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Use AI to Improve Your Performance - 7/23/24


Many companies are integrating Artificial Intelligence (AI) into some aspect of their business.  This could greatly change how they operate, how they communicate with customers. This AI wave reminds me of a story from 20+ years ago when a stock brokerage firm launched a new website that greatly enhanced the Read more

The New Burger Experience - 7/16/24


Floyd loves a good hamburger. Any chance he gets to try a new spin on an old standby, he takes it. Recently, a burger joint opened near his house, and Floyd was very excited! It was owned by and named for a world-renowned chef, so it had to be Read more

Boost Customer Happiness - 7/9/24


There’s a cooking show that a friend of mine watches, and the premise is all about reverse engineering food.  They may take a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup, analyze it, and determine the ingredients just by tasting it.  Then they figure out a recipe.  The cook will try to make Read more

Brainstorm to Better Yourself - 7/2/24


I’ve led enough sessions with clients on continuous improvement topics to have solid experience on how to lead ideation exercises, brainstorming to develop new ideas.  Oftentimes these sessions start with the right question; the first answers may not be the ultimate solution, but they can serve as a jumping Read more

The Power of the Pause - 6/25/24


When I’m facilitating a meeting, and it feels like it’s going off-track or the discussion is going a little longer than it should, I may say something like “let me pause the conversation so that…” or “let’s pause just for a minute and consider…” I don’t like the word STOP. Read more

Handle Interruptions Heroically - 6/18/24


In the middle of a project, Jimbo, the customer service team member, had to stop what he was doing because he received an e-mail from a customer complaining about their experience at a recent event. Later that day, Jimbo was asked by his boss to put everything on hold for Read more

From Employees to Teammates: The Shift - 6/11/24


Be a great teammate. Be a good team player. We’re all part of the team. We’re no longer employees, we’re team members! The phrase “Team” is used in describing co-workers so much more than it was used years ago.  Then, we would be talking about employees, talking about staff, talking Read more

Nurture New Relationships - 6/4/24


Freddie was a new business owner in town.  He was launching a franchise, had acquired some funding from a local bank, and was in search of staff who cared about customer service. All the while, he was in the process of renovating a storefront for his business, so he was Read more

There’s Positivity in Patience - 5/28/24


The employee at the financial services firm was working with a new client on a relatively simple loan.  The documentation was about as clear as it could get to the employee, but the customer had lots of questions.  The employee calmly, clearly, and specifically answered each question.  The meeting Read more

The Goal – A Great Experience - 5/21/24


The following is a narrative of a great experience (people, process, service, facility) at a minor league sporting event – key points that could apply to any business are in bold… Mark and I pulled into the parking lot, excited about the game.  The Slapshots had been on a roll Read more

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Predict, Prioritize, and Personalize – 9/12/17

Posted on September 12, 2017 in Customer Service Tip of the Week Please leave a comment

Many sports organizations are overly marketing-driven, so they’re typically much more focused on major marketing initiatives/programs than the 1-on-1 relationship-development approach we promote. So when we work with Sports clients, we’re often asked why we use research to do so much analysis on individual fans. Here are 3 key reasons we offer:

  • Predict – Sales to and return/renewal of existing fans typically result in 70%-90% of a sports team’s ticket revenue annually, so we use our CSS Renew+ analysis to predict the renewal likelihood for every existing fan. This prediction enables teams to know who’s most likely to renew, who’s on the fence, and who’s least likely to return. This leads to the next reason.
  • Prioritize – When you know who’s most likely to return, you can prioritize them for upsell/cross-sell efforts. When you know the customers who are on the fence, you can prioritize them for service recovery or retention efforts. When you know who has little-to-no chance of returning, you know with whom to spend little time – these fans may get the e-mail instead of the personal call or visit.
  • Personalize – When we perform analysis of the client base, it typically occurs after we’ve conducted a fan survey, so we’ve gathered tremendous intelligence on the individual fan. Instead of the follow-up to the prioritization activity being thousands of generic e-mails being sent, the follow-up involves a call to the customer named Marty that references how he likes to take his family to games and what other kid/family activities are available. The follow-up involves addressing Claudia’s concern with traffic and parking, noting actions the organization is taking to relieve those concerns. And the call to Chris includes following up on the interest he conveyed in the survey for more tickets for his small business.

 
If you’re trying to uncover the reasons to research and analyze information on individual clients, remember these 3 key words.

Predict, Prioritize, and Personalize.

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What’s Truly Unique for Fans in the Seats

Posted on October 24, 2012 in Business Advice, Carolinas, Sports Please leave a comment

I’ve been fortunate to have been a season ticket holder for a professional football team for 15+ years, so when my company consults with pro sports teams on season ticket holder (STH) retention and fan relations, I can talk as a strategist and researcher or…as a fan.

And I love talking as a fan. One key point that those in the sports industry need to remember is that the game day experience is – to many fans – far beyond what the smart phone experience or television experience could ever become.

As a fan, when I go to the game, there are certain aspects of the experience that I could never get on TV. I feel and am a part of the emotion of 70,000+ people (FYI – I’m a Carolina Panther STH). And even when that emotion is negative, it’s raw emotion, at times it’s yelling, at times it’s tense silence – but it’s almost always a roller coaster of emotion for 3+ hours.

And unlike the fan at home, if I want to watch a defensive end for a couple plays, I can focus just on him. If I see a wide receiver wide open 20 yards downfield, I can yell “He’s open! He’s open!” at the same time that a TV watcher is being shown the quarterback standing in the backfield. I can think to myself – “that pass is going to be intercepted” before the TV cameraman even focuses on the receiver and cornerback.

You see, I can see what I want to see. It’s in my hands (and my eyes) to focus on anything going on, whether in the field of play, on the sidelines, or in the stands. The customer has the power – a power that cannot be duplicated by television.

Television is a wonderful thing and is constantly expanding its capabilities, but these expansions of capabilities erode the gap between the game day experience and the home experience.

So to maintain gate receipts, STH retention, and enthusiasm for attending the games, game day professionals and pro sports teams need to address this key point – we need to leverage, improve, and market the two greatest aspects of being at the games: (1) Being a part of the experience with tens of thousands of other fans, and (2) Controlling one’s own perspective on the event.

To keep fans coming to the games, enhance the “group experience,” and find new ways to help fans gain more from their unique view of the event.

Interested in improving your team or club’s fan relations? See more at our new website! http://cssamerica.com/csssport.htm

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


Service or a Perk – Pick 1

Posted on January 25, 2012 in Business Advice, Sports Please leave a comment

“Service, Price, or Quality – Pick any 2.”

A sign with that statement used to hang in my dry cleaners years ago – luckily, it was a joke. They’re pretty good at all 3!

But that statement hasn’t died; a recent article in Moneywise essentially had a revised version of the statement – “Service or a Perk – Pick 1.”

The article references a survey with the following finding: “Almost half (49%) of consumers would change banks because of bad customer service – more than twice the number (22%) of people who would change providers because of rewards and incentives.” Now you may be thinking of an incentive from a bank being a stereotypical “toaster,” but different organizations have different definitions of incentive, reward, or perk.

We work with lots of organizations that focus on perks, particularly professional sports organizations. And many of them are constantly looking to expand their offering of benefits to season ticket holders (STHs) to impact renewals for the next season. But instead of assuming perks drive retention, we often survey (or tell our clients to survey) STHs and ask them directly – how much impact does “X” have on your likelihood to renew?

Now “X” could be “Direction of the Team” or “My Relationship with My Account Representative” or “Perk A” or “Benefit B.”

But don’t make assumptions; ask the customers what drives their retention and renewals, and then act on that information. Remember, Perks/Benefits can cost a LOT of money, so don’t spend it unless you have to do so.

So when you’re determining what perks and benefits to provide, first ask your customers if those items really drive retention.

Listen to our Pro Sports episode of “Stepping Up Service” on The MESH Network at http://themesh.tv/stepping-up-service/2011/10/11/stepping-up-service-3-customer-service-in-professional-sport.html

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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