Customer Care Tip 9

Customer care is the job of everyone, but it's up to management to find ways to keep it going, every day, every week, never ending. But how?

A process for keeping it going....

Encourage a daily review by everyone, maybe every day, maybe at random:

Did I think "Customer! Important!" before talking to them?
Did I make a little extra effort with at least one customer today?
Did I ask myself "Why did that problem happen?" and do something about the underlying cause rather than just put it right for that particular customer?
Did I handle the difficult customers well, if there were any?

Have a monthly review, formally, as a meeting:

What is annoying our customers most at the moment?
How are we finding this out? (What are we doing in the way of surveys, both of users and non-users of our organisation?)
Have we improved anything on customer care this month?
Are the changes we are bringing in to the organisation making life better for our customers, or just for us? (Cutting costs isn't enough - service has to improve as well, or at least not be affected by any changes)
Have we compared ourselves with any of our competitors recently?
What are we doing in the way of little things to really delight our customers at the moment? (Giving them more than they expected)
Have we done a "mystery shopper" recently? (Getting a friend or other outsider to try the service and report back to us on their experience)

You can add your own questions to the lists above. But I hope they form a useful start....

Onwards and upwards

Chris