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Be Supportive, Not Defensive - 10/7/25


[An employee on the phone with a customer…] Who told you that you didn’t have to submit that form? … Bob?  Oh brother!  You see Bob is our “special” co-worker.  He seems to always tell customers the wrong thing to do, and we’re having to clean up after him.  Read more

Some Customers LOVE Predictability - 9/30/25


I was facilitating focus groups of businesses that utilize local government services.  The phrase that popped up multiple times was “Time Is Money!”  What these municipal customers were conveying was that their time was valuable, and delays were wasting their time.  But the conversations were not just about how Read more

Find Your Special Sauce - 9/23/25


When I watch a football game and I see a great quarterback (somebody who may be considered a “Star”), he might be an excellent runner, have a big arm, be able to diagnose the defense and get his team into the right play.  But he’s likely not great at Read more

Gain Control of the Conversation - 9/16/25


The customer’s angry or upset or they have a complaint.  They’re very chatty or very wordy or they just want to talk to somebody.  You’re on a time crunch, and the customer obviously is not. There are times when you need to gain control of the conversation.  It’s important for Read more

Complement with a Compliment - 9/9/25


We perform many tasks for our customers every day, and when we’re done with a step in the process, oftentimes we will tell the customer what’s been done.  But if we want to create more of a WOW experience, if we want to make the customer feel a little Read more

When Patience Begets Patience - 9/2/25


Jennifer, the server, walked toward the couple in the restaurant.  The customers had been seated for a minute or two, and they noticed the server was walking briskly toward their table.  Jennifer recognized the couple she was about to serve, because they had been in the previous week. Since the Read more

Address the Expectations that Were Set - 8/26/25


Before the caller ever got to Marco – the customer service representative, the customer had been working with the company for months.  They had read the marketing brochures, had a conversation with a sales rep, reviewed the new customer information on the website, and read all the information e-mailed Read more

When Technology Fails the Customer - 8/19/25


Technology is a wonderful thing…until it isn’t.  The website is down, the mobile app won’t work, the system keeps kicking them out of their account, or they received a spoofing phone call supposedly from your department. If you’ve ever been manning the phones or managing the department inbox, you know Read more

The Misunderstood Physician - 8/12/25


I was speaking with one of my personal physicians years ago, and when we were talking about my work – particularly customer satisfaction research - he started talking about online physician ratings.  He lamented that a few low ratings were dinging his overall score.  Then he shared that the Read more

Uncover Silent Concerns - 8/5/25


One of the customer service statistics we have quoted many times over the years is:  For every complaint you do hear, there could be 26 other customer issues that you don’t hear. And when we bring up that statistic, we bring it up because we want to make sure companies Read more

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The Quest is Not the Thing

Posted on January 31, 2011 in Business Advice, World of Customer Service Please leave a comment

The quest for the next customer is exciting, arduous, challenging, and – when you win – rewarding. Every quest begins with a first contact. You work hard to learn about this customer’s needs, wants, and priorities. You strive to learn their goals, their price parameters, and their personal profile. Where did they go to school? Do they have children? Who’s their favorite football team? Where did they grow up?

You learn the facts. You create the plan. You execute the plan. You make the sale, and you ring the bell in celebration! Then you move on to the next potential new customer, the next quest.

Is there something wrong with this picture?

You’ve just worked hard to earn that new customer. Yet, your focus now is on the NEXT new opportunity. What’s most important is the CURRENT new opportunity. So many people in business are in such hot pursuit of the next new opportunity that they are blinded to the current new opportunity.

What would rather achieve: 50 one-time sales or 50 sales from one customer? I hope you all responded "the latter." Think of each new customer as the beginning of a new relationship – your current new opportunity. Your primary focus after completing that transaction with the customer should be developing the relationship and initiating an ongoing system of communicating with them.

Selling to people you don’t know and don’t have a relationship with is hard. Create a legion of customers with whom you can relate, communicate, and – hopefully – enjoy working.

Create this legion by developing relationships with the one-time customers and making them your source for long-term business success.

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

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


How Fast are Your Customers Churning?

Posted on January 25, 2011 in Business Advice, World of Customer Service Please leave a comment

In the TMC.net article titled A Challenge for T-Mobile: Reducing Sky-High Customer Churn Rates, author Tracey Schelmetic discusses the high turnover rate of customers at T-Mobile and what the company is doing about it. Essentially, over 2% of customers leave their long-term contracts monthly, or about 25% per year. To address that, the organization is going to make several changes – the first of which is tying executive compensation to customer turnover.

So this article begs the question for every company – what is your customer churn rate? I know every business has a Profit & Loss statement that shows top line revenues, but what percentage of the customers that produced those revenues last year are producing revenues for you this year? How much money did you lose last year that you have to backfill with new business this year?

Let’s just say it’s 25%. What is that in terms of dollars? How much effort has to be put into place by your Sales & Marketing forces to attract that level of dollars in new business – just to get you back to where you were last year?

Any business – large or small – needs to know their customer churn rate, their revenue loss. When you do, you begin to realize the true financial impact of customer retention. You begin to understand the importance of every interaction with customers. You begin to define how you can improve your bottom line by improving your customer service.

So how fast are your customers churning?

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

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


An Ice Cream Cone and a Princess – Lessons from Disney

Posted on January 20, 2011 in Business Advice Please leave a comment

The little girl was with her family at Disney World for the first time. She had just sat down to have her ice cream cone, and was wearing a princess outfit which was bought just for this special trip.

As she started to eat, the ice cream fell off the top of her cone onto her dress, and then onto the floor. As the tears started to well-up, the mother took her daughter to the restroom to get cleaned up.

When they went back to their table, they noticed two “cast members” standing at the table, and the other family members were there as well. The ice cream had already been cleaned up by the employees, and they asked if she was the girl whose ice cream had fallen. When she replied “yes,” one of the employees said “please come with me,” and the employee took the little girl’s hand, walked with the mother and child to the counter, and greeted the employee making the cone saying “This princess had an ice cream cone, and it fell. Can you please give her whatever she’d like?”

“I would be happy to,” replied the other employee, and the girl was thrilled to get a new cone.

There are LOTS of lessons to be learned here. First, the employees spotted the issue because they were looking for opportunities to engage and help customers. They proactively addressed the other family members. They immediately cleaned up the mess without having to be asked. They were patient in waiting for the child to return. They clarified what had happened. They used respectful phrases in addressing the customer. They quickly provided an alternative product, communicating well with co-workers.

I know…it was just an ice cream cone.

But think about your company. Where are there issues, whether caused by your organization or the customer themselves? How do you deal with these issues?

Are you looking to help customers? Are you proactive in engaging customers? Do you address issues without having to be asked by the customer? Are you patient with them? Do you clarify the issue instead of making assumptions? Are you respectful in how you address customers, particularly in these situations? Do you quickly remedy issues, working as a team for the customer?

Ask yourself these questions, and then learn a little lesson from a Disney Princess.

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

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


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