Key Insights for Delivering a Perfect Customer Experience

By Shaun Smith

Do you know what your most profitable customers value and the 3 or 4 most important attributes which drive their intention to repurchase or to refer you?

Without the answers to these questions you may have data, but you do not have insight. A key difference between simply providing ‘good’ customer service and a customer experience is being differentiated in a way that is valuable to target customers. Being different is not enough.

For example, the Fashion Café, the chain of restaurants created by fashion models including Naomi Campbell, was clearly differentiated in its use of fashion memorabilia in the design of its restaurants. However, its offer had no lasting value for people who go to a restaurant first and foremost for the quality of its food and service. As a result, once the novelty factor had worn off The Fashion café saw a decline in business.

Another example is Barclays, the UK based bank that created a very expensive advertising campaign to promote the fact that it is a big bank. The campaign bombed because most retail customers see no value in their bank being big. In fact quite the opposite; ‘big’ stands for impersonal and uncaring.

One more example: Like a number of business people, I use the Platinum American Express Charge Card for its travel service and benefits, yet I receive unsolicited direct mails shots from an organisation called Capital One on a weekly basis. The mail shots all say the same thing and offer me the same credit card promoting a low rate of interest. They always enclose a cheap ball-point pen in the envelope. This bank clearly has not taken the trouble to understand me, what I value, or develop an offer that is likely to appeal to me. It has gotten to the point that now as soon as I feel the pen through the envelope I throw it away unopened.

We can all avoid making this mistake -- treating customers as if they are all the same ... or worse yet, treating them all as if they were you. When we look at how we can provide value to each distinctly individual customer, we will be moving in the direction of the perfect customer experience.

Comments

[Glenn (Customer Service Experience) Ross]

Excellent points. My blog template doesn’t permit trackbacks, but that won’t stop me from manually doing it. http://www.allbusiness.com/sales/customer-service/4301689-1.html

I'll be reading.

Regards,

Glenn