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Is Their Poor Planning Your Emergency? - 12/17/24


Have you ever heard the saying:  Your poor planning is not my emergency. I’ve heard it said often – not necessarily directly from one person to another.  More typical is that I hear it from the person having to drop everything and do something immediately because someone else didn’t think Read more

Empathy Examples for Everyday Situations - 12/10/24


I’ve often said that empathy is the single most important characteristic of people who are great at customer service.  If empathy is essentially “to understand the other person,” it helps so much to have that ability in order to specifically help someone.  To talk to what’s unique about them.  Read more

Tell Them Why You’re Giving Thanks - 12/3/24


Thank you! Merci! Danke! Doumo! Gracias! It seems like every language has a translation of Thank You.  Even though I only fluently speak English and speak Spanish, un poco, I – and probably most of you – have heard some or all of the translations of "Thank You” noted above.  Read more

Refine Your Decision-making Process - 11/26/24


Every day, you make decisions of what to do and what not to do.  And in the world of customer service, often the affected parties are our customers, our co-workers, and our company.  Here are a few quotes to consider when you’re thinking about evaluating and refining your decision-making Read more

Acting on the Guiding Principles for Great Customer Service - 11/19/24


In last week’s tip, we shared 5 Guiding Principles for Great Customer Service.  This week, let’s address what “taking action” looks like on those key principles.  If last week was about what to do and WHY, this week is about the HOW. Engage with Interest: To engage with interest, proactively Read more

Guiding Principles for Great Customer Service - 11/12/24


It’s hard to know every procedure, every policy, every technique possible to handle every situation correctly.  After all, maybe our procedures are standard, but our customers are not.  Maybe our policies stay pretty consistent, but our customers’ needs and issues, their attitudes and actions can change from customer to Read more

From a Simple Question to an Exceptional Experience - 11/5/24


Phyllis loves her job.  It’s not just because she loves being a customer service representative, not just because she really likes her co-workers, and not just because she enjoys her company.  It’s because she really appreciates her customers, as well. A customer had ordered a register book off the company Read more

Fix One Problem without Creating Another - 10/29/24


If you’ve ever had an issue with your dishwasher, this will sound familiar.  I’ve dealt with so many dishwashers over the years, and they always seem to have some kind of an issue.  Maybe it’s because of the mix of water and technology, but for whatever reason, these never Read more

Delight Your Customers - 10/22/24


Buddy the Bug Man was different.  His company was new, and the only reason why Janet tried him out was that the service she had used for years just wasn’t working.  Whether it was mosquitoes in the yard, ants in the kitchen, or cockroaches flying through on their way Read more

A More Complete Definition of Responsiveness - 10/15/24


I was purchasing something recently that was being custom-developed.  At one point, the company’s employee and I had a good 20 e-mails going back and forth - 10 from each of us.  Unfortunately, I broke my own rule, and I did not pick up the phone after 2 or Read more

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Fast, but Not Fast Food

Posted on September 3, 2009 in Business Advice, Carolinas Please leave a comment

Customer service is not all about the eye contact, the smile, and the “soft” aspects of the personal interaction. They are very important, but process is also important.

The restaurant world is a tough business from a customer service perspective, because it has many characteristics of a manufacturing environment as you’re processing the food and getting it out, and timeliness is of the essence. One restaurant chain seems to get it when it comes to process. At least the particular location that I frequent of Monterray’s Mexican restaurant is excellent in their service delivery process.

You walk in and you immediately see where to check-in.  You get waited on quickly; typically within 30 seconds, somebody is leading you to your table. As you are being seated, a second employee is walking up behind the host or hostess with chips and salsa, so that the minute the hostess walks away, you are already eating free chips. The drink orders come quickly, the server frequently comes to you in a non-pushy way to check on your readiness to order. No matter what you order, the food comes out fast — all the time it comes out fast. It’s hot, it’s fresh, and it’s very very good. But this blog is about process, not food quality.

When the chip basket looks nearly empty, the next thing you know it’s been refilled. The water is constantly getting refilled. The check comes quickly, and it’s convenient to pay as well.

We never ask about the training, the processes, the systems, or the internal communications that happen over and over and over again between employees during a typical night at the restaurant. But we know they must be standardized, because the service is so consistent. We know they must work, because the service is so quick. We know employees must be confident in understanding their roles, because the flows between encounters with the servers and other employees in the discussions we have are always seamless.

Monterray’s is a great example of how big an impact an effective customer service process can have on the customer’s experience.

Do your processes help or hinder your customer’s satisfaction?

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


What is Your Post-Exit Strategy?

Posted on August 31, 2009 in Business Advice, Sports Please leave a comment

Every year, professional sports teams lose season ticket holders.  These season ticket holders exit the organization because of a myriad of reasons.  With the economy like it has been over the last 18 months in particular, professional sports teams are losing season ticket holders at an alarming rate.  Many pro sports organizations deal with these issues by ramping up their advertising and marketing efforts.  Many others chalk up the losses to a bad economy, but few of these organizations really have a strategy targeted at these former season ticket holders.

These ticketholders have left; so what is your strategy post-exit?

Some of the best sales prospects your organization can have are former customers. You already have a great deal of intelligence on your former customers. You already know their likes and dislikes, their preferences, what’s most important to them, key demographic information, and their purchase history. Well, at least you should know all this information.

The two things you don’t know are two pieces of information that can make you a lot of money very quickly. The first piece of information is the specific reason or reasons why they left. This is where you avoid making broad assumptions about the season ticket holder base, and you look specifically at each one to determine why they left. You would probably be shocked to find out why the individual season ticket holders left even though you might be able to guess broadly about the major reasons why season ticket holders left. By knowing why they left, it helps in future conversations to help get them back.

The second piece of information that’s vital is their likelihood of future interest in your products and services, or as pro sports teams focus, on tickets. You have to know what level of interest they have and in what type of individual game ticket, a mini plan, or some form of full season plan. Without this information, you don’t know enough to have an efficient sales pitch with a former client.

So what is your post-exit strategy?

With our pro sports clients, it includes conducting Exit Interviews in a soft form with the season ticket holders to gather intelligence about these key pieces of information. And then to use the results of that research to both apply to current season ticket holders to best retain them but also — in the hopes of increasing revenue — to make targeted sales pitches at the former season ticket holders.

Your lost season ticket holder is one of your greatest sources of future revenue. Have a strategy for getting them back.

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


What’s Your HCAHPS Strategy?

Posted on August 21, 2009 in Healthcare Please leave a comment

As healthcare administrators know, HCAHPS is a comparative database to which they are reporting many different pieces of information about hospital performance, including customer service and patient satisfaction indicators.  Essentially, any individual with web access (i.e., any current or prospective customer) can go to the internet and compare your organization side-by-side with other local hospitals.  It’s a scary thought to have that kind of comparative information readily available to your customers, when you have no control over what’s displayed or how it’s displayed.

When organizations have issues in the patient satisfaction or customer service indicators, they immediately think of the need to do scripting with nurses or rounding on the floors, or training for personnel.  And while these might all be appropriate actions to take, these are typically only a part of a strategic action plan.  If you want to make adjustments and improvements in customer service and patient satisfaction performance, at some point you need to have a strategy behind it.  Most hospitals have marketing strategies. They have advertising strategies.  They do detailed planning when opening up a new wing or building a new patient tower.  But how many of them have a customer service strategy?

An effective customer service strategy focuses on the customer experience, service delivery, the corporate culture, and metrics to measure all of those components.  It focuses on management’s role in preaching and modeling the types of behaviors that lead to high levels of customer and patient satisfaction.  It has tactics listed out in a Gantt Chart format over time that helps to change the culture, get more focused on the patient, and specifically help employees to know what to do right and how to stop doing what’s causing problems.

If you want long-term success in your organization in the areas of customer service and patient satisfaction, develop, commit to, and execute a Customer Service Strategy.

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


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