Archive | July, 2010

What Does Customer Delight Mean Anyway?

by on July 25, 2010 in Customer Experience

Anyone know what it means to “delight” customers? Or what it takes to exceed their expectations? Is it even worth the effort? These are some questions raised in the latest Harvard Business Review article, Stop Trying To Delight Your Customers (or read Anne Miner’s synopsis Should you stop trying to “exceed customer expectations”?).

I once served under a VP of Services who wanted to dramatically improve customer service so he made it a benchmark to “delight” our customers. When asked how we’d be improving our service operations, he replied it was in the works. Then when pressed to actually give some idea of what a “delight” benchmark meant and how it was going to be measured, he quickly found a way to change the subject. Before long, delighting customers became just another meaningless buzzword for the Services department.

Don’t let this happen to your organization.

First and foremost, get your basics up to grade. That means committing to excellence at customer service fundamentals – like responsiveness, internal teamwork, accountability, plans and metrics…to name a few – before graduating to delighting your customers. It’s that whole crawl before you can sprint kind of thing. If your basic customer service structures and systems stink, no amount of delightfulness is going to mask the stench.

Service is just one facet of the whole customer experience. Even if the customer service experience goes from baseline to phenomenal, what if your company’s products or services remains blah? What if there are chronic issues with shipping? What if marketing’s promises turn out to be undeliverable half-truths? The point is that investing financial and people resources into creating stellar customer service just through channels like phone, web, Twitter, and self-service is a waste if the rest of the enterprise doesn’t match up.

Finally, I must admit I hate the word delight. Have you, as a customer, been on the receiving end of a customer service rep asking, “Have I delighted you today?” or “What more can I do to delight you?” It’s practically impossible for the use of “delight” to not sound condescending to the customer. And when it comes to building relationships with customers, communication and language matter.

Rather than saying, “Every business must delight (or astonish or thrill or enchant) its customers!” it’s more important to take care of the basics FIRST. Instead of proclaiming fuzzy, high-minded (while no doubt well-intended) initiatives, place initial priority on a steady dedication to practice, reflection, and continuous improvement. Your customers will love you for it.

photo credit: Metro Transportation Library and Archive (via flickr)

Are We Down For The Count? Never!

by on July 19, 2010 in Life

One of my all-time favorite movies is Cool Hand Luke with Paul Newman and George Kennedy. Remember the classic scene where both men fight in the yards and Newman’s Luke refuses to stay down? It’s right up there with the egg eating bet in terms of iconic scenes.

We’re all going to get knocked down. It’s a fact. And as so many wise folks have said before, it’s not the getting knocked down that’s the problem…it’s refusing to get back up again and keep moving. I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately. I’ll openly confess that the past six months have been a strange, at times frustrating journey. I’ve been on job interviews that seemed like great fits for both me and the employer only to learn that I failed because I wasn’t exactly what they were looking for. I’ve also had a few potential contracts for Bailey WorkPlay dry up and disappear for reasons largely unknown. (And if you’re thinking there are lessons to learn when it comes to closing deals, you might be right.) But my point is not to lament these missed opportunities or seek pity. Instead, it’s to highlight how – when we get knocked on our ass – to get back up again.

Out of these experiences, I’ve learned to dream even bigger, work even harder, be even more persistent than before. Like Luke, when I get knocked down I’m dusting myself off, wiping away the bloody nose, and getting back up. Currently, I’m working on creating opportunities to do things I wasn’t sure I would ever be able to do. I’m chasing down a long-held dream I want to become real. And I can’t wait to share the outcomes when the time is right.

How about you? Are you struggling to get back up on your feet after taking one to the chin? Are you shoving aside a dream to do something you’ve always wanted to do? Know that you’re not alone and don’t stay down. See it as an opportunity to stand up strong and continue to move forward in your journey. Fully believe that you deserve good in your life, because – trust me – you do.

The Price Of Free And Google Voice

by on July 15, 2010 in Customer Experience

There’s an update – and positive resolution – to this saga.

What’s the price of free? It’s not a trick question like “Who’s buried in Grant’s tomb” but a dead serious one, particularly if you’re a small business relying on inexpensive business solutions to succeed. You might use Zoho CRM for your customer database, Evernote to take important business notes, and Skype to communicate with your employees or contractors. All of these options are free (though some have paid, upgraded services) but I argue not without cost.

For me, I’ve been a user of Google Voice since back when it was non-Google GrandCentral. It was a great solution for me, providing slews of neat features all for free. There was even a time when I went on a working vacation and accidentally left my cell phone at home. No worries – I went to the online settings and had all my working calls forwarded to the vacation house. How cool is that?

These past couple of years, I’ve been a happy user…until this week when I discovered that the free service came with a high price. It turns out that I haven’t been receiving my calls to my Google Voice number for the better part of a month. When someone calls the GV number, they go to a generic voicemail and can leave a message. Except the message enters a black hole. The individual thinks they’ve successfully left a message for me but I never receive it. So for all intents and purposes, the caller thinks I’m not interested in their business (which couldn’t be further from the truth!).

So what to do when things go wrong? In my case, I have two recourses: 1) I can go to the public forum and log a question. Or 2) I can go to a private troubleshooting form, describe my issue, and wait..and wait…and wait. See, when a service is free there are no SLAs that a company has to worry about. There’s very little we can do when a problem is urgent. We’re at their mercy which is a tough spot to be in when you’re struggling to build a company or consultancy. I’m into day #3 and haven’t heard a peep from Google about this problem that is entirely their fault. Talk about feeling helpless. And personally irritated that I left something so damn important as a communication channel in the hands of a free service.

This is a situation very similar to one my friend, Paul Hudson, at Intersperience talks about in a recent article called Hidden Cost of Self-Service. I would also argue that even though Google Voice is free and that imparts risk for us users, it really doesn’t matter whether the service is paid or not. A failure to provide even an adequate level of service will tarnish your reputation and significantly diminish the customer experience. I’ve learned the hard way to not be so trusting of Google’s entire service suite or the free services from other companies. The cost to me has proved far too high.

A show of hands – are you using Google Voice for something important like your business or job hunting? Are you okay with the consequences when things go wrong? Before you answer, think carefully about your own reliance on free services (you can also take a look at some of the issues listed at the Google Voice Support Forum…it’s a bit scary).

Friends, protect yourself when it comes to the important things like phone numbers, email addresses, websites, etc. Don’t be lured by free when the cost could be lost customers. And business executives, don’t casually walk down the path of free and self-service. When things go wrong, will your customers still trust you to care for them when it really matters?

Anyone else have experiences with free services costing them more than you bargained for?

Update 07.20.10
After a few days of trying to line up a call, I finally spoke to Craig Walker, a Product Manager for Google. Turns out the major issue here was my request to move my GV number from one Google account to another. There’s an account transfer request form available through the GV help forum but it’s not exactly supported (which raises questions about why its still in existence). Associating a current GV number with a new Gmail address presents some hairy technical issues so word of warning: When you sign up for a Google Voice number, make certain its associated with a permanent account because it’s pretty much locked in.

But once I finally nailed Craig down, he was responsive in getting my call history and voicemails transferred to my Bailey WorkPlay gmail account. And he was generous in offering me a few perks including a sparkly new – and rather easy to remember – number: 512-827-9000.

Kill The Resume

by on July 14, 2010 in Career

I can’t possibly say how much I dig this article. Ben Popper at Business Insider advises companies Want To Hire Smart? Ditch The Resumes. Regardless of whether you’re in the middle of a job search or gainfully employed, I think the ideas highlighted in the article will resonate with you.

For me, resumes are like elevator pitches. Excellent at helping job seekers fine-tune their professional marketing focus but utterly worthless when it comes to adequately communicating overall strengths and value. And for HR pros and hiring managers, the resume becomes a lazy way out of understanding what a candidate can do for the organization. The reason is that a resume is all about past history and nothing about the present and future. And God forbid you want to move toward a different type of job or enter a different industry; that damn resume virtually locks you out of those options.

As Ben ends the article:

In an age of disruptive business models, a resume doesn’t say much. The smart hire puts the candidates ideas first, then looks to see how they network and collaborate. It’s about seeing what someone can go, not where they’ve already been.

Of course, this means that both company and candidate have to dance to the same tune. A few courageous business execs are out there rewriting how they find great talent. What’s your organization doing to kill the resume and start uncovering an individual’s actual value, their strengths that transcend a piece of paper?

photo credit: brymo (via flickr)

My Problem With the Fast Company Influence Project

by on July 6, 2010 in Social Media

The latest social media meme to roll around is Fast Company’s Influence Project and I’m going to take the role of pissy curmudgeon on this one.

Fast Company wants to find out who the most influential people online are right now. In order to figure this out, they’ve devised the following measurement criteria:

1. The number of people who directly click on your unique URL link. This is the primary measure of your influence, pure and simple.

2. You will receive partial “credit” for subsequent clicks generated by those who register as a result of your URL. In other words, anyone who comes to the site through your link and registers for their own account will be spreading your influence while they spread theirs. That way, you get some benefit from influencing people who are influential themselves. We will give a diminishing, fractional credit (1/2, ¼, 1/8 etc ) for clicks generated up to six degrees away from your original link.

So let me get this straight. An individual’s measure of influence is how much they can bait their peers, friends, and followers to click a link? Anyone else think this sounds more like a popularity contest rather than a measure of influence?

And when it comes to measurement, here’s yet another dubious claim to measuring something humanistic using only a quantitative scale (and a rather paltry scale at that). Fast Company, if you really want to understand online influence, slick graphics (in Flash!) and linkbaiting isn’t going to cut it. Start asking WHY individuals gain, maintain, and utilize influence and then maybe I’ll take your little parlor trick seriously.

Or am I wrong?

UPDATE 7.7.10: Alexia Tsotsis at SFWeekly digs a little deeper and demonstrates the crass nature of this whole fiasco, implicating both Fast Company and Mekanism in some rather shady doings. Talk about tarnishing your reputation.