Care More and You Will Spend Less
Is customer service at an all-time low? Many people suggest that it might be. Does spending less pay off with more? Do the businesses that care more have the biggest advantage of all?
People are wondering what happened to customer service. The well-known restaurant chain, the shopping mall, and the pharmacy, what happened to the customer experience?
Keep Costs Low
Many businesses connect caring with costs. Perhaps not always consciously, but they still do it.
Why train our youngest workers in customer service, they’ll be gone at the end of the season.
It takes an extra full-time employee to monitor the rest rooms, the landscaping, and the outside trash containers.
Only one checkout line is necessary. Customers can wait when we get busy.
Call us back in a couple of hours, we’ll give you and update.
Sorry, we did nothing. We needed more information before we could process your order.
The customer experience is a simple one. Do more, give more, and care more than what is expected.
Measuring the Experience
Sometimes the trick is analyzing what is expected. Expectations are not driven by the front-line supervisor, the storeowner, or the even the marketing committee. While all three may have a hand in it, ultimately the customer decides.
When the high cost franchise restaurant cannot survive while the mom and pop diner consistently is consistently packed, or when the local shopping mall closes, and when the medical office cannot understand why patients are so angry. Perhaps they need to consider how much they really care.
Better yet, start with caring, it may be too late when everyone has already starting leaving.
Care More
It really isn’t that hard to grasp. If the population of those you serve are citing the chronic problems with customer service, your opportunity is to care more, not less.
The best businesses avoid correlating expenses with the bottom line. They correlate expenses with growth which leads to a better bottom line.
When cutting costs to improve cash flow is the only thing you’ll do to improve your position. Your position will lack service. Your culture will be focused on spend less and earn more, instead of care more and spend less.
The biggest advantage is the one waiting on you to make a difference for human interaction. Dollar for dollar customer onboarding, retention, and lifetime value will be more effective when you care more.
It is the only effective way to get more by spending less.
– DEG
Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSPTM), and corporate trainer that specializes in helping businesses and individuals accelerate their leadership, their team, and their success. He is a five-time author and some of his work includes, #CustServ The Customer Service Culture, and Forgotten Respect, Navigating A Multigenerational Workforce. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.
