Capturing Conversations: the future of customer service

With all the talk of Twitter being a customer-service platform (among other things), I'm curious to know how this dialogue of sorts (in 140 characters or less) will affect what we've known to be "customer-service" - you call some 1-800 number on a website or on the back of a direct mail piece, then get re-routed through various robot-operated loopholes in the system and maybe, just maybe you'll end up talking to a real person about your issue. I can say with full confidence, this is not the best we can do. So, what can we look forward to in terms of customer-service in 2009?

"Customer Service is the New Marketing"

Customer Service is the New Marketing (Web2Expo)

View more presentations from Thor.

The smart brains who put this together are Thor Muller & Lane Becker, the guys behind getsatisfaction.com - people powered customer service for absolutely everything. Getsatisfaction is getting it right, but if it was created in 2007, what has it inspired CS (customer-service) to be since then?

An open, transparent, and public conversation. Think about blogs. When one reader/customer/user leaves a question in the comment field, another reader/customer/user may respond with an answer, leaving the original blog author to benefit from their discussion. Think if this was a brand who was able to facilitate as well as witness this conversation - not only is this FREE feedback, but it encourages brand loyalty by being transparent, offering up dialogue, and providing timely and direct feedback.

The future of customer service is about capturing conversations. Go get 'em!

[feel free to read more on why Get Satisfaction rules]

Starbucks: One year from now

A colleague and I made a friendly wager today: my $5 says Starbucks will be successful one year from now. Howard Schulz is returning to the helm because he sees the rapid growth plan is backfiring and dissipating the brand's worth. My coworker's $5 says Starbucks is sunk, soon to be outrun by the independents that sprinkle the marketplace worldwide.

A BusinessWeek article states what differentiates Starbucks, and what will ultimately test the competition as it tries to take first:

Schultz: Starbucks is the quintessential experience brand and that brand is brought to life by our people…we have no patent, no secret sauce whatsoever…. The only competitive advantage we have is the relationship we've built with our people and the relationship they have built with the customer.

McDonalds or Dunkin Donuts may have their sights set on taking the top position within consumers' minds for "coffee," but my money's on Starbucks. They owned it first and they owned it well. Howard Schultz is no sissy when it comes to passionately being unique and rising above the challenge the marketplace puts forward.

Where do you place your bet?

convenience, food tech, control and opportunity

The consumption of food is a cultural conundrum. Us Americans just can't figure it all out: diet, convenience, health, family-time, 6 small meals, 3 large ones, no breakfast, Kellogg's flakes for breakfast-lunch-and dinner, etc.
How does one make sense of it all? A recent article in Dallas News, has called it out: Convenience.

• Restaurants are in a bid to replace Mom as the family's primary chef.
• Today, consumers are eating more but cooking less. (ouch)

For some examples, look at California Pizza Kitchen, TGI Friday's, Wolfgang Puck and Marie Calendars. More from the article:

• Food technology has blurred the line between ready-to-eat food from a restaurant and ready-to-heat food from a grocer.
• Sales of frozen entrees are growing slowly > the challenge has set in.
• "Companies will be tempted to offer fresh - not frozen - prepared meals. And that will put the competition between grocery and restaurant take-out on more equal footing."
  

There is something to be said for being the brand on the shelf when the consumer says, I want convenience.

• "It all goes to the Starbucks strategy of giving the consumer 360-degree exposure to your brand."

Personally, I don't think restaurant take-out can viably compete with ready-to-heat frozen food. Both sound as in-convenient if I'm in a lazy mood. I propose we combine a delivery service with customer-service for a solution. These vehicles could be a chance to exhibit more sides of a brand personality: say an SUV with TGI Friday's comes to your door and a hybrid from California Pizza Kitchen pulls up at the neighbor's. I know some consumers would cringe to hear about advertising creeping into another area of their life but there already is advertising on the road - Billboards.

Delivery = Convenience. Brand that pulls through with the solution = Awesome. Let the races begin. Good lucK!

next steps in customer-service

In a USA Today story this morning, it's reported that Concierges go the extra mile in the Internet age:

• High-end brands are upgrading concierge operations and training staffs to improve their neighborhood knowledge. And other brands are looking for better ways to share information with guests...

I think it's a great way for the consumer review popularity online to mix with a Let's Go/Lonely Planet DIY feel, moving the authenticity of these reviews to a brand experience.

• Hotels must not only figure how to get local knowledge in the hands of employees and train them to deliver it, but also how to provide local knowledge that is relevant to guests' needs. (Marriott)
• Guests are looking for whatever it is that makes Detroit Detroit. There's a desire to say, I caught a slice of that. - Michelle Lapierre, Marriott's senior director of customer relationship marketing. COOL!

This could be a push for updating the hiring process when looking for hotel employees. Hire the people who are passionate about their city and enhancing tourists' stays. See the sites! Get out: go to this restaurant, see this offroad place, etc.

Some of the more notable initiatives are:

• Courtyard by Marriott later this year will roll out its first "Go Board," a flat panel HDTV with local information, including restaurant recommendations, for guests.
  
• At Loews, the new "In The Know" program calls on concierges each week to come up with a list of local tips.
• Marriott's extended-stay brand, TownePlace Suites, plans to put an 8 by 8 feet wide map marked with restaurants and local places of interest on the lobby walls of all 128 hotels.
  
• Marriott (clearly the leader in this trend) will also give guests pocket guides and two-sided cards with local information.
• Hyatt will launch a website that lets members chat with concierges and other travelers.
  

I'm not sure if recommendations will be tainted with marketing sway...but I'm hoping for a more "consumer review" / authentic approach to the information provided. It could be real easy for money hungry, less-educated advertisers to see this as a marketing jackpot calling their name. Let's hope it stays more honest and real. :)

Consumer Reviews

Research done by Spendallyourmoneyhere-Mart says:

• 80% of shoppers have more trust in brands that feature reviews and that 75% of shoppers say it's extremely or very important to read customer reviews before making a purchase. Peer reviews are preferred over expert reviews by a margin of 6 to 1. (adagemobile)

Stick this in the back of your mind and take a trot around the internet. More companies these days are welcoming customer feedback (not Sprint) and are creating online platforms for user reviews. Yelp.com is fast-emerging as user-friendly and fun.

• Yelp is part social network, part localized review site - think Facebook meets Zagat - and it's fast becoming the web's gift to small business.
• When we discover something wonderful (or horrible), we love to tell our friends about it. We also turn to people we trust when we need a good recommendation. Yelp is enabling those conversations to happen on a massive scale. (money.cnn.com)

Yelp is quickly blending the boarders between a consumer review site (amazon, consumerreports, or epinions) and a social networking function (myspace & facebook). Web browsers (I'm referring to the people) are of course looking for convenience online as well as off. If a site can provide information as well as community, then it's good to go > or at least live on someone's toolbar for a while.

The question on companies' lips is: Will social networking sites make people buy more products? Answer: No, via Jupiter Research. But maybe the question should be: Will social networking sites make my products better, in turn creating greater customer love and loyalty? Answer: Yes.

• “Your customers are out there saying things about you, whether it’s on Yelp or on some blog. The faster you can fix problems, the better you’re going to do. Customer service is the new marketing.” (itbusinessedge)

the customer's NOT always right

A MAS friend (thanks LB!) called today with the news: Sprint Dumps Customers. What?!?! In a period where customer-service is coming under the brand microscope, Sprint has decided to say: this relationship isn't working for me.

On one hand, I agree that a brand engaging in customer-service is half of the relationship. It's interesting to think about: What if customers had certain obligations to a brand/product, more than just pure love and loyalty? Sprint is putting it's feelings on the line sort of like a person saying, hey this isn't fair and I'm not putting up with it anymore.

On the other hand, what is Sprint thinking?!?!? In a period where most people would still mark "true" when asked if the customer's always right, Sprint has said it's not playing this game anymore. What are the rules of the new game? And if we wanted to, how do we play?

I think Sprint is taking a huge leap of faith. I'm also curious to know what Goodby added to this conversation...it won the business earlier this year with "Sprint Ahead." Maybe Sprint thinks it can get farther ahead without the excess baggage (true) but does it know where it's going?

and interesting conversation to keep your ears open for...

good service: happy customers

had one of thee best customer-service interactions EVER this morning (getting my hair done, so males, you might not understand this). what made it so special?

Communication. she listened. i was the customer and she listened to me explain in a very roundabout way "the process" i have accumulatively put together to make my hair what it is. I am not just a highlight or a lowlight or an all-over-color customer, I'm a this is sort of what i want and do you see the same thing in your head? type.

In a service industry, they're working for tips and as much as it's built into the American psyche that you naturally leave a tip, but it's also something to be used when the service goes above and beyond your original intentions or expectations. Define "above & beyond"

• she was enthusiastic about the process
• she listened to my suggestions and tried to work with them
• she did not act rushed or hussied when it took longer than originally booked
  
• she provided un-solicited feedback on "how good it looks" throughout

and she got a 20% tip and i would have left more if I'd had more. It will receive the most gratitude in the form of WOM.
I think this is the customer-service we should propagate and tip big for. and fyi, if i ever have my own agency, i'm going to work tips into the mix, like if someone brings me my mail or does something more service-oriented... Tips are grrreat! :)

customers rock!

just found this blog today on customer-service and customer experiences. I will be adding it permanently to my list.

Planners, we need to always be mindful of who we're talking to, what they're experiences are, and what they're really thinking/feeling/saying.

Customers buy the brands we inspire them to love. It's gotta come full circle.

practicing my consuming skills

• you know those discount racks of items? Well isn't it a conundrum when you're looking at each piece, making your way around the circle and you find a person coming in the opposite direction doing the same thing? You pause a bit longer and hope that they go away so you can continue in your systematic shopping method but they continue, and you're frustrated...what's a shopper to do?
  
• Do you have my size? Customer-service people are super nice when trying to find you a different size or locate a different color. But when you're request sends them in all different directions and you know your request isn't the only one on their plate, it gets a bit ridiculous and you retract your inquiry in the first place. They relinquish with a roll of the eyes but with a smile. I feel like I should tip them. Anyone else?
• in the shoe department, I was skimming the sales racks, totally immersed in my skim and out of my peripheral, I hear a sales lady ask "finding everything ok?" Passing me in the opposite direction, she was neither direct nor interested. I didn't even notice her till she was past me. Is this sneaky? is this shy? Whatever it is, it doesn't work if you want to be a good salesperson.

Customer-service should be a competitive advantage for brands. Starbucks spent almost a month training me in the frontline, customer-service ways of their beautiful brand. The Tuna Fish does a funny parody of what this service should really be. Remember to take your brand's values and beauty in-store too, this is where advertising can really make a difference.

new media, baby boomers and design

Ok, no lies, but one year ago I wrote down some trends I thought were interesting and cool:

• non-traditional media
• a focus on baby boomers in advertising/messaging
• more emphasis on the experience of design
• more brands taken through to the consumer level via customer-service

And what do we see happening NOW?

• New media: postcard flyers, cellphone texts, craigslist, etc.
• Cadillac's new campaign targeting the second wind the BB generation experiences
• Agencies like Anomaly, understanding a brand experience holistically through design.
• customer-service is the tortoise....looking forward to upcoming enhancements HERE.

and one more trend that is developing: latino marketing. I love this quote from the Director of MarComm at the Hartman Group: "Anyone can sell product - people are looking for an authentic shopping experience." (think design again, yeah!!!)