved him spending a significant amount of time in the banking hall undertaking manual tasks to achieve the desired objective – I was quite appalled. I requested him to compute the man-hours he had already spent following up with the bank and the hours that would be spent in the bank both by himself and his finance officer and to nicely ring that up and send it to the bank with a letter from his lawyer.  All this would have been completed by the automatic click of technology, and is the reason for which he signed up for the automatic salary transfer system.

What for me what the wringer, the straw that broke the camel’s back, was that all this back and forth, discussions being held and his interaction with the bank over this matter was through the bank’s call center. One would have imagined that this kind of malfunction from a bank of high repute would have his phone inundated with calls from the bank manager or some other such important person in the bank’s pecking order apologizing profusely for the problem and seeking to see how best to make good. This call center experience involved during many instances, an auto response informing him that all the call center agents were busy at the time and that they would get to him ‘as soon as possible’.  He’d made several attempts to get through with the calls truncating mid the waiting period. His frustration was palpable.

I wondered out loud to myself and to him – who exactly should be responsible for bearing the costs of these calls? Doesn’t it behoove a service provider who offers a help desk or call center service for clients, to have some software that identifies incoming calls, how long the person has been on hold and the specific customer profile of the caller? This would then enable an auto response for priority level customers that the provider would get back to them and then have an agent actually do so?

In my then very justice seeking and indignation on his behalf demanded that he compute as well the cumulative time he’d spent making calls including the attempted calls to the bank, and the opportunity cost based on other important things he’d have been doing at the time, ring up that bill as well and serve it hot right along with the earlier billing in the letter the lawyer was going to submit.

Why would we as service providers not provide systems and processes that are customer centric and that focus on providing a smooth, hustle free experience for our customers? Customers are very simple people. All they want is quality, consistency and practical solutions for their needs. That’s all. They do not need bells and frills and belly dancers sent to titillate their senses – ok ok once in a while they’d love that too – but not as a typical occurrence daily…..

 Customers stay loyal to organizations who serve up pain free processes. So much so that pain-free is the new ‘excellent’.  We are so used to problems,  used to things that don’t work,  used to false promises and ‘technical  hitches’ such that when what should actually be the norm happens, we record it in our ‘excellent’ rating scale.

So given that the bar isn’t set so far beyond reach in terms of eliciting customer loyalty, doesn’t it follow that we should at the very least ease our customers’ pain? Because soon enough their  pain will be painful enough to have them ‘monetize’ their pain levels and the legal ‘pain’ that will follow  will not be well worth the pain of having not eliminated the original pain in the first place.

Here’s wishing you and your customers a pain- free week ahead J

Customer Service Investment - Capex or Opex?

Excellent Customer Service, the much touted ‘must –have’ that every organization desires attributed to them, and every leader irrespective of profession or economic orientation is anxious to have as one of their achieved deliverables, is indeed just that – a ‘must-have’.  But beyond being a nice item on the organization or leadership wish list, what sort of investment are organizations ready and willing to make to transform this dream into reality?

A recent 2013 research study by The Institute of Customer Service in Kenya on ‘The State of Customer Service in Kenya’ reveals that ‘whereas leadership within organizations are cognizant of the need for superior customer service as a brand differentiator, the actual tangible investment in customer service is negligible and in want of corporate commitment in the form of budgets, structures, goals, systems, capabilities and robust assessment methods’.

Where then does customer service investment fall in the finance sheets of an organisation? Who is responsible for the budget creation and implementation of the budget action plans? Who is kept awake at night thinking about the next best way to delight the customer? And most importantly what sort of investment is Customer Service? Does it fall in the Opex budget and form a line entry for operational costs to keep things moving, or does it fall in the Capex budget as a heavy investment required to provide an input into the business for which return on investment will be reaped over time?

Stephen Walden – Senior Head of Consulting and Research at Beyond Philosophy, indicates that the biggest challenge facing the customer service industry is how to link Customer Experience to financial value. The leadership of most organisations demand a demonstration of the return on investment before any customer experience programs pass budget stage or if in place, get implementation approval.

How does one create a distinct equation between a brand’s emotional engagement with customers and an upward spike in the organisation’s bottom line? Is this an achievable KPI that can be tangibly tied to customer experience activities? Whatever one’s line of business, whatever one’s leadership style, whatever sector of the economy an organisation lies, the undeniable common denominator is that customers drive business. And the direct spin off of that, is that happy customers drive business further and faster. Happy customers in this context are customers that are emotionally aligned to the brand and are unshakably loyal to it. Creating this level of emotional engagement demands delivery of delightful customer experiences, having consistent quality of products and services, having the organisation’s ear to the ground to anticipate, meet and exceed customer expectations and most importantly, acknowledging service failure if and when it does happen and instituting make good and service recovery mechanisms diligently. This is the not-so-secret formula to business success.

Does all of the above require proper strategy, planning and execution? Does investment in customer service excellence require assiduous budgeting and resource allocation? If indeed business and personal success is a key objective, then the big debate should revolve around if customer service is an operational cost given its now apparent importance as an ingrained element for every day success, or if it is a capital expenditure, planned and planted to reap sustained benefits over time. I leave this crucial debate to all you professionals. Do let me know the outcome of your discussions.....

Customer Retention - Are You Still Loyal To Your First Love?

                                                        This article first appeared in Business Mind Africa Issue 005/2014

“The secret formula for business success is the concept of creating a rabid tribe of followers and fans. It is undeniably effective that if you can turn your customers into raving evangelists, you have an unpaid sales force out there spreading the word about you” Maria Ross

On every CEO’s dashboard, irrespective of the size of the organization, be it a start up, an SME or a blue chip firm, are the bottom line numbers that reflect the company’s financial health status. Central to their planning and what keeps CEO’s awake at night, is how to connect the dots and influence the company’s performance positively.  What reaction therefore is expected when presented with a cost-free solution to spike results? What right thinking CEO wouldn’t step closer towards a proposal that delivers ‘priceless’ results?

In the wise words of Maria Ross, happy customers are an organization’s best friend. In the growth cycle, when organizations are starting up, their bid to draw customers and develop a reputation for excellent service is high.  Employees have a clear understanding that each customer interaction translates to the growth and sustainability of the organization. As such, concerted efforts are placed on ensuring the customer experience is seamless.

Fast forward into the next stage where the same organization transitions into a midsized business, well on its way to becoming a significant corporate. The general consensus from customers who started off with them is that the business has ‘forgotten’ those that supported them when they needed the support most. This is typical of corporates from both  manufacturing and service delivery, and unless a specific focus is placed on enhancing customer loyalty, the very tribe of rabid followers that served as evangelists, may very well convert into sources of damaging word of mouth reviews that could halt a business in it tracks.

How does a business then protect itself from slipping and forgetting the people that matter the most? How does a corporate avoid a decline in customer service when growth takes off?

Ultimately speaking – an organization is only as good as its employees. A culture of customer service excellence must be deliberately grown and maintained.  It is imperative that training, retraining, culture awareness programmes and inculcation of the organization’s vision, mission and values are conducted.

Loyal employees who have the organization’s values, aspirations, hopes and dreams deeply rooted, should be diffused to new branches, outlets and geographies to ensure standards and work ethic are upheld. This has the twofold benefit of creating new inspired team leaders as well maintaining brand standards.

Recently on a social media page with a membership of over ten thousand mothers, a disgruntled customer posted about the decline in customer service at a popular coffee house chain that has rapidly expanded with over 15 branches country wide. Needless to say the conversation thread was very long, with many unpleasant narrations. There general consensus was that people should patronize other brands.  This is the unfortunate folly of rapid expansion without a robust and dynamic customer service strategy.

It is acknowledged that indeed knowing every customer by name and having deep and close knit relationships would pose a challenge when the customer base grows significantly. However, the things that matter most including making them feel appreciated, rewarding loyalty, seeking feedback and responding to needs, are critical irrespective of organization size. Customers want consistency and predictability. They want to know that service levels will be the same consistently and consumers need to be engaged at all levels.

A case study in point is the Nakumatt supermarket chain. A business that is on record for rising from very humble beginnings to being a retail brand powerhouse. With over 40 branches, there is positive customer feedback about the quality and consistency of service. At the South C branch opened recently, I was pleasantly surprised to see staff from the older branch on Uhuru Highway, leading the teams and even more pleasantly surprised that a familiar face hailed me in greeting and requested for feedback on the new unit. Very impressive. So impressive is this chain’s focus on being in touch with the customer that they have launched a customer call center to attend to customer needs. Now that is a customer focused business from whom crucial lessons should be learned.

Today’s customers have very high expectations and the onus is on every organization to develop and maintain steps towards creating customer delight. There’s really no secret to customer service success. The answer’s pretty simple - Listen and Learn.

Back To Failure Kindergarten..................

There are numerous inspiring and comforting quotes on failure, how great it is to fail and how failure is not failure but actually a stepping stone to success. Without fail( pun completely intended)every inspirational biography and autobiography we read, of great men and women who have transformed lives by the works of their hands and who've shifted dynamic milestones, is rife with stories of how these icons have fallen many times, picked themselves up, dusted off the debris clinging on and forged forwards. Every motivational speaker be they on the pulpit, podium, dais, lectern or platform, sings the same song – of the beauty of rising from failure like the lady of the lake at dawn in the Welsh folk tale.

When  Ralph Waldo Emerson says ‘The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall and Bill Gates says ‘It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.’ They mean exactly that. And we so often preach the good gospel of their messages.

Now let’s get out of the time warp of all things good theory and reflect on what happens in reality. What reaction do we have when an employee in our organization makes a fatal mistake that: costs the company losses in millions of shillings or dollars; makes a service delivery blunder that causes brand damage to the organization and results in negative publicity; impacts on a high net worth value customer in the close circles of the CEO’s buddy list?

In a recent training session, the reaction from a group of senior customer experience managers was that ‘heads would roll’. It was definite. There was no discussion around it. It was a given. I have since conducted a small poll amongst my colleagues in industry around the globe and the verdict is watertight. That consequences would follow and these consequences would not dressed up as an opportunity to look back at the mistake, determine root cause and learn from it, but rather as consequences that ‘teach’ the entire organization that mediocrity will not be tolerated.

Well……….if one is logged as a serial and habitual mistake-maker, then coming down hard is not an option but a mandatory next step. However, if one makes a genuine mistake then should we not take a step back, do root cause analysis, learn from the findings and move on, richer for the experience?

The current punitive culture severely erodes the gains slowly being made in the customer service industry. When staff are too fearful to report their mistakes, terrorized by the thought that they may lose their jobs or be subjected to some ‘head rolling’ disciplinary measures, they would much rather keep mum about it. And because there’s comradeship in error, fellow colleagues happily aide the ‘culprit’ cover up the ‘crime’ seeing as to it, they may be the next offenders. And so the vicious cycle continues. Genuine mistakes do not get assessed, the source of the service failure does not get analyzed and corrective and preventive action goes un-instituted. And yes you guessed right - the bearer of the brunt of all these non-happenings is the customer, who experiences the unresolved process or people issues over and over again.

We need a complete culture change – starting from top leadership. Where genuine mistakes are truly viewed as learning opportunities and where service failure is embraced as useful feedback in the business loop. We need to move away from thinking of staff who make mistakes as perpetrators of crime but as victims of our systems, processes, procedures or transactions gone bad that need rework. We need to extend this thinking across business and have leaders champion the cause of truly embracing failure with open arms. No matter the gravity of the mistake, if it is established that indeed a genuine mistake has been made, then subsequent reactions should angle towards learning.  There’s an anonymous quote about customer complaints being the school book from which we learn. If we embrace this school of thought, we should all be sporting PHD degrees by now.

It may be a long journey ahead to create transformation in this area for it is natural for leadership to strike out and ‘deal’ with offenders. But as clichéd as it is, every journey indeed begins with the first step and recognition of the lack in this area is already a big step forward. As we regroup to re-programme and recalibrate to hardwire the national thinking towards espousing genuine failure, we need to soberly internalize the wise words of Colleen Barrett – President South West Airlines, whose biggest pain point is a foul attitude far that far outweighs mistakes…………..

“We’re looking for people who take the business seriously, but not themselves. A sense of humor is a must. And we look for people who were raised on values like the golden rule….we’re a very forgiving company in terms of good honest mistakes, but we’re not at all forgiving about attitude and behavior and demeanor.”