Enjoyed A Piece of Apple Computer Treatment Today

While in very much a hurry today, I realized that my Dell laptop, of which I paid a handsome sum for a few years back, decided to act weirdly.  Of course this was not a good time for this kind of thing to happen because I am scheduled to conduct a harassment training session for a company here in Orlando in about five days.  I was stuck.  Stopped in my tracks by a non-working, frustrating- building, piece of junk and future doorstop.

Needing a laptop to present some critical figures and informative case studies as well as state and federal laws to my audience, I went onto an Apple site and found a chat feature.  I threw my issue at the feet of the customer service rep and waited to see if this person could magically provide a solution.  I was not disappointed.

My Apple representative was superb!  My first question to her was that if I go to the Apple store, (which is about 45 minutes away because of Central Florida traffic), and bought a MacBook Air, could I plug in my InFocus projector?  She immediately chatted me back a link to an adapter that I would need.  Then, a minute or so later, she sent another link to one that was about $6 cheaper.  I was impressed.

I told her that I would go to the Apple store on Thursday when I had some time and purchase both the computer and the adapter.  She suggested that if I order it online before 5:00pm that I could have the items on my doorstep on Thursday, two days away.  Great!  I placed the order while still chatting with her.   She walked me through the process and stayed online with me until I received my confirmation.  She then asked me for the order number that I received via email so she could confirm that everything was in order.

Just wanted to share with you that this is the way it is done.  No hesitation.  No pressure.  No frustration.  No guessing how to do things.  No wondering if I made the right decision.  This customer service rep held my hand through the entire transaction.

How about your business?  Does your team go the distance with your customers?  Please let me know.  I would love to share your story with others.

Providing Outstanding Customer Service

" Southwest Airlines is successful because the company understands it's a customer service company.  It also happens to be an airline."  --- Harvey Mackay

Our businesses depend on great customer service.  It seems so obvious stated here, but the concept escapes even some of the most seasoned business leaders.  It is as if after the business is up and running that providing great customer service takes a back seat to getting orders filled and out the door.  It becomes forgotten and left behind other priorities such as closing the sale, completing the project, and collecting on accounts.

All of these processes are important and necessary and in defense of business leaders that tend to lose focus on customer service, employees were hired to fill a role of providing for the customer.  Because of this the business leader is usually the last to know that the business is falling short in the customer service department. 

Unfortunately, if, and that is a big "if", a customer takes the time to complain about poor customer service, it is usually too late.  The customers that were upset have long since left and have told the world about
their bad experience.

Thankfully, in most businesses, it only takes a little bit of training and a lot of focus to get the team up to providing great customer service.  Here are three things a business leader can do to ensure that customers are being taken care of:

1.) Be the customer.  This means that you will need to take time to set up some role-playing scenarios to teach your employees how a customer is to be treated.  It is not that complicated.  Either you or someone you appoint plays the role of a customer.  Begin by having the customer be extremely polite and ask general questions.  In the next scenario, have the customer be a little bit irate and demanding.  Then, gradually, with each scenario, have the customer become downright vulgar.  Examine how employees handle the situation and review and critique each exercise.

2.) Ask a customer.  Invite a customer that you've met (or even one you haven't) and ask them to sit in on a meeting to discuss how employees could treat him or her better.  Make the event worth the customer's time by providing lunch, discounts, etc.  Solicit feedback from the customer and have your employees make note of what the customer likes and dislikes.

3.)  Love your customer.  Pick a day to have a customer appreciation day and invite a few customers to the event.  Have your employees plan the event and handle all the arrangements.  Put the ball in the employees court and let them love on the customers.  This will give your team members an idea of what it means to treat customers well and will also enhance customer loyalty.  Before and after the event, talk to your team about the importance of customers and that without them, the company will suffer.

Amazon-Like Customer Service

Amazon is known not for its books, nor for its now thousands of electronics, furniture, clothing, and the other 20 million products it sells, but for its extraordinary obsession with providing great customer service. This obsession was instilled into the company at its earliest phase.

Every employee knows that customer service is the top priority at Amazon because CEO Jeff Bezos makes sure that they know. At every meeting of his top executives, Bezos places an empty chair at the table and explains that the chair is for the customer. If he is sitting in that chair, what would that customer want to tell us. Bezos has been bringing in the empty chair sense he started the company in 1995. The company now has over 56,000 employees and all of them come second, which is unusual in today's world of free Google and Mircrosoft meals, haircuts, and babysitting. Amazon provides cheap furniture for employees in order to spend more on efficient customer service.

While there is a direct correlation between how employees are treated and how customer service is perceived, these four customer services nuggets can still be applied to your business.

1.) Obsess over customers- Use the empty chair example or even bring customers into your employee meetings for constructive feedback, but do whatever it takes to create a culture of extreme addiction to great customer service.

2.) Use customers to define what they want or need- Don't rely on in-house engineers or creative employee experiments to determine what your company will provide for customers. Listen--- really listen to your customer's needs and wants. They will tell you if you'll only listen.

3.) Put every team member on the phone- This is a good practice to implement periodically. Your salespeople, your COO, CFO, and top team leaders need to be in your call center or receptionist desk to here what your customers are saying; to feel what your customers are feeling. This is also a good exercise to discover what those employees that normally do this work are experiencing.

4.) Commit to spending 70% of your day on customer service issues- This is not what normally happens. Most business leaders spend 30% of their time on customer service thinking that their time is more valuable in other areas. If a business leader were to take just the next 90 days spending 70% of their day on customer service issues--- improving response time, correcting billing issues, making on-site employees more presentable-- as well as preventing future customer service issues, they will see a dramatic increase in repeat business as well as positive word-of-mouth marketing.

Be like Bezos and go crazy over customer service!

Goober's Customer Service Secrets

"I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening carefully. Most people never listen" --- Ernest Hemmingway

George Lindsey, the actor who played the character Goober Pyle on the Andy Griffith Show, died yesterday at the age of 83. His character took over the position of Mayberry's gas station attendant after Gomer Pyle joined the Marines. Lindsey went on to play the same character on the hit show Hee Haw, and in stand-up comedy shows for many years. While loved for his innocence and simplicity, leaders can learn a great deal from how Goober ran his station.

Three Goober traits we can adopt today:

1.) First, Goober never formed an opinion about a person until he really had a chance to know him or her. He always listened, I mean really listened, to what the customer had to say before responding. Of course Goober would listen with his mouth open in child-like anticipation, but he still listened. When we do the same (minus the open mouth), we not only hear what the customers want, need, are complaining about, etc., but we see how they say it. We can witness in their body language more of what they are trying to communicate. Goober could sense what the customer was needing and addressed those needs.

2.) Next, Goober was passionate about fixing the problem. He worked relentlessly trying to get the car running, fix the flat, provide alternative transportation, and anything and everything else that would help to make the customer happy. Goober knew his job and not only wanted to provide satisfaction to his customers, but he would make sure that if he found another problem not addressed by the customer, he would fix that too. He always knew that if the customer was happy, then he and the town of Mayberry were happy.

3.) Finally, Goober knew that he knew when a project was right. His standards were often above the customer's and he stubbornly stood his ground when it came to making a repair or pumping gas. Goober's confidence in his abilities spilled over to the service he provided for his customers. He doggedly worked until the vehicle purred like a kitten even if the customer didn't bring the vehicle in for that kind of treatment. Goober's pride in his workmanship didn't allow for him to cut corners or skip over quality for the sake of quantity. This led him to develop a reputation for being perfectionist and in more than one episode caused Andy Griffith to recommend Goober to a customer as the greatest mechanic around.

Seeing Green

It's not easy being green, although it is popular. In fact, consumers look for the green label on everything from toilet paper to power cords to ice cream (seriously! saw it on a ice cream carton myself!) But what does it cost to go green and who sets the standard for green? Well, it all depends on your industry, who talk to, and what the general public opinion is regarding green.

There are really good reasons for going green today, but most of the businesses I follow are going green, or stating that they are going green, in order to increase the bottom line of their business. In other words, they want our business based on the shade of green of their business.

Before getting all greenish to help the sales of your business, perhaps we should all step back and look at what really brings in the biz. Customers want good customer service. Notice that I wrote "good" and not "great" customer service. Most customers are willing to settle for average service because they see so much poor service today. I hear from customers of some of our clients who state that the good customer service they receive is almost a shock. They are stunned that a salesperson actually made eye contact with them and seemed to care about the needs of the customer. Their face didn't look like they fell into a tackle box (way too many piercings), and they could speak the Queen's English without nonsensical slang. They seemed to understand that their pay is based, in part, on providing a good customer service experience.

Do you want to go green? First, make your competitors grow green with envy when they see that your business is stealing customers because of the great service that you provide.

During a recent conversation with a former colleague about the staggering decline in customer service, as well as employee & customer satisfaction many businesses are experiencing, we found ourselves using feel words. Yes, two mature, objective, career- oriented, type-A business folks using feel words.

We were most amazed by the palpable loss of pride and passion for one’s work. Particularly in these tough times and in spite of this clearly being in an employers market. We exchanged ideas about my prior post (“You can’t fire me!”) and agreed that ignorance is not really bliss.

Ignorance is what propels, otherwise cognitively-aware adults, to overspending money, resources and time. Ignorance has entire populations ‘nurturing’ their bodies with what, in places like Europe, would be banned foods and a host of Genetically Modified Organisms whose consequences nobody seems to know and we remain oblivious to. Ignorance, more times than not, is at the root of wars. And ignorance is the currency poorly performing employees are banking on to keep sucking the life and profitability out of your business.

I cannot tell you what to eat, what to think, how to spend your money, resources, and time. But I can remind you the importance of two key areas for the health of your business:

1. Knowledge of at least the basics of HR Law in your state
2. Knowledge of how your good employees feel about changes and your company’s mission, vision, and long-term direction

In fact, you will notice as you browse through the blog that these are recurring themes for us. And for good reason. We’ve seen businesses hurt their bottom line due to lack of basic prevention, knowledge and simple good use of empathy. We’ll dissect these issues and share some ideas on how to shed some light on them in upcoming posts.

Meanwhile, read, learn, and if you have no time to do either, be sure to contact an HR specialist to hold your hand through the ins and outs of the HR world.