Create a Winning Sales Culture with Superior Customer Service
The goal as a company is to have customer service that is not just the best but legendary.
Sam Walton, Founder of Wal-Mart
“Profit in business comes from repeat customers; customers that boast about your product and service, and that bring friends with them.”
W. Edwards Deming
Superior customer service is a pretty hot topic and can make or break your business. People have little patience for lousy customer service and easily get tired of missed commitments, waiting in long lines, trying to get a live person on the line, going through an interrogation to return something or trying to communicate through a language barrier.
If you provide them with a simple, efficient, pleasant experience on a consistent, predictable and reliable basis, they will engage with your business over and over. More importantly, they will tell business associates, friends and family!
As a business leader, you must have a clearly defined plan for your firm and that includes customer service. There are three prime considerations and let’s just keep it simple:
- It must be easy for customers to do business with you. You can do this in a number of different ways through your pricing, sales/distribution channels, website, technology, etc.
- From a customer point of view, doing business with your firm needs to be efficient from a time standpoint, but also each interaction must be an exceptionally positive experience. First of all, your staff must be professional: competent, knowledgeable, courteous, etc. Furthermore, your processes and systems must make things simple and easy. Your customers must know they are getting good value for their time and money. Value goes beyond the price of the products and extends to the shopping/buying experience and other intangibles like the reputation that your company brings to the table. And finally, you must define a process for follow-up to check in with customers to ensure the product/service is meeting expectations, and to confirm that you understand future needs and requirements.
- Change your mindset and ask yourself “How can I NOT afford to do these things?” This shouldn’t be a question of expenses, because acquiring and retaining happy customers has an enormous return on investment.
With these thoughts in mind, from an execution standpoint, here are a few key success factors:
- Share your customer service vision with your team an actively solicit their buy-in, support, and engagement. This not a one-person type deal and not even a plurality, but every person in the firm must take ownership of the customer experience
- Connect your incentive programs and bonuses directly to the customer experience
- Monitor closely and assess the level of customer service your team is delivering
- Focus on continuous improvement; an exceptional customer experience is truly a journey and not destination
If you are looking for assistance in developing and implementing a strategy to deliver a superior customer experience, please contact me at (281) 817-7391 or adam.vital@avbgs.com.
