Episode #71 Create Great Customer Service Every Occasion

Well this is the time everyone is driving their results over the line, with the approaching financial year end looming on the horizon. I hope it is all on track! Today we are talking about do we really have a clear idea about the first impressions we are providing for our customers. Are the support teams delivering services after the sale, really reinforcing the brand and the customer’s commitment to using us again and again? Today, we cover some simple check points to make sure that what we think is happening, is in fact the norm of our customer interaction. We look at how to apply Jan Carlzon’s “Moments of Truth” insights into our own operation, to make sure we don’t drop the ball when we hand off between different sections.

Japan is set to become a major food supplier. Agriculture, forestry and fisheries exports in 2018 grew twelve point four percent, buoyed up by Asian demand. Japan has targeted one trillion yen or nine billion US dollars in farm exports by 2019 and is on track to make it. Agriculture Minister Takamori Yoshioka said, “To achieve the one trillion goal, we need an annual growth of more than ten percent”. Hong Kong is the largest buyer, China second and the USA is third. Beef exports increased twenty nine percent and sake was up forty one percent. These sectors in particular will benefit from reduced tariffs under the Trans Pacific Partnership and Japan-EU agreements coming into force. In other news, Goldman Sachs has been promoting stocks in Riso Kyoiku a cram school. They recognize that the shift to one on one tutoring away from classroom style, has been a forte for Riso Kyoiku. Goldman’s Yukiko Nonami said, “we expect education spend per child to continue increasing in line with the trend toward fewer children per household”. The stock trades at forty one times earnings, a multiple three times higher than the average for companies in the Topix index. Finally, some elementary and junior high schools are trialing cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) games to help children confront their everyday problems. CBT works by changing attitudes and behaviors by focusing on the thoughts, images, beliefs and attitudes that are held and how these processes relate to the way a person behaves, as away of dealing with dysfunctional emotions. The program was created by the Research Center for Child Mental Development at Chiba University.

Know, like, trust is a well known mantra in sales. Salespeople are always trying to reassure their buyers that they and their firm are trustworthy and reliable. The follow through component of the sales process is when these two claims are fully tested. The salesperson can be doing a splendid job, but what about the rest of the support team? Do they share the vision of the leadership, toward the firm’s commitment to the customer? Are they backing up the salesperson’s efforts with their protection of the brand. Are they bolstering the salesperson’s strong customer focus?

Jan Carlzon, many years ago, published a tremendous guide to customer service. He had the job of turning around SAS airlines and captured that experience in his book “Moments Of Truth”. I was reminded of Carlson’s insights when I was checking into my hotel in Singapore.

By the way, the drive in from Changi Airport is a credit to the Singaporean Government, who spend millions every year to develop and maintain their landscaped, leafy, tropical thoroughfares. This is smart. You are already in a pleasant mood just getting into town. While going through the check-in process at the hotel, a waiter from the adjoining restaurant approached me bearing an ice-cold glass of freshly squeezed juice. Singapore is very humid and trust me, that ice cold beverage went down very well. I thought this is really well thought through customer service by this Hotel’s management.

One of Carlzon’s observations about customer service however was the importance of consistency of delivery. For example, visualise the telephone receptionist answers your call in a pleasant, helpful manner and you are uplifted by your exposure to the brand. The next staff member receiving the transferred call however, is grumpy and unfriendly. Now both your mood and positive impression of the establishment immediately plummet. You are suddenly irritated by this company, who have just damaged their brand by their lack of an ability to sustain good service across only two consecutive touch points with the customer.

So back to my story. As I get to my room, in good spirits after unexpectedly receiving my ice-cold juice, I find out the television isn’t working. After a forensic search for the cause, including a few harsh words with the television controller, I discover the cause – the power is not on. There is a card slot next to the door, that initiates the power supply to the room. Actually, I discovered the same system in the elevator, when I unsuccessfully tried to select my floor. Yes, I worked it all out eventually, but the thought occurred to me, that the pleasant young woman checking me into the hotel, failed to mention these two key facts to me. Sustainability of good service has to be the goal, if you want to protect or grow your brand. How are things down at your shop? Can you put your hand n your heart and tell me, “don’t worry, we have nailed it?”.

Let me mention a customer service breakdown I particularly dislike here in Japan. You call just about any organization and you will get a very flat voice answering the phone saying in Japanese “XYZ company here”. The voice is greatly lacking in pleasure to hear from you. The person picking up the phone is the most junior person in the section, yet represents the brand to the world. You ask to speak with that very excellent and impressive member of staff, Ms. Suzuki whom you met recently at a networking event. The flat uninterested voice tells you that she “is not at her desk right now” and then stone cold, motherless silence.

The “may I take down your name and phone number so that I can make sure she calls you back” bit is rarely offered. Instead, you are left hanging on the phone. The inference of the silence is that if Ms. Suzuki is not around, that is your problem and you should call back later, rather than expect a return call. Again, to Carlzon’s point, these inconsistencies of customer service directly damage the brand. What is the cost of a helpful intervention by the person answering the phone to help you on your quest for the talented, if elusive, Ms. Suzuki? If I call your office and ask for you, and you are not there, what will I be told? How will I feel about your company after my interaction with the person answering the phone? What can we do?

In this example, when I had previously met Ms. Suzuki, I was impressed by her and had a good impression of the whole organisation. The person taking the call has just put that positive image to the sword. This is what happens to us in sales. We do the right thing but elsewhere in the organization, someone else is sabotaging our good efforts. Internal silos and internecine warfare between rival fiefdoms don’t help. Leaders trying to coagulate their lot, by dissing everyone else, may make them and their ilk feel good, but it destroys the engagement of the people in the company

The senior leadership of companies, sitting in their gorgeous offices on the upper floors of the building, presume that everyone in the company “gets it”, about representing the brand. They imagine that the whole team delivers consistent levels of service. They expect that the whole team is supporting the sales and marketing departments’ efforts to create an excellent image of the organization. After all, the company have been spending truckloads of money on the sales and marketing effort, hasn’t it?

But are all the staff supporting the sales team’s effort to build the brand? Perhaps some of the other team members have forgotten what was said about the importance of consistent customer service in the past. Maybe they are a new hire who didn’t get briefed properly. There is one thing about leadership. That is you have to constantly beat the drum loudly about the culture, philosophy and style of service you believe in. An email, a framed Vision, Mission, Values statement, an ancient rousing speech to the troops won’t suffice. You have to be banging on about these things constantly.

We should all sit down and draw the spider’s web of how customers interact with us and who they interact with. We should expect that we all need reminding of the importance of good customer service, for the image and credibility of the company.

So how about this for a starter:

1. Answer the phone with a pleasant, friendly voice, be helpful and offer your name first, so the customer won’t be embarrassed that they didn’t recognise your voice.
2. If the person they are calling isn’t there, proactively offer to ensure they will get a call back as soon as possible.
3. End with thanking them for their call and again leave your name, in case there is anything further the caller may need.

First impressions count, but so do all the follow-up impressions, if we want to build a sustainable, consistent positive image with our customers. Consistency of good experiences doesn’t happen automatically. We have to look again at all of our touch points with our customers and ensure that everyone in the team understands their place in maintaining the excellent brand we have built up.