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Customer attention and loyalty are not managed using cards

December 9th, 2011

Loyalty cards This week I went to a local baby center, a store that sells the whole shooting range of products for babies, well, for parents who have babies. My reason was to buy a trailer for the baby’s buggy. As we have had a new born it makes getting around harder so with these ingenious (market driven) products you just connect the trailer to the buggy and another child can stand on it, so you can get around a lot faster.

We went to shop that is in our village, which is about a 1KM walk, with the intention of buying the gagdet there and hooking everything up and then coming home with our eldest son on the trailer, which made him very happy and his parents as well as a 1KM walk with a four year old is a long process, at least in my case;-)

So good so far

So, we choose the product in question that best suited us and told the woman that it was great and that we wanted to set it up there and then. This is where it all goes wrong.

She told us that it takes time and that you would not want to rush it, that maybe we could do it in the park that was outside. It was 7pm and dark:-( She then went on to tell us that she connected one up last week and it took some time.

Loyalty is not managed using cards

Myself and my wife looked at each other and I could see what she was thinking; last time we will come here! And she was right. When we went to pay for the product was when the woman told us about the loyalty card, that’s when I thought; you had my attention and chance for making us loyal 30 seconds ago not now and not via some generic, 1 fits all discount card that every other shop is offering.

I don’t mean for this post to sound like a rant, as it is not, the woman was quite agreeable and helpful to an extent; more or less what you would expect. And I am sure the woman had many reasons for saying NO, however she could have shared them with us, “You can set it up in here but if some customers come in I will have to attend them” would have been perfect with me.

Customers attention is more valuable than ever, don’t waste it

My point is this, now more than ever we all have to go that extra mile to earn customers loyalty / business. A friend of mine, recently commented on how the game has totally changed. It’s a brave new world where we have to bring our A Game (our best) every single day and that our A Game has to be different to everything else out there. The woman gave typical service, however, she had the opportunity , our attention, to go that extra mile.

Seth Godin in a recent post talked about the economics of Attention and what it actually costs:

Every interaction comes with a cost. Not in cash money, but in something worth even more: the attention of the person you’re interacting with. Waste it–with spam, with a worthless offer, with a lack of preparation, and yes, with nervous dissembling, then you are unlikely to get another chance

There is no second chance. Customers, generally speaking, will not complain until you have earned that opportunity, the opportunity to rectify the situation. So the first impression is make or break and if you really believe that it’s a brave new world first impressions become even more important than ever.

 

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Posted in Customer service, Differentiators, Engagement

How important is breakfast in your business?

September 8th, 2011

 

The business breakfast rule

“The most important meal for the hotel is the clients last breakfast”, this is what Paddy Fitzpatrick, one of Ireland’s most successful hoteliers, told me over 15 years go. His logic was that the last breakfast was the last opportunity for the hotel to leave a positive lasting impression for the client.

I am not too sure if the since deceased hotelier, may he rest in peace, had a process in place to ensure that last breakfast customers were given special / extra attention on their final but I do remember that he was very emphatic about the point, adding that to his charisma made that memory stay with me ever since.

First impressions count but what about last impressions?

Over 15 years have passed and my industry is not the same as Mr Fitzpatrick’s but I believe the breakfast rule holds through for all business regardless of the industry. The importance and power of the first impression is almost universally accepted, but I think we may however underestimate the power of the last impression or au reviour.

Anybody that speaks or presents for a living knows that this makes perfect sense as the start and finish of the presentation are key to moving your audience. But in a lot of other businesses the breakfast rule is not as important as the first impression, the focus is always getting the people in the door, making the transaction and taking care of everything along the way but no special emphasis is placed on the last important service contact.

A bad breakfast is bad even if it’s free

I bring this up as we recently had a designer doing up our home, they did a great job start to nearly finish, really splendid but they really dragged their feet on the last few items which were to be done. It was a small type of snag list, it was a day’s work at the most and they were doing it for free however we are still waiting.

Now you can spend an amazing 2 weeks in a hotel but if you are keep waiting indefinitely for your last breakfast you’re going to be P-ed off and that breakfast is going to unsettle your (stomach of) otherwise pleasant memories, and I don’t care if it’s free.

Do you take breakfast seriously?

In summary, think about where your last important point of service contact is with your customer and think are you really leaving a lasting memory or you just offering cold coffee and dried toast that will leave a bad taste in the future? Can you think of another company that has an interesting have of focusing on the last service contact? Please share!

 

P.S: I stay at Fitzpatrick’s hotel (their Dublin hotel) at least once every year and they do the best breakfast I have ever experienced in any hotel and I’ve been in a few over the years.


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Posted in Customer service, Engagement, Marketing

Satisfied customers are not necessarily loyal

October 25th, 2010

Loyalty is gained through human engagement

A satisfied client is not necessarily a loyal one! Companies talk about their customer satisfaction rates as if they differentiated them from the rest of the pack. However, satisfaction is merely the baseline for business and loyalty is what is needed for sustainable growth through renewals, referrals, up sells / cross sells etc.

.A satisfied customer is one that has received what he / she paid for, so if you have 90% positive satisfaction it really means that 10% didn’t receive what they paid for! On the other hand a 10% loyalty rate could leave your competitors eating your dust.

100% satisfaction….0% loyalty

If I want to send a package to Ireland from Spain in 48 hours. So satisfaction for me is when my package arrives in Dublin 48 hours or less after my sending it (with no alterations or problems in-between). A 100% satisfied customer in this case should be easily achieved and I am sure these companies have customer satisfaction stats that are amazing, but what is the corresponding loyalty rate?

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Personally I couldn’t care less which company delivers my package so I am 0% loyal but I am 100% satisfied.

Satisfaction is just basics

Satisfaction just means you are giving your customer what you said you would, what they expected from you based on your promise / pitch. So everybody should in theory have satisfied customers, it’s sort of basic stuff.

In these cases you differentiate yourself on what you offer your customers not on how you follow through on your offer.

Loyalty is in the intangibles

There are many studies on product / brand / company loyalty and what drives it. For me it is an emotional, human connection you feel in regards to the company. In one way or another you feel attached, connected with the company and this could be because of numerous reasons:

  • The company in question listens to you
  • The company appreciates you and your feedback
  • The company puts your problems first
  • The company represents your ideas / ideologies / philosophies / outlook etc.

I think in the grand majority of cases loyalty is triggered through human engagement. Excellent handling of customer complaints, pushing value over promotion, companies that take a sincere interest in their customers not just when things are going wrong, and so on.

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These are all intangibles which are probably not being taken seriously enough in the present economic climate where it’s all about short-term economic tangibles.

Loyal customers don’t have to be happy to be satisfied

Once a customer feels the human connection with the company / product etc they can be loyal without being satisfied. Look at football clubs for example, they can have terrible seasons and still fill stadiums and sell merchandising, it’s much more than satisfaction.

I consider myself a loyal customer of countycarrentals, an Irish car rental company. My loyalty is based on:

  • Excellent customer service I have received over the years
  • Staff have gone out of their way to make my customer experience more pleasurable.
  • They may not do everything exactly right, but my contention is that they will always go that extra mile for me (excuse the pun)

What about you

Do you think companies put too much emphasis on satisfaction? Are you a loyal customer to any company? What triggers loyalty in you? What can companies do differently to make customers loyal?

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    Posted in Customer service, Differentiators, Human behavior