Hey, what about your own customers guys?

Sometimes what seems like a great deal to one customer is a kick in the guts to another.

Recently Air New Zealand offered $50 one-way fares to Jetstar passengers left stranded by the company's check in policy or delayed by more than 2 hours. On the face of it it seems like great marketing; what a great way to make a competitor look pathetic and win some customers along the way. But how would you feel if you were a loyal customer of Air New Zealand who ignored Jetstar's wooing deals, and paid more than $50 to travel on the same plane, or who has regularly been delayed for more than 2 hours without similar deals offered?

It is important not to send mixed messages to loyal customers.

Similarly, with the launch of Telecom's XT network, the marketing battle between Telecom and Vodafone hots up (again). Both companies are offering new services and deals to attract new customers. Exciting isn't it? Well, not really if you are already a customer. Many of the new deals are not available immediately to existing customers who are already "locked" into earlier (now inferior) plans or products.

A friend of mine contacted Telecom keen to to upgrade to the new technology but was told he couldn't because he still has x months left to run on his contract. He was not looking to leave Telecom, he just wanted a better product. Now he is not so keen to stay.

I have had similar (inflexible) experiences with Vodafone too. I was looking at upgrading my phone and wanted to know if I could swap the dataplan from my vodem, over to the new phone as it had internet capabilities. I was told I could not, but I could buy an additional plan! How many dataplans does a girl need?

An alternative, more customer friendly, approach would be to upgrade (or swap) existing customers, at no or minimal costs, to "showcase" the new deals and products. This seems to happen overseas. They often throw in a new phone too!

Northland retailers turn away business

We are supposed to be in a recession. Yet a number of Northland businesses seem determined not to close sales even where customers are keen to buy. My own recent experience, and that of family and friends, shows worrying sales and service complacency in businesses selling large ticket items:

• The furniture retailer that provides quotes on the back of a business card but keeps no record of the quote and takes no customer details. This means they cannot follow up to try and close the sale. It also means they have no record of the price quoted if the customer does come back. Furthermore, the business owners have no idea what discounts the staff are offering. My friend was given a quote on the back of a card at this store. When she did go back to purchase the item things got worse: she was told that that price would never have been offered. She did not have the quote with her. She felt insulted but later when she went to another branch of the same retailer (having now found the quote) she got the item for that price with no trouble.


• The car salesman who when approached about a new range said "I didn't go to the launch so I can't tell you anything about it". He didn't offer me a chance to look at the one in the showroom, sit in it, test drive it etc - he just offered to mail me a brochure. When the brochure arrived, he left me a voicemail and again didn't offer a test drive.


• Another car dealership had a run out deal on that I was seriously interested in. The salesman offered me a test drive in a very old model vehicle (I was looking at a new one), and then never got back to me on a quote for my trade in. I even phoned to follow up. I left a voicemail and my call was not returned.


• The car salesman who will talk only to men, when it's a woman that wants to buy.

Large item furniture sales and car sales are not the types of purchases that people make each week. They often think quite hard about them. Once they are in the "sales zone" if the service experience, the product and the price are right they will often buy. But once they have decided they are ready to buy, if you make it hard for them, they will quickly go somewhere else. One thing is for sure, once they have bought elsewhere they will not be back for quite some time.

What do you think? Is Northland the only area of New Zealand that isn't in recession or do these businesses just need help with some basic sales and service skills and processes?

Northland Business Expo Whangarei

I am blogging from the Northland Business Expo in Whangarei. April 17-18.

The Business Expo has been a great chance for us to tell other businesses what we do and raise awareness in Northland. We have had a lot of enquiries from business owners who are interested in learning more about their customer experience and how to fix customer service. This is just the start of our marketing efforts but has galvanised us into action and the date of the Expo also encouraged me to get the website live and work on our promotional materials.

You can also see our website at: www.customerservicedesign.com

Are your customers your new marketing department?

Times are hard, all businesses have pressure on resources and there are a lot of competing priorities. Consumers have fewer spare dollars to spend so you also have to work harder to make the sale ahead of the competition.

Your business needs to take action to survive. Where should you focus?

The top priorities must surely be:

• Serve existing customers and maintain customer loyalty
• Maximise revenue streams

Of course you need to do all of these while minimising costs. So what can you do?

Focus on fixing the customer experience
You can reduce your traditional marketing spend and you can look at getting your customer service so good that your customers do your marketing for you. This is a double whammy. You will have delighted customers and fewer priorities to juggle.

Customers can be your marketing vehicle
If you do all you can for your customer they will return. And when the opportunity arises they will also tell their friends what you have done and how good you are. Positive word of mouth is a powerful marketing tool:

• 67% of all consumer decisions are primarily influenced by word of mouth (McKinsey)
• Word of mouth travels fast. This is both good and bad. International research has repeatedly shown that a customer is likely to tell ten people about a bad customer service experience. Here in New Zealand the latest research (KiwiHost and JRA 2009) shows most people tell 4-6 others.
• Word of mouth has grown significantly in importance: 93% of customers identify word of mouth as the best, most reliable and trustworthy source about ideas and information on products and services (NOP World 2005)
• People trust word of mouth: On product recommendations, 90% trust their spouse, 82% trust their friends, 69% trust their work colleagues however only 27% trust manufacturers/retailers (Henley Management Centre)

In an environment like this, the experience that a customer has of your business, and the way that they describe this to others will become a key factor in your business success.

What do we mean by word of mouth?
It’s not just chatting over a fence with a neighbour, or over a beer with a mate. Today consumers have other tools they use to communicate their views and opinions. Tools such as blogs, posting consumer reviews on websites, or rating your business on sites such as www.tripadvisor.com all form part of the mix. There are even sites and communities that specialise in collecting bad service experiences such as www.nocustomerservice.com.au.

Even if you didn’t think of your customers as doing some of your marketing for you today, maybe now you may feel differently. The question is: do you know for sure if it is positive or negative marketing?

What are the other benefits of getting customer service right?
Now that I have frightened you and you see some of the risks of poor customer service, let’s also think about some of the additional benefits of getting the customer service experience right.

The latest New Zealand Research (KiwiHost/JRA 2009) shows that over 58% of consumers are less than satisfied with customer service. It also shows that 75% would start looking elsewhere to spend their money after only one or two bad customer service experiences. If your business is typical this means that you are losing customers right now. Fixing customer service becomes an urgent imperative if you want to stay in business. If you can delight customers, you will close the sale, the customer is likely to come back again and they may encourage others to do the same.

One frequently overlooked benefit is that good customer service is also a great source of information about changing customer demand. Well trained staff can help you figure out how customer needs are evolving. What you are selling today may be what your customers needed yesterday. Ask yourself this: Do you keep track of the products and services that customers ask for, or just those that you sell?