Customer Service Simplified

It’s Saturday, the day before Easter and I want to deposit some of the checks that have come in during the week from all of our affiliate programs, ad sales and such.

I go to my local branch and go inside and am at least the 6th person back.

Two tellers, which is normal and one at the drive-up window, which is normal.

The teller on the left is dealing with a young lady with a check written on an account from this bank, but she doesn’t have an account.

It’s not too painful, but it does cause some consternation, as the teller acts as if the young lady is some kind of criminal because she doesn’t have an actual bank account of her own.

I can’t say as I blame her, as most transactions performed in person are painful, which is why I have direct deposit, bank and pay bills online and use PayPal when I can.

The really painful part though, is when the teller completes her transaction and then tries to sell the young lady a “no minimum balance checking account “, while 6 of us, who have accounts stand and listen to the young lady and the teller go thru all the features.

OMG ! This ain’t the time for this. Like Kenny Rogers said, ” … you gotta know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em. “

Have her come back when the lines aren’t this long or refer her to a customer service rep who doesn’t have card carrying customers waiting 6 deep and getting more fed up all the time.

There’s a time for sales and there’s a time for customer service.

I was just over at Lorelle’s blog, reading a post about comment spam and all the measures we can take.

I currently have to wade thru the crap on 20+ blogs that we operate … every single day.

I hate spam and spammers.

That’s not what I’m here to talk about though.

If you look at the comments on Lorelle’s post, you’ll see one from Seth.

Seth said he’s tried twice to contact the people over at Akismet to buy a couple of licenses, with no reply.

Lorelle gives the standard response that they’ve had server trouble, which is a cop out created by the internet that I hate with a blazing, burning, bigass passion.

She then says to give them a few days to respond. What !?

OMG ! A few days !?

People fall in love, get married and move entire households faster than that in Vegas.

And we have to wait that long for a response to an email from someone we want to give money to ?

My company has 18 locations if four states and we answer every single call, with a live operator, before 4 rings.

If we don’t, the prospective customers go somewhere else and current customers become former customers. Period.

A few days !?

To sell something to someone ? Not a freakin’ chance.

That crap started with the internet, but it needs to stop … now.

It doesn’t work for Starbucks.

Me - ” Hi, I’d like a white chocolate mocha latte venti with whipped cream please. “

Them - ” Okay, but today is Thursday and right now we’re taking orders for next Tuesday. “

Nope. They’re a real business serving real people, so they make it right now.

They charge a fair price and spend some of the profits on stores, employees and phone lines. Try it.

If you can’t answer all of your emails before the end of the day, don’t end the day. Hire people. Fire people. Raise prices. Whatever it takes to actually give customer service to actual customers.

Memo To The World - I’m certainly not aiming this towards Lorelle, nor at Akismet, but at all the companies that claim to do business on the internet.

Please don’t read anything vindictive into this, the comment just spurred a rant and they happened to be the ones involved in rattling my brain into action.

Akismet’s name just happened to be the one used in the post, that just happened to be written by Lorelle.

I don’t use Akismet’s service, so I can’t comment on their responsiveness.

The real issue here is the vast majority of anonymous companies that try to do business on the ‘net … anonymously.

Why in the heck does anybody deal with anonymous businesses ?

Would you eat dinner in a restaurant that wouldn’t let you see their face, hear their voice or shake their hand ? Me neither.

I’d have to be pretty damned hungry to do so and I’ll have to be pretty desperate to buy from an anonymous company on the ‘net.

No phone line ? No deal.

No way to contact you except email ? No chance.

No physical address to see ? See you later.

You want my money but don’t want me to know who you are ? Forget it.

Why do you think that internet only businesses can get away with only having email contact with their clients ?

Should they at least have some hours during the day to answer a phone ?

Should we even care ?

Via Amazon’s Editorial Review: In October 1985, at age 27, Danny Meyer, with a good idea and scant experience, opened what would become one of New York City’s most revered restaurants-Union Square Cafe. Little more than twenty years later, Danny is the CEO of one of the world’s most dynamic restaurant organizations, which includes 11 unique dining establishments, each at the top of its game. How has he done it?

How has he consistently beaten the odds and set the competitive bar in one of the toughest trades around?

Back in October, I remember reading an article in USA Today written by Jerry Shriver. In it, he did a Q & A with Danny Meyer, which I’m sure you can find in the USA Today archives, if you’re interested.

The part of that article that I want to focus on today is the excerpts from Meyer’s book, Setting The Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business.

Meyer say’s, in the interview, that his 9 restaurant empire is beset daily by problems, as are all of us, The difference is in the culture that he’s instilled in his emoployees for solving those problems.

In one instance from the book, a diner had arrived and discovered that she had left her wallet and cellphone in her cab.

The woman was seated and was assured she could pay later. While she dined, the receptionist repeatedly called her cellphone, until the cab driver answered it.

The cab driver was far away from the restaurant, so unbeknownst to the woman, they sent a staffer to meet the cab and retrieve her wallet and cellphone.

As she finished her meal, the staffer handed over her wallet and cellphone, much to her astonishment.

The cost to the restaurant: $31.

The value to the restaurant: Priceless word of mouth advertising and eternal gratitude from a more than satisfied customer.

In another instance, as a couple sat down to dine, the man remembered he’d left the champagne for their celebration in the freezer. After asking the maitre d’ about the harm to the bottle of champagne, the maitre d’ asked if he could go to their apartment to move the bottle from freezer to refrigerator.

They agreed and gave him their keys. The maitre d’ drove to their apartment, moved the bottle AND left them some dessert chocolates, a tin of caviar and a congratulatory anniversary note.

Again, the time it took was minimal, but the return was uncalculable.

Tags: customer service, sales, selling, usa today, restaurants

What has your company done for your customers that nobody else would ever do ?

Another wasted trip to Best Buy has gotten me riled up enough to write this post. It’s not a situation that’s singularly theirs, but they do seem to specialize in it … or almost as much as Home Depot, who I thought was the master of this error in advertising.

Here’s how it started -

I grab the Sunday paper and look for bargains in the ad inserts and circulars. Target has a great looking gizmo that toasts muffins, cooks eggs and re-heats my bacon. Looks like a great way to make my own breakfast sandwich and not have to fight the lines at the fast food places.

I drive over, walk in and grab one, head for the checkout and am gone in 60 seconds.

No problems.

Then to the Best Buy, that happens to be about 100 feet away, but eons behind in customer satisfaction.

The circular had a Wacom Graphire4 tablet that i’ve been wanting to get for a certain daughter and her fabulous mother. Both of them are really, really good with Photoshop and this will be a great addition to their arsenal.

I notice that CompUSA has it listed for $99, but it would have to wait til I get to Louisville later this week, as we don’t have a CompUSA.

Best Buy has listed it for $105, $6 more, but who would care about $6 measley dolars when you can get it now.

But wait ! It’s on sale at Best Buy for $69 ! I run over to grab one and think that the savings will pay for the sandwich machine. Cool ! Kinda like a 2-for1 deal.

Except that they don’t seem to have one on the shelves.

I’ll try to flag down one of the dozens of the denizens in blue who seem to congregate in 2’s and 3’s talking to ….uh, each other, not customers.

I look for one of them not using this herd mentality. Kinda like one that the wolves would look for. Culled from the herd because he’s weak.

I find him. Tall and has that mouth that continually hangs open. Perfect. I’ll trick him into going into the back and finding me one.

He leaves and returns the same way. Empty handed.

No deal dude, he says. Not only do we not have any, we can’t even order them.

He does mention that a whopping 2 are scheduled to come in this week on one of the two trucks that bring replenishments.

What day do those trucks come, I ask.

I have no idea, dude, he says.

I kinda knew that already.

I leave thinking these few simple things -

1) Do those who create ads have any way to see if it’s worth wasting the ad space on an item ? If you have 6 items spread out over 50 stores, don’t bother putting it in the circular.

2) Have they thought of putting something on sale that they have a lot of and need to move, instead of clearing out just a few items and pissing off those that get the same feeling that I got ?

3) Can they offer to find a store that has some inventory and have the item shipped to where they’re needed ? Think about it. There may be no need for these in New Jersey, but 100 people in Kentucky that want them.

4) Does any other electronics store habitually fare any worse with this type of situation ?

5) Is there any way to get more than one checkout lane open and have fewer blue-clad talkers talking to each other ?

I hate going to Best Buy just because they always have dozens of blue-shirts doing a lot of chit-chatting, but there’s ALWAYS a long line to checkout and only one lane open.

And that dude at the door who watches his fellow employee put my stuff in the bag and then wants to check my register receipt … get rid of him or put him in a lane that has a register, so he can actually accomplish something besides making me feel like you don’t trust me.

Anybody else want to jump on this train ?

Back on december 3rd, 1o days ago, I asked the Hilton folks to help me out with a small and insignificant dilemma about my stays with them.

Here’s a link to my plea for customer service/saisfaction.

I emailed the post to my Hilton Honors Diamond VIP rep that day.

A week passed and I got no reply.

I then emailed that same post, with a plea for help, to one of their VP’s, Customer Satisfaction wise, and have not heard back from that either. I’ll not out him here, as he may or may not have actually seen that email.

I can’t tell what they’ve seen, since they won’t respond.

Well, I’m in need of a hotel again and I’ll have to go thru the trouble of fighting the 10 different rates at 13 locations thang again, so I’m going to the blogosphere for help.

Would all of you who have blogs related to customer service please Trackback, link to or help publicize this post in some way ?

I need to spend my time doing something besides arguing with myself, since they won’t argue back.

And if you have a Hilton Hotels contact, please send ‘em my way.

Over the last 2 years, I’ve spent about 50 nights in a hotel in Louisville, KY. Every one of those has been at a Hilton franchise, namely a Hampton Inn.

On the road in Knoxville, Hampton Inn. Nashville, Hampton Inn. Horse Cave, Hampton Inn. There have been other cities, but the one constant has been the franchise … Hampton Inn.

Over the last 2 years, my Hilton Honors account has gone to Diamond VIP, which is as high as it goes for their customers.

I’ve always enjoyed their cleanliness, their business services, the great, hot breakfasts and USA Today newspapers, the fine service, etc.

The one thing I haven’t enjoyed is their rates which fluctuate too much for my comfort.

Right now, 7:20 PM on Sunday nite, December 3rd, 2006, on their website there are 13 different hotels listed and there are 10 different rates. They range from $79 a nite to $179 a nite.

10 rates for 13 hotels is just plain crazy. Those hotels are blocks away from each other in some cases and on different ends of the same city in other cases.

I can drive for 20 minutes or less and save my company $100 a nite. That’s dumber than a box-o-rocks to make me make that choice.

Why can’t a diamond VIP get a rate that doesn’t fluctuate and consistently stay at the same hotel every week ?

3 weeks ago, I was waiting to check in and the young lady who was attempting to help me with that answered the phone, instead of finishing my check in, because she was the only one here, she said.

She told the caller that his rate would be $79 per nite. I was standing in front of her at the time. She never asked if he was a Hilton Honors customer or not, so he could have been a first time customer. It might be the only time he ever stays in one of their hotels.

She then proceeded to try to charge me $99, but I pointed out that she just gave the guy on the phone a better rate. She said that was because he was staying 5 straight nights.

I pointed out that I would stay in that very hotel for 26 to 50 times in a year, so she dropped my rate to $84.60.

This last week I called for a reservation and the same young lady wanted $109 for a room. That’s $30 more than a month ago. It amounts to a 38% increase in 30 days.

Does your industry raise it’s prices 1% a month ? Mine neither.

Same room. Same newspaper. Same bedspread. Same breakfast. Nothing new. 38% more.

No deal Hilton. No deal Hampton Inn. I won’t play.

I have a blog that reached over 40,691 visitors last month. Those people viewed 78,020 pages.

I work for a corporation that has 18 locations in 4 states. We have “several” sales people who stay in hotels each and every week.

We attend forums, seminars and training several times a year, nationwide, and spends thousands upon thousands of dollars in hotel bills.

I’m ready to make a deal and get a consistent rate for my stays … or I send out a memo and eliminate all stays at Hilton franchises.

What’s it gonna be Hilton/Hampton ?

Deal or no deal ?

I’m sending a link to this post to my Diamond rep and I’ll let you know what we agree on.

If we can’t work this out, I’ll be asking for recommendations on hotel chains.

Either way, you’ll know how it ends.

Thru Glenn Ross over at Customer Service Experience, I just read, for the first time, a blog written by Sara Cantor - The Curious Shopper.

It’s premise is to outline and define why some stores work and some don’t. Great idea, great reading, great insight from Sara.

As someone who spends time in hotels, I can tell you I’ve never seen such a great idea as the one from Holiday Inn. I actually saw the board at a Louisville hotel one time when I picked up a business dinner guest.

I didn’t think much of it, at the time, as I didn’t spend as many days away as I do now.

I can also say I’m terribly disappointed in the promo from Marriot. That’s incredibly cheesy and cheap.

The worst part is you know that Marriot knows what Holiday Inn is doing and still doesn’t match their ingenuity or their effort.

That spells lack of caring, lack of love, lack of direction from management, and last but not least, lack of pride.

If you’ll knowingly let your competition outdo you with something as simple as that, you’re really not much of a competitor … are you ?

If you’re going to be a player, you’ve got to play.

If you can’t run with the big dawgs, stay on the porch.

Either go big, or don’t go at all.

Lukewarm companies are worse than a cold company.

If you didn’t even try that kind of campaign, say like most discount motels, nobody would blame you. But if your last name is Marriot or Hilton and you don’t match that campaign with your own campaign that’s at least equal to, if not better than, then you are not very interested in your image, in my simple opinion. And you know I like simple.

What can your company do today to make your customers feel special, loved, appreciated and best of all, like you showered, shaved and put on some Victoria’s Secret for them ?

PS - Image above courtesy some really brave BMXers.

Back in May I wrote about how I wished that my bank, Chase, would remember my preferences for the amounts I usually withdraw, the language I use and all those other tedious actions that never change and slow down an ATM transaction.

Tomorrow is finally here and all is well in the bankosphere. Chase has come thru by making ATM transacations faster, more intuitive and simpler. You know I like simple.

I just went in and set my preferences to English, because they didn’t list Kentuckian as one of the available languages. English is close, but lacks a little color when compared to Kentuckian as a language.

I also set it to always print a receipt and set some of my favorite amounts for withdrawal.

Now I’m out the door to test it out by grabbin’ some QuickChoice cash and heading to Cracker Barrel. I did say I was Kentuckian, didn’t I ?

Thanks to Chase for leading the way or for giving me my way. I really don’t care which it was, I just want what I want.

How about you guys, does your bank do this ? Do they plan to ? If not, hop over to the Chase corporate site and find your nearest location. Then go open an account and tell ‘em Mike sent you.

Recently I’ve gotten some great feedback and comments from two people who have great info to share on their sites/blogs.

In the spirit of Link Leaks, since I coined that phrase several months ago, I’m going to leak some links and spread a little link love on two people who’ve linked to and spread the love towards me.

First we’ll travel to Florida, I think, to visit Doug, who writes Service Untitled.

” Know the power of “Yes.” Saying yes is so important to customer service. The advice the articles gives (when you get a request that is at least somewhat feasible, say Yes and then figure out how to do it). This is going the extra mile, and your customers will appreciate it. Say no as little as possible and do what you can to fulfill your customers’ requests and make them happy. “

There’s a lot of good info about customer service over there and I suggest you check him out.

Next, we’ll travel to St. Louis, where my Cardinals play, to visit Dr. Kim DeMotte, the man behind The Power of No. One point of real interest for me over there is Catch and Release Prospecting.

” It is a program that teaches companies that all prospects are not equal, and shows salespeople how to quickly identify their best and worst prospects. CATCH & RELEASE creates a filter system that keeps costly sales resources from being wasted on marginal prospects while identifying MORE quality prospects. “

Doesn’t that sound like a winning strategy for every salesperson ? It does to me and Kim says it’s scalable, so it’ll work for one-man-shows, as well as multi-national corporations.

Give these guys a visit and let me know what you think.

PS - Use your favorite search engine, mine is Google, to see hoe many instances of “link leak” are out there. I see 15,300 when I use quotes.

PS2 - Which do you like …. Yes or No ?

The great Sethmeister himself, Seth Godin, says to transform your business, you have to do something remarkable. Well, fast-food coffee has now been done remarkably well.

I just had my first cup of the new Premium Roast coffee at Mickey D’s. I didn’t even have to put in the 2 sugars and 2 creams that I wanted …. they did it for me, so I wouldn’t have to fumble with the packets.

What’s the big deal with that ? Well, as I see it, I’m on the road 5 or 6 days a week. If I stop at a drive-thru and grab a quick bite, I take the chance of getting crumbs all over my double-mercerized golf shirt or my micro-fiber slacks.

You have to either drink bad coffee black or hope they remember to put some packets in your sack.

Not anymore. McDonald’s has gone above and beyond the road warriors expectations. They have great coffee and a great lid, which we’ll get deeper into in a minute, and they make it like you want it.

Their new premium roast coffee is the best I’ve ever tasted at a fast-food establishment. The absolute best.

Do I know anything about coffee ? Yes, if I say so myself ( and I will ), I worked at one of Millstone Coffee’s roasting facilities eons ago and I’ve tasted the best coffee’s from around the world. This new stuff is pretty good for the time and cost. You pay about a buck and they hand it to you, with the amount of cream and sugar you ask for, in a few seconds.

Better philosophy, for the consumer, than at that big ‘Buck’s place.

Life is good.

What they’ve done will force those that want to be players in the breakfast market to counter with their own take on kicking customer service up a notch.

Instead of that other place having their king, at McDonald’s YOU, the customer, are the king. Life as royalty ain’t all that bad, despite those wretched tabloids.

And that new coffee cup lid is the stuff of dreams. Have you seen it yet ? A little doomafloggit that hinges back and forth. Domed a bit to relive the peripheral pressure that only accumulates in suburban coffee climates. Almost impossible to spill onto your Dockers.

Life is good.

You want to be treated like royalty ? You want 2 sugars and 2 creams, without having to rip, tear or squeeze ? You want great coffee with your morning breakfast sandwich ?

Then head on over to Mickey D’s and feel the love.

Now if we could just get them to make their sandwiches a little better …