Top 10 ways to instill customer service into your company
Date submitted: 28/04/2011
Mystery Customer shares the 10 ways to instill customer service by Zappos.com CEO, Tony Hsieh
In previous articles we have outlined the importance of setting a service standard and making sure your employees abide by them. In this article, we pose the following question: "Are your customer service standards being followed by the whole business, or just parts of it?"
 
Tony Hsieh, CEO of online consumer goods retailer Zappos.com, has written the book "Delivering Happiness: A Path To Profits, Passion and Purpose". In it, Tony has outlined his 10 beliefs in customer service. He emphasises the importance that all staff within the company should provide great customer service, no matter what their role is.
 
Here are his "Top 10 ways to instill customer service into your company":
 
  1. Make customer service a priority for the whole company, not just a department. A customer service attitude needs to come from the top.
  2. Make WOW a verb that is part of your company's everyday vocabulary.
  3. Empower and trust your customer service reps. Trust that they want to provide great service... because they actually do. Escalations to a supervisor should be rare.
  4. Realise that it's okay to fire customers who are insatiable or abuse your employees.
  5. Don't measure call times, don't force your employees to up sell, and don't use scripts.
  6. Don't hide your 1-800 number. It's a message not just to your customers, but to your employees as well.
  7. View each call as an investment in building a customer service brand, not as an expense you're seeking to minimize.
  8. Have the entire company celebrate great service. Tell stories of WOW experiences to everyone in the company.
  9. Find and hire people who are already passionate about customer service.
  10. Give great service to everyone: customers, employees, and vendors.

 

How many of these ideas do you use? They seem to have worked for Tony Hsieh and Zappo's - growing the company from almost no sales in 1999 to over $1 Billion gross merchandise sales annually, while simultaneously making Fortune magazine's annual 'Best Companies to Work For' list. Maybe you could implement some of Tony's ideas in your business model?
 
Our comment:
Some of our new clients complain that they never got to speak to a real live person when they first called our competitors. We don't think we are perfect, but we see answering your calls as a priority!

For more, see our customer service articles  

The Mystery Customer team.
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