During the Olympic games many years ago, my husband and I went out to take in the much anticipated Canada vs Russia hockey game. Wing night at a pub in a community dubbed “Hockeyville” seemed like an obvious place to go. Were we wrong, was the game not on at 5:30 pm? No, that wasn’t it. The problem was that we chose the one pub in Canada that was airing the curling between Great Britain and Scotland instead. It was only when enough patrons arrived in Canada jerseys (it was standing room only) and my husband had a small fit, that the waitress conceded and changed the channel to the game.
As a business owner, I was taking this all in from a customer service perspective. My only thought had been that the waitress with the remote MUST BE the owner of the pub and she must be independently wealthy. Turns out, the waitress was from Scotland and preferred the curling game to the hockey game and so it went.
The bottom line comes down to one question: “Did they do what they said they were going to do?”. In the case of the game, I had not seen any ads saying they would be airing the hockey game, so maybe it was unfair to assume, though in my defense, the small town we were in did run an ad campaign that dubbed them as “Hockeyville”. Were the actions of Hockeyville’s only pub in line with the town’s branding efforts? I think not. And that’s the lesson here – customer service is one of the key elements of your brand. This pub in “Hockeyville”, bursting at the seams with jersey-clad hockey fans, took one giant step back in it’s branding efforts by the action of its employee.
As a business owner, how can you prevent an employee from behaving badly? You can’t. But what you can do is check in once in a while. Get customer feedback and invite your clients to report any dissatisfaction as soon as possible and then rectify the situation. While you cannot guarantee your staff, you can guarantee your customer satisfaction.
Here are some ideas for managing and maintaining customer service in your growing business
- Develop a mantra that resonates with your brand.
For me, standing behind my word is #1, so I tell my team to “under promise and over deliver”. Not sure what your mantra is? Take time to establish your brand up front. Customer service should be an extension of it. - Do routine spot checks.
If you’re like me, you’re hiring on the fly and you hardly have time to train let alone check up on workers on a regular basis. No matter how busy you are, take the time to evaluate front-line workers. Put a system in place to make it easy, measurable and routine. - Be accessible.
As you grow, you relinquish some control over how your customers are served on a day-to-day basis. You have to count on your clients to tell you when they are unhappy, so make it easy for them. Whether it’s a direct phone number (not my first choice!) or your personal email, make sure they can get in touch with you directly and let them know that you welcome their feedback. - Qualify your customer.
The customer may always be right but that doesn’t mean they’re right for you. If you’ve encountered a complainer (ie everything you’re doing is wrong), tactfully “fire” the customer and move on. Not all customers are worth mollifying. Let’s go back to the pub example. Had my husband and I shown up and requested that the waitress turn the channel to the season finale of “The Bachelor”, she may have chosen to kindly refuse our request and cut her losses. - Advertise your “#1” and guarantee it.
Walmart promises low prices, Subway is fresh fast food; if you received anything less from these suppliers you’d be disappointed. Determine what your #1 is and develop a system to guarantee it. I tell customers they can count on me to do what I say I’m going to do, whether it means meeting a deadline or keeping within a budget. I’ve built my business on referrals who are looking for this type of service. So what do you do when something goes wrong? Look for solutions, not excuses and waive fees and/or offer credit to make sure your client understands that your word is worth something. - Think BIG.
Once upon a time, Bell ran a commercial with the theme “even my dad’s on Facebook”. Keep that in mind when you go about your daily transactions. As I witnessed the above-mentioned issue with the waitress in the pub, I kept thinking how funny it would be if I recorded the transaction on my mobile and posted it on Facebook then Tweeted my friends and in real time we saw it appear as a Bell commercial on the TV screen at the pub. The point? Nearly every client has the ability to have this sort of reach. Scary, isn’t it?
Key Takeaway: Customer Service is Core Critical to Branding
Your people are a big part of your brand, especially if they are interacting directly with your customers. Think about a time when the customer service you received was not in alignment with the advertised experience.
Here are a few examples of ways your people might be negatively impacting your brand:
- Not being open during advertised hours. This is one of my biggest pet peeves. Please do not list your place of business as “Now Open!” on Google if you’re not open.
- Not suited to a position/not doing their job. For example, a group of sales associates chatting amongst themselves while you struggle to find pants in your size. Or people with poor personal hygiene that will be in close proximity to your customers. And, increasingly so, people with social or political viewpoints that do not align with your brand but can be associated with it via social media.
- Not providing advertised products or services. We understand that you cannot always keep up with orders if demand peaks, and if you don’t have product your people can’t fulfill orders. What you CAN DO is put a system in place that equips your people with options. They can help the people who responded to your ad and provide them with an alternative solution or a raincheck.
- Not treating customers with respect. To a degree, you want your front-line people to assume a “customer’s always right” attitude. If they run into a sticky situation, the best thing is for them to defer a resolution to someone in a position to handle it.
Ultimately, each experience a user has with a brand forms their opinion of it. Use every touchpoint as an opportunity to build your brand.
