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Don’t Harp on the Customer’s Mistake - 6/24/25


Seth’s daughter, Sarah, had missed some swim classes, and Seth remembered that the aquatics center had several make-up classes available late in the summer.  So Seth pulled up the class schedule on his phone, found one that worked on his and Sarah’s schedules, and planned to attend a session Read more

Create Customers for Life - 6/17/25


Veronica has gone to the same automotive service shop for at least 20 years.  She bought a new car about a year ago, and this is the third car she’s brought to the shop instead of taking her car to the dealer where she bought it.  She’s had three Read more

Don’t Turn the Customer into the QA Department - 6/10/25


Roberta received a form with information filled in by the company after her conversation with the account rep.  Roberta just needed to review the information, fill in some of the blanks, sign it, and resend it in order to set up a new account. She noticed that the effective date Read more

Imitate to Improve - 6/3/25


Oscar Wilde said that “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.”  Now this doesn’t mean that plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery.  Nor does it mean that great impersonators such as Rich Little, Dana Carvey, or Frank Caliendo are always offering flattering portrayals of those that they imitate. Wilde’s Read more

How the Customer Perceives a Truth as a Lie - 5/27/25


You’re the customer, you’re asking about an unused item that you’re returning, and you hear the employee say: “The refund process takes 7-10 days.”  You’re thinking: “Great!  I can get the refund check as early as a week from today!”  The reality is that the company means that they’ll Read more

Tell Customers What’s Next - 5/20/25


In most businesses that have been around for a while, how a process was originally designed is not how it currently operates.  Sometimes this change is referred to as “practical drift,” where the actual process moves further and further away from the documented steps over time.  Maybe the changes Read more

Questions to Guide You to Empathy - 5/13/25


“If I was him, I would do ABC…” If you’ve ever heard somebody say this - whether it’s a friend or acquaintance, whether it’s some TV reporter or podcaster - you may get as frustrated or as annoyed as I do. I get annoyed because we are not that other person. Read more

Negate the Nervousness - 5/6/25


The customer needed a loan, so he walked into the bank, but he was a little nervous.  He knew that launching his business would be easier if he had some working capital, but that’s about all he knew.  He was anxious because he didn’t know what to expect in Read more

Don’t Rush to Resolve Quickly - 4/29/25


The customer is angry, so you use the CSS LEAD technique as designed.  You, listen, empathize, accept responsibility, and deliver on a remedy.  But it doesn’t work.  The customer is still upset, and maybe even a little more frustrated than when you started…why?! If the use of this technique fails, Read more

Energy v. Apathy - 4/22/25


I asked a couple friends who are much more scientifically-oriented the question: What is energy?  I didn’t mean E=MC2.  I meant physiologically, what is energy? They described a lot of things that sounded really good, yet far too advanced for my non-medical mind. Part of the reason why energy is of Read more

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The Good, the Bad, and the Needed of Municipal Customer Service

Posted on May 24, 2012 in Business Advice, Government Please leave a comment

The Tulare County (California) government has launched a new customer service program. According to Fifth District Supervisor Mike Ennis in the article County unveils customer service program, “Customer service is the lifeblood of any successful business, including local government. Thousands of residents utilize Tulare County services every day. These residents expect and deserve great customer service.”

We’ve worked on improving customer service for local municipalities for over ten years, and we’ve seen the Good (a county IT department going from “worst to first” in customer service), the Bad (employees who bring bad attitudes into training because “it’s not like the residents have a choice”), to the Needed (municipalities lacking customer service standards and plans) of municipal customer service.

And as with many businesses, when organizations do start to focus on customer service, the first thing they think about is training. While training is important, it should never be the totality of a customer service program. The ultimate goal of any customer service program is to provide consistently high levels of customer service to internal and external customers.

To gain that comprehensive focus, training is important – it creates a baseline definition of core expectations, principles, and service skills for employees. But the consistency comes from having a customer service vision defined, having management model the way, having organizational structures, incentives/accountability systems, processes, measures, communication plans, and ongoing reinforcement all aligned toward that vision.

When you think of creating a “customer service program,” don’t just fallback to training as a panacea. Ensure you’re doing all you need to do to truly create a culture of customer service.

Read our New Book – “Ask Yourself…Am I GREAT at Customer Service?” http://www.amigreatat.com/

Listen to our latest podcast episode of “Stepping Up Service” on The MESH Network at http://themesh.tv/stepping-up-service/

Interested in improving your company’s customer service? See more at our new website! http://www.cssamerica.com/


They Booed You. Should You Boo Back?

Posted on May 23, 2012 in Business Advice, Sports Please leave a comment

When Cleveland Indians’ pitcher Chris Perez chastised fans for not showing up at the stadium and for booing the first place team, a Sports firestorm erupted. How dare the player get on the fans?! What right does he have to rip fans?! Where does a rich player come off chastising people who pay their hard earned money for entertainment…and his paycheck?!

In the article Chris Perez calls out Indians fans, Perez’ rant is documented, and the team’s counter to his comments is noted as well. The team distanced themselves from his words, and praised the fans.

When you hear about this story, what it essentially comes down to is last place attendance for a first place team. So Perez’ solution to the issue is to say “Hey! We’re in first! Support us!” It’s an emotional reaction from a guy who apparently wants to win and wants support.

But that’s just the solution; nowhere in the article does it get at the root cause of the attendance problem. Many sports teams (many businesses for that matter) address issues with attendance or sales or revenue or retention with solutions without ever determining the root cause of the problem.

I was once told by the owner of a professional football franchise that the only thing that drives attendance is “wins and weather.” Well if that was true, then we could put a mathematical calculation together that looked at weather forecasts and wins, and determine attendance every year. If that were true, you could fire most anybody in business operations as well as game day staff, and there would be no impact on attendance. So while wins and weather have some impact, they don’t tell the whole story.

For the Cleveland Indians or any organization to truly fix attendance/sales/retention issues, they have to learn how to get to the root cause – what can be controlled in business operations, in particular. They have to think about how to – on an ongoing basis – learn from fans, develop relationships with fans, retain and grow business with fans.

Don’t let your company’s players try to guilt fans into spending their money with you. Find out why they left, and address those root causes to keep them.

Interested in addressing your team’s fan relations/retention? Check out: http://cssamerica.com/csssport.htm


HCAHPS – How Performance Measurement is Driving Fear and Opportunity

Posted on May 9, 2012 in Business Advice, Healthcare Please leave a comment

Transparency is an often-used term by business executives, sometimes noting it as one of the organization’s values – being open with information within the business. But when transparency means having your performance publicized for all the world to see, it can drive a wide range of emotions.

Hospitals are dealing with this new level of transparency, according to Janette Jones of The Jackson Group – a healthcare research provider and consultancy. The Federal Government’s mandated performance measurement process called HCAHPS not only has led hospitals to survey patients with specific/consistent questions about their experience, but it has also touched on two key components of a business, its customer’s opinion and the impact of those opinions on its financial success.

According to Ms. Jones, the customer satisfaction ratings (along with multiple quality indicators) are currently being posted online for consumers to see. These patients and family members will increasingly “Look at the overall ratings and the nursing/doctor information. They’ll see how hospitals have scored, and do a comparison – ‘What is this hospital’s overall rating v. that hospital’s rating?’, and for the informed consumer, all those domains will be important if they have a choice – particularly if they are going to have surgery,” said Ms. Jones.

So when these hospitals think about how their performance – as perceived by the customer – is being measured and posted for all to see, it can create anxiety and fear – but also opportunity.

Imagine that you outperform your competitors. Having those customer satisfaction metrics posted online is free marketing. It’s an objective, customer-based opportunity for you to differentiate yourself from competitors.

Whether you’re a hospital or not, you can learn from the HCAHPS measurement and reporting process. Remember, this is essentially word-of-mouth on a government website.

So think about your current experience through the customer’s eyes. Think about who you hire and how you train them to make the impression on the customers who are evaluating you and sharing their feelings with friends. Think about what drives their satisfaction and loyalty and what you need to do to capitalize on it. And think about your competitors – find out where are they better and worse so you can improve and differentiate.

Use this HCAHPS example as a challenge that spurs your organization to become better than you are today.

Interested in improving your company’s customer service? See more at our new website! http://www.cssamerica.com/

Listen to our latest podcast episode of “Stepping Up Service” on The MESH Network at http://themesh.tv/stepping-up-service/


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