Recently we posted five tips for exceptional customer service. Today, we wanted to take that one step further and talk about how to create customer delight.
You’d be right in thinking that it is a by-product of exceptional customer service because without the latter you don’t have the former. However, having a customer delighted by your service takes their experience from merely good to amazing. And that is the stuff legendary customer loyalty is built upon.
So where do you start?
6 Tips To Create Raving Customer Fans
1. Set Realistic Customer Expectations
This is possibly the most critical tip. We’ve all hear under promise and over deliver. But how many people still promise the earth and don’t deliver, or deliver only half a job. Create a process, explain that process to the customer (and not in the fine print) and deliver nothing less than what you’ve promised.
If a product only comes in 3 colours or options, don’t offer a “range of colours”. Three generally doesn’t make a ‘range’. If you only do the bare minimum but it’s super cheap – explain why – think successful budget airlines. If your service is likely to take a week, but sometimes longer, offer a two week turnaround. That way if it’s quicker, the client will be impressed at your turnaround.
2. Mystery Shop Your Customers’ Experience
Engage someone impartial to test your service. Not a friend – they’ll try to be kind when what you really need is objectivity. Have someone experienced give you the bald-faced truth about what really happened along the way.
Now this might seem a little scary and sometimes the truth about how your customers are served can hurt. But, better a little pain now, than a great deal of pain later when you have to close the doors for lack of business. If you know what the problems are, then you can fix them.
3. Ask Your Customers What More You Can Do
The funny thing about this is that it’s all but free to do and almost no-one does it.
Pick several of your best customers (or all of them) and ask them, entice them if necessary to give you some honest feedback. Ask them to make suggestions for how you could improve your service or your product line. More than likely, they’ll be a. chuffed you asked and b. more than likely to tell you.
The bonus here is, that they’ll often give you new business ideas and then you’ll know exactly who to sell that new product/service to.
4. Don’t Be Afraid to Apologise
Everyone has a bad day. And whilst we all try to not let that get in the way of business, we are only human after all. So if you or your staff members had a bad day and that got in the way of delighting a customer – ring and apologise. They’ll remember you for it.
5. Be Consistent
I had an experience at a bank the other day where the manager bounded up to me (I’d never met him), smiling, shook my hand and asked if I was just banking a cheque as he’d be delighted help me with that – at his desk. We chatted about how the bank was taking customer service really seriously and they wanted people to enjoy their bank interactions. Though the exercise cost them nothing, I walked away having had what could only be described as a delightful banking experience. I told several people about the encounter – it was quite literally that good.
A week or so later, I drove past two other banks to go to my now ‘preferred’ bank – actually looking forward to the experience. What I got was ignored by 6 staff engaging in busyness – there were only 2 other customers in the bank, and yes the same manager was there. Then I was asked for to verify my phone number just in case my cheque was fraudulent – hello? Needless to say, my earlier experience had set higher expectations than usual, so I was even more disappointed than I would have been by a usual banking transaction.
6. Have a Single Focus
As a business owner, really you only need to focus on one thing – your customer. Are their needs being met? How can you help them better? How can you deliver not just on their needs but give them something more. It doesn’t have to cost you much. Sometimes customers just want an ear, a smile, a quick chat or a glass of water.
If we can help take some of your dreaded admin off your hands so that you can focus on what’s really important to your business – serving your customers, we’d be delighted to assist. You can call us on 02 9994 8000 or join us on LinkedIn.
