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July 3, 2013

Customer Relationship Management – remember me When It Matters

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  • Under : Customer Experience, Uncategorized

I used to live abroad and came back to the UK looking for lovely things and experiences to remind me of home. A kind of ‘Brit-fix’. One of these was regular visits to a very swanky country hotel with several Michelin stars to its name. My husband and I clocked up several thousand dollars worth of amazing memories and several tens of thousands of calories over the years. But each time we went they would greet us like first time guests. At first I thought it was because we arrived looking like we’d ‘won the holiday’ , so I changed my wardrobe and wiped the chocolate off my daughter’s face. Nothing changed. One awful day my husband remarked on their lack of acknowledgement and suggested we find an alternative.

Horrified that my oasis would be denied me, I wrote to the manager. If my local pizza joint can tell by my mobile number who I am, where I live and how much pepperoni I like…why can’t you say ‘welcome back’ when we come visit?

They were contrite and admitted they were pretty arrogant in believing they did not need CRM. Our clients like discretion they said. Well this client wants to feel welcomed and recognised I said. So they asked us back, pulled out all the stops and made a huge fuss of my daughter who loved being welcomed by name and given a small bear to hug.

We are going back again, we will likely spend most of the cost of a week’s holiday on wine and we will continue to love them as long as they love us back.

I don’t need them to remember my birthday or note my blood group. I just want them to recognise me when it matters. Obvious.

It is the When It Matters part that counts. Try looking at your customers’ journey and identify the key moments of interaction customers experience with you- does your CRM kick in when it really matters? Or do you sling stuff at them according to your signed off marketing plan? Are you missing them When It Matter

A reminder of home

An English Garden


July 1, 2013

Business, brands and the blindingly obvious: turn poor customer service into a virtue

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  • Under : Case Studies, Customer Experience, Retail Innovation
How to make an honest deal with your customers

How to make an honest deal with your customers

Don’t promise what you can’t deliver. Blindingly obvious. So why do so many brands and businesses persist in creating illusions of customer service they simply cannot fulfil ? If I know what I am getting /signing up for, that’s cool. If you over promise and don’t deliver, I get mad, I tell my friends how mad I am with you , I start writing letters, or posting on social networks about how hacked off I am with you and maybe I don’t ever come back to your store. Brands need to be honest about their operational capabilities, customers will love them all the more for their honesty. Moreover, we won’t loathe them for letting us down. Obvious.

Swedish furniture retailer IKEA is a great example of the art of not over promising.  Not only that, they make a virtue of their lack of customer service. We have all been and had family rows in their stores and been irate about their returns policy and nearly killed ourselves or a loved one wrestling with an IKEA self assembly erection! But they don’t promise it will be easy, quite the reverse. IKEA ran an in-store communications campaign themed ‘Why ? That’s why!’  designed to reiterate what customers get in return for all that hassle… you pick up your stuff yourself from their warehouse, transport and build  it all yourself …. and in return you get exceptional design at eye-wateringly cheap prices – ‘Why ? That’s why!’ explained that at key ‘moments’ in the shopping journey, reminding you of the customer service ‘deal’ you are making with the store. Ultimately you only have yourself and your wallet to blame for the trials of the purchase , self selection and self assembly. You can’t loathe IKEA for under-delivering.  They never promised anything extra.

What can brands learn from IKEA’s approach? Simple. Don’t over promise. Explain what the deal is. Stick to it. Done. Obvious. Check out the blog list of the top ten ‘not so excellent customer service’ issues below for more.

Related articles
  • Top 10 of “Not So Excellent” Customer Service (business2community.com)

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