Is incivility a root cause of service failure?

I'd like to share a not so radical idea.

Is it possible that the rude, self-absorbed behavior that many people display in public is one of the primary causes of poor customer service?

I recently ran a few errands around town and witnessed the following examples on my short trip:

  • A couple enjoying coffee and pastries at Starbucks left a huge mess behind when they got up to leave.
  • An aggressive driver cut off several cars in an attempt to beat them to a traffic light.
  • Another driver sped up in a parking lot rather than stop for pedestrians.
  • A customer at a car wash left his empty coffee cup on a bench when his car was ready.
  • A banking customer cut to the front of the line ahead of other people patiently waiting their turn.
  • A work truck ran a red light a narrowly missed running into several cars entering the intersection.

Some of these people assuredly work in jobs where they serve other people. If they behave selfishly, even dangerously, in a public setting can we really believe that they will be so different when helping customers? Maybe a little, but not much.

Most of my blog posts are action oriented and I try to provide a few tips you can use right away. This one is a little different, simply because I don't know the answer. Any ideas?

3 Ways Hotels Can Generate Loyalty on the First Visit

I recently had my tenth stay at two of my favorite hotels, the Napa River Inn and the Westin Portland. Both hotels recognized this milestone with a very nice welcome amenity in addition to the wonderful, personalized service they always provide. This special treatment made me look forward to my next ten visits, but it also got me thinking about how many other hotels I've stayed at where I don't care whether or not I return.

Welcome amenities at the Napa River Inn for our 10th visit

What can hotels do turn first-time visitors into loyal guests?

I spoke with a few hospitality professionals to get their ideas and reflected on my own experience to come up with three simple suggestions. I'm sure there are more ideas -- so please add your own as a comment to this post.

Sign 'em up!
Many hotels have loyalty programs, especially the larger chains. Why not encourage first-time guests to join? This should be standard procedure at check-in, but in practice it doesn't consistently happen.

A few years ago, I checked in to the Hilton Garden Inn in Henderson, Nevada. The friendly front desk associate invited me to join the Hilton Honors loyalty program and even offered to use the information they had on file to complete the application for me. It cost me nothing in terms of time and effort, but over the next year I found myself staying in several hotels within the Hilton family and soon reached their first level of status. All else being equal, points and status will influence guests' decisions, and I recently booked a stay at a Hilton over another brand I wasn't loyal to.

Smaller hotels without a loyalty program can simply collect email addresses and send out periodic newsletters. For example, the Napa River Inn sends out a special discount code just for returning guests. 

I stay in a lot of hotels, but I don't bother to join their loyalty program if I don't think I'll be coming back. It often takes a simply nudge from a helpful associate to get guests like me to join, but when they do, they might start feeling a little more at home.

Engage at Every Opportunity
Quick question - which associates have the most guest contact? In a smaller hotel, it's likely someone at the front desk, but in a larger hotel it might be the valet staff, housekeepers, or even the engineers. All associates, regardless of their position, should be trained to engage guests at every opportunity.

They can start with a simple question, "How is your stay?" In my experience, most of the hotel associates I encounter in the hallway or elevator rarely go beyond saying "Hello." An associate once asked me how my stay was going, but when I said, "Eh," she wasn't sure where to go from there and missed an opportunity to turn a mediocre experience into an outstanding one.

The associates who do get it right can make all the difference. For example, an associate named Darryl took time out from a painting project to engage my wife and I when we stayed at a resort hotel. He asked about our plans and then gave us inside tips on how to best enjoy ourselves. Darryl even encouraged us to come find him if we needed anything and he'd personally take care of it. (Read more about Darryl.) 

Follow-up
I've recently had a four night stay at three different hotels. One was the Napa River Inn and the other two were clearly not. At the Napa River Inn, I frequently encountered associates who were friendly, helpful, and outgoing. At the other two hotels I hardly had any contact with associates after checking in. I found myself feeling very disconnected from these properties, despite the long stay. 

Why take chances? Someone from one of the "other" hotels could have called my room halfway through my stay to make sure everything was going well. They could have sent up a free bottle of water. Perhaps one of the hotels could simply have responded to my repeated maintenance requests instead of ignoring them. Anything to check in and say, "Hey -- we know you're still here." Instead, nothing. No contact, which means no connection. I've already forgotten about them.

How quickly should you respond to an email?

Note: The latest study was conducted in March 2020. You can read the latest results here.

More than two thirds of us expect co-workers to respond to emails within four hours or less, according to a recent email response time survey. Perhaps its no wonder that so many workers can't go five minutes without typing away on their smart phone or losing focus on an important task to answer another message in an endless series of email exchanges.

coworkeremail2012.jpg

Of course, the results are a bit skewed by Generation Y (born 1977 or later). Members of this generation aparently do their best Veruca Salt impersonation when it comes to receiving email, since 43% of them expect a response within one hour.

coworkergens2012.jpg

People have a little more patience when it comes to receiving a response to emails sent to a business. Companies should always try to respond to customer emails as quickly as possible, but 75% of us are willing to wait at least a day:

bizemail2012.jpg

The survey also asked how quickly we expect our friends to respond to email. Here, we're a bit more lenient, with 88% of survey participants saying they thought they should receive a reply within 1 or more days.

I conducted the same survey last year (see the 2011 results), so have there been any changes? The short answer is no, not really. The only thing noticeable was members of Generation Y have grown slightly more impatient, since 35% of them expected co-workers to reply to email within one hour in 2011, but that number has risen to 43% in 2012. 

What does all this mean?

Service, whether it's external to your customers or internal to your co-workers, is all about expectations. Should our co-workers be more patient? Certainly, but the reality is right now they're not. Do people misuse email? Yes, but screaming at your computer won't change that.

While we can't change others, we can lead by example. For businesses, I wrote a short post on managing customer service email three years ago that still feels relevant today. The top tip? Track email response times and set a goal of 1 business day for everything. (You can read it here.) For individuals, I wrote a post on 10 ways to avoid email overload. (Read that one here.) Perhaps the most important lesson there is to have the discipline to use email correctly rather getting sucked in to becoming part of the problem. 

C-Sat: So what?!

Question: Let's say your business engaged in a process that was mildly annoying to your customers and provided absolutely no value. You aren't quite sure how it got started or who in your company owns it but the process continues simply out of habit. What would you do if you found about about this process?

For many companies that gather customer satisfaction (C-Sat) data, the answer is, "We'd keep doing things the same way." 

Sports talk radio personality Jim Rome has a favorite saying for his callers, "Give me an A or give me an F." If your company gathers C-Sat data, I hereby challenge you to do the same. Either make sure your C-Sat process earns an A, or stop wasting time and annoying customers with a process that yields no value.

How can you tell if your C-Sat process gets an A?

I propose three simple tests to get you started. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but if you answer "Yes" to these three questions you are probably doing OK.

#1 Do you know why you're asking what you're asking?

Forget your survey questions for a moment and ask, "What do I want to know?" Now, ask, "Why do I need to know that?" If you can't think of a really good reason to ask the question, don't.

I recently received a survey after getting my car's oil change that contained 36 questions (see "Customer Service Survey Mistakes to Avoid"). Does it really take 36 questions to find out if I was happy with my oil change? Of course not!

Surveys of any sort consume your customers' time. The shorter you make them, the better. As a rule of thumb, if you can't get the information you need in five questions or fewer, you are probably asking the wrong questions.

#2 Do you do anything with the data?

The whole point of capturing C-Sat data shouldn't be getting a good score. It should be using the data to improve actual customer satisfaction. If you aren't acting on the data you receive, you aren't extracting any value from the process.

In most cases, you don't have to be an expert in statistics to find value in your C-Sat data, provided you are asking good questions (see #1, above). For example, a client of mine recently grouped the comments attached to their C-Sat survey and discovered that the majority of negative feedback was attributed to one particular process. My client used this insight to fix the process and make it more customer friendly. Customer satisfaction immediately jumped and many people commented on how pleased they were with the improved process.

#3 Do you close the loop?

C-Sat instruments usually collect individual data points and combine them into an average. That's helpful for an overall score, but what do you know about each individual customer? A good system allows you to follow-up with people to either thank them for their business or fix a problem. It can be as easy as asking for their email or phone number at the end of the survey, but it's essential that you follow-up if you request this information.

Here are two examples that highlight the value of closing the loop:

A shipping company recently left a case of wine on my front doorstep. Not only did they fail to get an adult signature for the wine, they left the wine outside where the wine might have been ruined if it had been a hot day. They never asked for my opinion, so they never got my feedback. However, the next time I ordered wine from a winery that used them, I shared the story and asked the winery to use UPS instead.

One of my favorite hotels, the Napa River Inn, sent me a survey after my wife and I stayed there last year. The visit was terrific overall, but there were a few things that weren't up to their usual standards. The General Manager emailed me in response to my survey, thanked me for my feedback, and assured me she would correct the problems I had noted. She also invited me to let her know the next time I visited so she could personally ensure I had a wonderful stay. I took her up on her offer and on my next visit my wife and I had an absolutely amazing time. And, the problems we had noticed on our previous stay had clearly been corrected.

My personal policy for identifying companies via social media

I gave a lot of thought to how I would identify companies and individual employees by name while writing my book, Service Failure. Through the help of my editors and a little trial and error, I came up with what I think is a fair and reasonable way to approach this issue.

As my audience for this blog continues to grow, I think it's time to apply this personal policy here as well. My goal is to use examples of good and bad customer service to inform and perhaps entertain, while recognizing that customer service is difficult, mistakes can and will happen, and sometimes even the best companies and employees fall a little short.

Here's my policy:

  • When I receive poor customer service, I won't mention the company by name unless I've first attempted to address my grievance with a company representative.
  • I will mention companies by name if I am commenting on a news story (rather than my own experience as a customer).
  • I won't hesitate to identify companies by name when I receive exceptional service.
  • When discussing individual customer service employees, I will only use their first names unless I've been given permission to quote them by name. 

Like all policies, it may get broken or stretched from time to time, but I'll do my best to be faithful to it.

Survey: How quickly should people respond to email?

It's time for my 2nd annual email response time survey. Chances are pretty good that you send a lot of emails. Please take a moment to complete a short survey to let us know how quickly you expect to receive a response. You may also view the 2011 Email Response Time survey results here.

The survey will close on Friday, May 18 and the results will be posted on Monday, May 21. The final results willbe posted on my blog. You can subscribe to updates via email by clicking here

Update - May 21, 2012
The survey is now closed. Please click here to view the results.

A tale of three stores: how service drives sales

Service makes a difference when mattress shoppingMy wife, Sally, and I recently went shopping for a new mattress. We visited three stores that had the same products, similar prices, but vastly different levels of customer service. Guess which one we went with? Once again, proof that customer service drives sales in a retail environment.

Last Place: Nightmare service

The worst example came at a mattress store near our home. As we walked through their door, we heard a guttural, "Howyaguysdoin?" from across the store. We both looked in that direction but couldn't tell who it came from since nobody was looking our way. After a minute or so, a woman approached us and revealed herself as our greeter by repeating, "Howyaguysdoin?"

If you haven't purchased a mattress in awhile, the process generally involves lying down on a bunch of mattresses and trying to imagine how comfortable you'd be sleeping on each one. Our salesperson made this fairly impossible because she never stopped talking. She told us about the great deals they were offering each mattress, about the cutting-edge technology integrated into the designs, and then somehow segued into her personal medical problems. None of those topics had anything to do with whether we'd get a good night's sleep on a particular mattress, and her medical history threatened to give us nightmares.

I'm sorry life dealt you a rough hand, lady, but that approach was a huge turn-off. 

Distant 2nd: Slow service, dirty ceilings

We also visited a major department store where our salesperson was nice, but he was too busy to be helpful. We had to wait a few minutes while he served another customer, which wasn't so bad, but after we caught his attention it was hard to keep it. He left us repeatedly to serve other people while we were trying out various mattresses and discussing their pros and cons. Each time he left us, it made us less enthusiastic about shopping there. It also gave us time to notice things like their incredibly dirty ceiling.

Holy cow, that ceiling was gross! Seriously, store, lie down on one of your mattresses and look up at your disgusting ceiling and tell me if you feel restful. 

The Winner: Dan at Sleep Train

Our winning salesperson was Dan at Sleep Train. The Sleep Train store was nicely organized with sparkling clean ceilings, so the deck was already stacked in their favor. However, Dan really nailed the customer service aspect of the sales process. Here are just a few things he did right:

  • He greeted us immediately and introduced himself.
  • Dan asked questions to get to know us and our needs.
  • He encouraged us to try out various mattresses and adjusted the models he showed us based on our feedback (too hard, too soft, that sort of thing).
  • There was silence, glorious silence, while we tried each mattress, but Dan remained nearby to immediately answer our questions.
  • Dan didn't discuss price until we had picked our top choices. He realized that price was irrelevant if the bed was uncomfortable.

Service Pointers

In retail, service can have a huge impact on sales, especially on bigger ticket items. Here are just a few take-aways from our mattress-buying experience:

  • Train your sales staff to first identify their customers' needs and tailor their pitch accordingly.
  • Literally see things from your customers' perspective so you won't miss problems, like dirty ceilings in a mattress store, that are costing you sales.
  • Consistently remind your sales staff that their job is to solve their customers' problems, not dump their problems on their customers.

Authenticity matters in customer service

My new head shot - it looks like the real meI recently had to get a new head shot for the jacket of my upcoming customer service book, Service Failure. These sorts of things are tough for me because I never know exactly what look to go for. I'll admit to spending a good deal of time looking at other author's head shots to find examples that resonated with me.

Finally, I decided to just be me. I wanted my headshot to pretty much look like the person who would show up at a client's office or be at a speaking engagement. In other words, the look I was going for was authentic.

Fortunately, I think Ted Donovon at Donovon Photography nailed it. (Shout out for great service - Ted is personable, does great work, and turns things around fast!)

Why Authenticity Matters

The short answer is your customers can tell the difference. We like authentic - it can feel trustworthy, welcoming, and enthusiastic so long as your company and your employees really are those things. 

Customers can also tell when an employee is faking it. I love this vintage commercial from Pacific Southwest Airlines that promoted the difference:

 

(Here's a link in case you can't view the video.)

Terrific stuff, right? Unfortunately, Pacific Southwest Airlines (PSA) was acquired a number of years ago by US Airways, but I still have fond memories of flying on PSA when I was a kid. 

3 Ways to Keep it Real

There are many ways to promote authentic customer service, but I'll give you three of my favorites.

#1 Hire people who want to do what you want them to do
It's never fun to encounter a customer service employee who clearly doesn't want to be there. This challenge can be partially remedied by hiring people who not only have the skills to do the job, but the passion to match.

My wife, Sally, and I were on vacation in Napa a few weeks ago when we met Bob at one of the wineries we visited. Over the course of our conversation, we learned that Bob worked in the tasting room at Rombauer Vineyards, but enjoyed wine so much that he went wine tasting on his day off. He gave us his card and invited us to stop by Rombauer later in the week. We decided to pay Bob a visit that Saturday, and despite a large crowd in the tasting room, he remembered us and treated us to an outstanding tasting experience. 

#2 Ditch the script
Scripts are for actors, not customer service employees. Give your employees guidelines if there's an essential message you need to convey, but don't trip them up with a clunky script that makes them sound like robots. (My disdain for scripts is frequently documented in this blog -- see my "ditch the scripts post.")

I once visited my local True Value hardware store and was greeted with, "What are you doing in here?!" That greeting would never pass muster in a corporate brand standards meeting, but it felt wonderfully authentic to me. The employee who greeted me had been helping me with a home project that required several unexpected trips back to the store. After each trip, we both hoped it would be my last visit for this particular project. Alas, when he saw me once again, he knew something else had gone wrong. 

#3 Give employees something to smile about
There's a flip side to authenticity, where customer service employees harbor negative feelings about their co-workers, their boss, or their company. Venting frustrations to customers is certainly authentic, but it's very unappealing. I want the people who serve me to keep it real, but I still want a great experience.

The antidote to this problem is to help employees maintain a positive outlook. Show appreciation for their contributions, acknowledge their successes, and help them recover from their mistakes. Be quick to share good news, but don't hide the bad news either. Involve them in solving problems. Make them feel like partners.

I'm sure there are many other ways to promote authentic customer service. Please be sure to share your ideas and comments.

Are daily deals good or bad for customer service?

Are you thinking of using a daily deal service, like Groupon or LivingSocial, to attract new customers to your business? You may want to think twice if you thrive on repeat customers and use service to different your business from the competition.

In December 2010, Patrick Maguire posted an excellent story on his Server not Servant blog about a restaurant that was overwhelmed by an unexpected walk-in party of 47 guests. Even worse, they were all wielding Groupons good for $35 worth of food and drink for $15 and expected 47 separate checks so each person could receive the discount. (Read about “The Perfect Restaurant Storm” here.) The post naturally generated a lot of conversation about the customer service challenges presented by this situation.

This may be an extreme example, but there is some evidence that suggests daily deal customers may be pickier about customer service. A September 2011 study published by researchers at Boston University and Harvard discovered that when Yelp reviewers mention a daily deal they rate the business an average of 10% lower than other reviewers (read the study here). A negative review can have a double impact on a business since it means the customer likely won’t return and lower average ratings can also warn off other potential customers.

Repeat customers are essential to making a daily deal promotion work. Businesses typically split the revenue with a daily deal provider, so a restaurant offering $35 worth of food and drink for $15 might receive only $7.50. If all goes well, customers have a great experience and return again paying full price. If not, then perhaps the customer posts a negative review on Yelp and visits the next restaurant offering a terrific bargain.

The two major daily deal sites counter with some impressive stats of their own. According to Groupon’s website, 90% of Groupon customers spend more than the face value of the promotion. LivingSocial’s website cites a study which found that 85% of customers are satisfied and plan to return to the business.

An article in the April 2012 edition of Fast Company provided a good overview of some of the emerging trends in daily deals, including three examples of promotions that worked with varying degrees of success (see “Are Daily Deals Done?"). The most successful example had a clear strategy for not only bringing in new customers, but selling them on other products and services that would make the offer pay off.

Perhaps that’s the best conclusion for businesses thinking about going the daily deal route. Be careful in how you construct the promotion and approach it with the bigger picture in mind. If not, you might just find yourself with a room full of impatient customers who can’t wait to write a scathing online review about your business.