Posts tagged as:

complaints

Customer Service: The X Factor

by Jen Kuhn on August 22, 2011

Revolve your world around the customer and more customers will revolve around you. ~Heather Williams

There are 6 levels of customer service:

  1. Poor
  2. Service Recovery
  3. Neutral
  4. Good
  5. Excellent
  6. The X Factor

Let’s talk about Levels 5 and 6.

As consumers, when an employee does their job well, we typically consider that excellent and exceptional.  The Experience Factor says, “Raise your standards!”

Excellent service is a bit rare, like spotting a Northern Hairy-Nosed Wombat.  It occurs when you, the customer, experience a level of service that is not only exceptional, it’s unexpected, welcomed and memorable.

The X Factor is when a business or employee delivers a level of service that leaves the consumer in awe.  The X Factor is when a business or employee makes a conscious effort to exceed your expectations, provide a personalized experience and excel at every touch point.  It’s about a 1% difference between excellent and X Factor.  It’s an employee mindset: always looking for ways to take it up a notch, to make the difference.  The X Factor is the rarest of service experiences.

Ask our clients: we are educated consumers who have high standards. It’s our job to educate our clients in order to take their service to the X Factor level (that’s level 6! I haven’t even achieved that level with Angry Birds!).

When was the last time you experienced X Factor service? Was it really the X Factor, or was it just a “given”?  Throw some examples at us!  And what about your business…do you have the X Factor?  We will give you our opinion.  And remember, we can agree to disagree, as long as you know we’re right!

Print This Post Print This Post

{ 1 comment }

Combat Gear, Attack Plans and the Unhappy Customer

by Kelly Ketelboeter on July 20, 2010

Have you ever felt like you have to put on full combat gear and map out a plan of attack just to deal with someone in customer service?  Please tell me I’m not the only one!

Last week we took our car to the dealership because we had an issue.  An issue that is still covered by our warranty.  Imagine that!  The dealership sent us to the body shop for them to take a look at our car.  The guy at the body shop was less than personable.  He checked out our car and proceeded to tell us that it had already been repainted.  I was completely confused since we bought our car new (not the wisest investment I know!) with only 4 miles on it.  And we put those 4 miles on it during the test drive.  When we questioned the expert on his assessment he just kept chanting the same line over and over again…

“It’s not up to me.  I just check out the car, tell the dealership what I see and they decide what to do.  This car has been repainted and that’s what I plan on telling them.”

Not once did the gentlemen actually recognize our real concern.  It wasn’t if the dealership was going to take care of our problem under our warranty, it was understanding how a car with 4 miles on it could have been repainted.  We’ve never been in an accident (knock on wood), we have never had it painted and we are the only owner.   Even after expressing our concern he just kept repeating the same line.  He did expand on his chant only to tell us he had been doing this for 40 years and knows when something has been repainted.  I wasn’t questioning his expertise or the fact that the car had been repainted.  I wanted to know how this could possibly happen!

The minute we got home we started to do some research.  We found out that there are several hundred other owners with the same car, the same year, that had the same problem.  We printed pages and pages of information ready to go into battle when the dealership called.  I had my weapons drawn, my armor on and my war plan in hand.  All of this could have been avoided if the body shop guy would have just taken the time to understand us and our concerns.

I realize the body shop couldn’t solve our problem.  We weren’t expecting them to.  Regardless of who’s at fault or whether or not you can solve the problem there’s an opportunity here to create a positive experience and diffuse a potential battle with these 4 simple steps.

1. Listen.

The key here is not to interrupt when the customer is talking and not to jump to any conclusions.  You also want to make sure you give the customer your full attention.  Avoid thinking about what your going to say next.  And definitely avoid drawing your weapons!  Focus on what the customer is saying, what’s happened, how they are feeling and what they want.  Ask yourself, “what is the customers true concern?”  Don’t just take a guess at what you think it is or you won’t satisfy your customers needs.

2. Empathize.

We bought our very first new car with only 4 miles on it.  Did I tell you that already?  It would have been nice to hear something along these lines, “It’s definitely disappointing to find out your brand new car was repainted.”  Why yes it is!  Empathy will help to diffuse emotion and it shows the customer that you were in fact listening and understand how they are feeling.  When there’s a problem realize that customers are not logical beings.  We are emotional.  So recognize that emotion.  How would you feel?  What would you want to hear?

3. Apologize.

Often times you probably didn’t create the problem the customer is having.  All the same an apology can go a long way in building good karma with your customer.  Apologizing doesn’t mean you agree with the customer.  It’s just a simple statement.  Again it will help to diffuse emotion and increase logic.

4. Educate.

As I stood there in the body shop in disbelief I wanted to know how on earth a brand new car had already been repainted when we didn’t repaint it.  Help me understand.  All it would have taken is for the service rep to tell us how this could have possibly happened.  Come to find out, after our own research, sometimes cars get damaged in transport to the dealership.  Sometimes they get damaged on the lot.  And sometimes that’s just how the car was built and painted originally.  Who knew?  Certainly not me.  I am sure that the service rep did know though.  Because when we came back to drop off our car, he explained that.  A little too late if you ask me.  There are things about your business that you know that the average customer doesn’t know.  Don’t quote policy.  But instead educate and explain the possibilities.   Not only will it save you a headache later on it will also build good will with your customer.

I am happy to say that the dealership did take care of our problem at no cost to us.  I put on my combat gear for nothing!  I did second guess our original purchase and for the first time in 3 years experienced buyers remorse.  I also said to my friends and family that we would  never buy a Dodge again or anything from that dealership.  It wouldn’t have taken much for this to be a non-event for us.  If only the service rep had these 4 tips.

What would you add?  What’s been your experience as an upset customer?  What’s been your experience in dealing with an upset customer?  We would love to hear your story and what’s worked for you.

Print This Post Print This Post

{ 8 comments }

Wednesday: Whining Employees

by Jen Kuhn on March 17, 2010

I’ve never worked with, at or for a company that does not have one or two chronic whiners.  No matter what you introduce, they find fault.  These are the people that complain about a free meal (“Pizza for lunch? We had that last time. Why can’t we ever get anything else?”).  Ah, how pleasant.

Several years ago, I was working with a company to help enhance their coaching skills.  All of the people I met were in positions of leadership.  On one of the breaks, a gentleman approaches me and begins a conversation about their holiday party. He stated that it was the worst one yet. They were finally allowed to invite a spouse/significant other. Upon arrival, he said there was barely any food left. To paraphrase, “My wife got a first hand experience of how cheap this company really is…running out of food! Can you believe that?  Then they send people out for chips and order some pizza.  How tacky.”  I responded by saying something like, “Sounds like you were disappointed.” Way to add fuel to that fire. He ranted for 5 more minutes.

On the next break, I avoided eye contact with him. I was speaking with a newer employee, and she asked me, “Did you hear about our holiday party?!”  I wanted to run. She continued, “It was the BEST! My fiance and I got there after it started and there was no food left. Our CEO is calling pizza places and asking ME what I liked on my pizza! He doesn’t even know me and I just started working here! Then, he hands my fiance money and asks if he would mind going with some others to pick up chips and dip. How cool is that?”  She went on and on about how excited she was to finally be working for a company where they cared about their employees and where the CEO connected with everyone.

Same event, different interpretations. As a coach, how do you deal with chronic complainers if stun guns are not an option?

Here are some common employee complaints coaches have shared with me.  I’ve added some possible responses to consider.

Employee: Why do we have to do it this way? We’ve never done it this way before?

Coach: You’re right. We are using a new approach. What concerns you most about using a new approach?

Employee: Do they have any idea how busy we are? They keep calling us with the same questions!

Coach: You’re right. We work in a fast paced department. What ideas do you have to help other departments find this information on their own?

Employee: Why do I have to attend that training?  It doesn’t even apply to me.  What a waste of my time!

Coach: There may be some parts of the training that do not directly impact what you do.  I want you to listen for things that do apply to you and tell me about them after the training.  I’d also encourage you to attend the training with an open mind; my expectation is that you challenge yourself to discover something new and connect with at least one person from another department.

I could go on and on with complaints that coaches have brought to my attention.  Yet you’ll notice a pattern in the responses I’ve provided.  The coach validates what is true within the complaint, then challenges the employee in a non-threatening manner to work toward a solution.  If every complaint is addressed this way, eventually the complainers will learn that you will hold them accountable for solutions, and that despite their complaining you are not going to change your course of action.  This should lessen the number of complaints you hear (as long as you are consistent with your responses).  Whiners want an audience.  Don’t give them one.  Give them a coach.

If you have other ideas about dealing with whiners and complainers, please share them.  You’ll be helping a coach who is currently hiding under their desk in an attempt to avoid the chronic complainer!

Print This Post Print This Post

{ 3 comments }