Improve The Customer Journey

I read Jeremiah Owyang‘s blog post The Future Career of the Corporate Social Strategist at Web-Strategist.com. He said in that article that one of the biggest corporate opportunities today for the social strategist was to rise into the head of the customer service. I agree on that. Today the vast majority of companies have failed to adapt themselves to this culture shift of communication. Or maybe the right way ta say it; they haven’t even recognized the shift. The real time information makes the online consumer very demanding and this is very severe for inflexible organizations to grasp.

Head Of The Customer Service

I think the customer service experience is one of the biggest opportunities to grasp if you want to create a gap between yourself and your competitors. To succeed with this companies definitely need to have a person that comprehend the entire customer journey from awareness, consideration, purchase, support, and beyond (infographic).

The Only Thing That Counts

Forget about old customer index when you were looking at a graph that said you had satisfied customers. A customer can be satisfied but still perceiving your brand as something else. When I’m waiting in a telephone cue listening to bad elevator music I expect to be abused. Why? Because that’s how it is today! Even if they solved my matter in a smooth way I could still think that the totally customer journey with that brand was crap. It’s the same thing with the majority stores and restaurants. Of course we have the exceptions, and that’s good we need to celebrate them. But many of the leading companies that deliver authentic customer service still miss out the holistic picture of the entire customer journey both online and offline. In today’s business world the only customers that for sure comes back are those that you successfully takes beyond “satisfied”; so the only thing that counts are hardcore fans.

The Worst Excuse

-Our customers are not using social media!

Honestly, if you say that, you are saying that your customers are not using Internet. Every single person who touch a key board 2012 is somehow affecting or affected by this thing called social media. Social media is Internet today, period! Stop drawing lines in the sand you are only killing yourself; but if that’s your goal? I should not disturb you. But for you who are willing to explore and improve the customer journey is very welcome to participate in this very important topic. I will tell you here what I believe in, and I look forward to read your thoughts as well.

Decide What You Want

I have said it before, raving customer service is all about building and evolving your company culture. You must have a clear vision of what kind of customer journey you want your organization to breath, this is a key ingredient to create raving customers. This vision should permeate through the entire organization, every single person in your company is a potential touch-point with your customers, this vision is not only for marketing and service people.

Discover What Customers Wants

I told you that listening is an underestimated word in customer service in our modern economy. It’s important to pay attention to both satisfied and dissatisfied customers. Using social media as a listening platform is great opportunity to comprehend what some of the silent customer thinks about your brand. The silent customer is the customer whom says nothing or maybe just “it’s good”. I know that many marketers put’s that on the scoreboard as a satisfied customer. Though, silent customers are a key factor to learn from if you want to improve the customer journey.

Taking Action And Deliver

It’s so important to listen, but remember taking action and responding to what customers say; separates you from a lot of competition. A very important cornerstone for business success is always consistency. You need to show up on daily basis to make the difference for your customers and you need to deliver more than they expected to reach beyond the level of satisfied customers. Consistency is an important factor when it comes to building relationships that’s why I always repeating that social media is not a campaign. Sometimes we over promise and under deliver, this is human! I have found that the H.E.A.T model is a great way to turn these mistakes around and even build a profoundly better relationship with your customers; let’s make them rave!

Your Turn

Have you over promised and under delivered sometime? I would love to hear you sharing an experience when you won back a dissatisfied customer and how you did it. And thanks Jeremiah for inspiring me to write!