True to my musical roots I’m a subscriber to New Music Strategies, a blog written by Andrew Dubber who certainly knows his stuff about the way the music business is changing. And, more to the point, how it’s not changing fast enough.
A recent post from him had this great quote:
Customer loyalty increases exponentially relative to the degree to which you make them feel important.
Absolutely. A few of the ways you can make customers feel important are:
- When they ring up, have a human answer the phone
- Be courteous and helpful
- Respond to enquiries quickly
- Trust what they say
How many companies fail in these simple points? Too many. What other ways have you been made to feel special – or been made to feel awful – by companies you’ve dealt with? What’s your top example – and worst gripe – with companies dealings with you?
One recent good example was over a shredder. The shredder just simply gave up the ghost. I contacted the vendor and they said it was not their responsibility outside of their 30 day window. They could not give me any information about who the real manufacturer was and it was a royal ball-ache to put it mildly.
Eventually I tracked down the manufacturer who told me to speak to the vendor.
Cue hair tearing, swearing, much frustration.
Eventually I go back to this lady at the manufacturers and she concedes if the vendor aint interested then she’ll just bloody well send me a whole new unit.
It didn’t cost her anything and on the back of it we had about a 2 week long email conversation, about mountain biking and all sorts of other things. I ended up emailing her bosses to praise the service level and everyone was happy!!
Doesn’t take much does it?
Nope, it doesn’t. So why do so many companies get it so badly wrong? Are they just full of drones (wee, we’re onto that subject again) or is it something else.
I think a lot of the blame can be placed with the current sue-happy culture, and the mountains of red tape it breeds.