The customer service experience
Organisations in the private and public sector face a constant challenge: to meet - and exceed - the demands of their customers, whilst improving business efficiency and controlling cost. What does this feel like for the customer? What happens when organisations get it right - or very, very wrong? This blog shares some of my thinking, advice and experience in some of the best, and worst, in customer service delivery.
11 February 2019
Using Google Tag Manager with Analytics to track Tableau visualisations
8 November 2018
Is your organisation 'customer-centric' yet? A simple test to find out
24 November 2017
How to ACE customer loyalty after a complaint
What matters, is what you do next – because how you handle the situation makes the difference between customer disappointment and negative word of mouth, or improved loyalty, satisfaction and advocacy.
Let’s look at my recent experience of hiring a rental car from New Zealand based Ace car rentals for a case study in customer service and complaints good practice.
26 September 2017
Online customer service - Are you scoring own goals that'll break your business case?
22 February 2017
We’re a 5 star hotel, but we’re not interested in your custom thanks
That’s not a phrase you’d expected to hear from organisations priding themselves on outstanding customer service, but it’s the message I received from half the major hotels I approached whilst researching course venues in Sydney, Australia, last week.To say I was surprised was an understatement. It did, however, resolve the issue of what topic to discuss in my next blog post!
What lessons can we learn from this impromptu mystery shopping exercise about the critical role of front line staff in creating a positive customer experience and generating sales?
9 July 2015
The Rosemary Anne Price Research Award 2015
What is the Rosemary Anne Price Research Award?
During my research degree, I had the benefit of gaining some scholarship funding to attend a conference in the US that helped me on the way to completing my PhD. I was generously supported by the Kathleen and Margery Elliot Scholarship Fund in Birmingham, UK.
My mother, Rosemary, died from Multiple Sclerosis in 1991. Inspired by my study experience, I set up a similar bursary award scheme in conjunction with the UK Multiple Sclerosis Society. The Rosemary Anne Price Research Award helps support two promising research students to attend the bi-annual MS Frontiers research conference.
13 June 2015
Human factors: how complaints psychology affects business performance
For those involved in managing an organisation’s response to customer complaints, this raises some thought-provoking questions:
- What is it that makes some people complain, whilst others do not?
- How can we influence human behaviour and encourage people to make their complaints?
- How do employees handle human emotions and does this affect our performance?
performance. Can we really translate the day-to-day reality of dealing with human emotions into these kinds of business performance metrics?
26 March 2015
Employee attitude can create a stellar customer experience
Leading management author, Ken Blanchard, has written extensively [1] about how customer service employees make the difference in providing an exceptional customer experience.
6 March 2015
Raising the standard for complaints - what's new in ISO 10002:2014?
From the day we’re old enough to understand that a knife and fork aren’t for decoration on the dinner table, we’re taught the difference that setting and achieving high standards makes in all aspects of life.
29 January 2015
Improving service performance : Why complaints hold the key
17 November 2014
Improving Local Government’s customer experience
Start by seeing how your people manage complaints…
Organisations in both the private and public sectors are continually on the lookout for new ways to balance the challenge of improving customer service whilst containing, or reducing, costs.
- Customers can’t usually choose to go somewhere else for their services
- Services may be subject to legislative procedures and processes
- Councils can’t choose not to provide services to unprofitable customers.
17 July 2013
Customer experience is a top priority - but are we doing enough?
We offer this discussion of the results as a prompt for you to think about your own organisation’s position and the progress you’re making in the areas of our survey.
- Customer experience
- Business leadership
- Business efficiency
13 March 2013
Turning customer service ‘moments of truth’ into PR disasters
1 March 2013
Why business process must never replace humanity in a contact centre
21 February 2013
Are you prepared for the business and customer priorities of 2013-14?
I’ve started the year by studying two key analyst reports and launching a new survey to find out more about the headline issues they've highlighted.
16 November 2012
Brilliant basics: How FedEx delivered outstanding customer service
I’m talking about FedEx. How did this organisation warrant the prize of being a feature case study in customer service excellence?
8 October 2012
Brilliant basics are essential in good service: a study of a banking failure
Is the key to banking customer service being “socially useful?”
15 August 2012
Why social media matters in complaints management
With this range of opinion, how can business executives decide whether social media is something that really matters when it comes to prioritising budgets for complaint management?
25 July 2012
5 essential tips for contact centre complaints handling
For many, this is one of the motivations for taking on a customer service role - making a real difference to the customer who's had a particularly raw deal. Being able to sort out a problem and see a fellow human being move from anger to gratitude is something that reminds us why we took on the job in the first place.
It can be an emotional experience for people at the front line of complaints. The rewards are equally matched (and frequently outweighed) by harder times that test personal resilience.
What are some of the essential tips that help the customer service managers and their teams cope with the complex challenges of complaints?
2 July 2012
Service failure: how social media changes complainants' balance of power
In the 21st century, dissatisfied customers can ensure their complaint experience is very public. The age of Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook radically shifts the balance of power towards the customer, giving new routes to publicise dissatisfaction with poor performance that previously remained a private and personal frustration.
Yet some organisations seem to insist on failing to learn the long proven lessons of giving good customer service, delivering experiences that are - at best - sloppy.
It may be that the finance director considers the pipeline of new customers delivering revenue into the sales department outweighs the customer churn and defection in service delivery. However, this is not a business strategy likely to produce long-term growth or award winning success.
Social media has shifted the balance of power to the complaining consumer, now capable of launching public reputational damage on a scale never before available.