Customer Service Excellence
What is it? Does your business aspire to achieve this?
What can you do to ‘wow’ your customers every time?
Whilst everybody seems to know that you need to treat your customers right, few businesses have devoted customers who want to brag about them.
Ken Blanchard in his book ‘Leading at a Higher Level’ found that in high performing businesses, everyone passionately holds & maintains the highest standards for quality & service from their customers’ perspective. Everything starts & ends with the customer front of mind, rather than as the end receiver of the chain. Employees know that their job is to exceed expectations & to back up the key frontline person at that moment. Even a key aspect of the orientation of new team members is teaching them how to treat customers & make this simply part of the way they do business.
I had a recent experience buying some flowers. The shop assistant checked the flowers before ringing them up & suggested looking for a fresher bunch. She assisted with picking out the freshest looking flowers & after putting the price through the register, offered to give me the other flowers to enjoy for the few days they would last. What a great, albeit simple, example of creating the best possible customer experience.
When it comes to the business world, customer service is one of the most important aspects of having a successful business. It doesn’t matter whether you are selling something or providing a service, you aren’t going to get far if you don’t have good customer service.
As individuals we can provide great customer service. It’s as a collective, working together with the same goal of providing an excellent experience throughout each stage of a customer’s interaction with our business, that the ‘wow’ experience can be achieved.
It’s valuable to take time out to review within our teams, & understand that each one of us plays an important role in the overall customer experience…How do we answer the phone? How do we treat customers when they come into our offices? How do we interact with them during our meetings? What happens when a problem occurs?
What kind of experience do you want your customers to have as they interact with every aspect of your business?
