“We have a problem!” proclaims influencers@ service lead, Dan Wendt, as he hangs up the phone. “The Brand Ambassador who is supposed to do today’s in-store sampling promotion has a family emergency and needs to cancel.” Matt Martin, our account manager, looks at Dan, then back at his computer. “We can’t disappoint the customer, she is expecting us to be there. I’ll do it myself.” Matt says. With that, Matt begins packing his bag for the hour drive to the promotion, knowing that he’ll have a mountain of other work to complete when he is back, and by that time it will be far past “business hours.”
Matt ended up performing incredibly well at the promotion, sampling and selling a substantial volume of product, ultimately wowing our customer. While it isn’t Matt’s direct role to do promotions as a Brand Ambassador, it is most definitely his responsibility to consistently deliver colossal customer service – going above and beyond to keep our customers happy and build strong relationships. This is what makes Matt such a talented people person and an excellent account manager – he will do whatever it takes, even sitting in traffic and driving an hour to a promotion, in order to ensure our customers succeed.
Similar to the attitude at Zappos, it is crucial to strive towards providing world class customer service every time, regardless of the size of the customer or magnitude of the issue. It’s easy to quickly forget this rule and get frustrated, but it is always worth the extra effort to make customer service a top priority. Consider the following to always deliver world class customer service:
1. Customer service is everyone’s job
Everyone at your company should be talking to customers. I know some firms that go as far as having developers speak directly to customers. Whether you are the Product Manager or COO, you should be jumping in to help customers whenever something is needed.
2. The simple things go a long way
Customer service can be as simple as giving a customer a quick call to check in on how they are doing, congratulating them on a big product launch or letting them know in advance if you foresee an issue with their service. You don’t need to spend a ton of time or money to make customers happy.
3. Focus on actions, not explanations
At the end of the day, customers care about results. Spend your time delivering tangible results and actions as opposed to describing what happened in the past or what you can do in the future. Do it now and show your customers that you mean business.