Service Untitled

My friend Linda is a power-seller of long-standing on eBay. For years she has been getting up on Saturday mornings at 5:00 AM to scour local garage sales for equine clothing, bridles, halters, and saddles. She purchases the gear, cleans it up, repairs it, and sells it on eBay. She has reached gold-level power-seller status and prides herself on great customer service. She has hundreds and hundreds of positive feed backs. I thought I would offer some of her advice, observations and suggestions for the entrepreneurial online eBay sellers, and at the same time show how excellent customer service continues to have a positive impact on our lives.

If you have decided to sell something on eBay, research your item thoroughly. Let “Google” become your friend, and use the search engines to capture more information about the items you are selling. The more specific the headlines and description of your items, the more attention you will get. It’s also a good idea to look at what your competition is selling and how your similar items are priced, and marketed.

Take pictures with a digital camera, and take the photos from all angles. This will give bidders a good idea of the condition of your merchandise. Many sellers use a third-party hosting site to display additional pictures to save money. You can place the link on your description.

Make sure you monitor your emails. Potential buyers often have a lot of questions. Seasoned sellers commonly create a FAQ which gives buyers information about policies. For instance, be clear about delivery charges, possible problems, refunds, and procedures. Confirm by email when a buyer has won the bid, and at the same time add the payment terms, and the postage charge information so there can be no confusion. Some sellers send out all items first class so it can be easily tracked, but make sure to specify if the buyer has the choice.  Thank every customer for their payment, and confirm when an item is shipped and instructions on how to contact you with any problems.

Take customer service even further by professionally wrapping any items you are sending out. It gives a buyer a good impression when you use the right sized boxes and the safest packing material to ensure the merchandise arrives in pristine condition. Don’t forget to include an invoice which should include the picture of the sold item.

Follow up on your sale in a few days. Excellent customer service reduces complaints. Let your customers make suggestions for the future which will reduce bad feedback that definitely can affect your eBay reputation.

photo credit: BinaryApe

For the upcoming July 4th weekend, I thought I would update you on the widely publicized drama when the Smoking Gun website revealed information from the US Freedom of Information Act concerning the 550 customer complaints about toll road collectors on the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway.

Of the 550 complaints, 341 were based on rudeness. Other complaints were more egregious. One collector told a woman to pull over for the toll collector to do a strip search. Another toll collector told a motorist to get on the road and die. Other contentious issues centered around using pennies to pay tolls and collectors throwing the pennies back at the drivers.

According to Commissioner of Transportation James Simpson, complaint rates have declined 28% since customer service programs have been instituted. PowerPoint presentations began in May, and both full-time employees and seasonal employees have been required to take the courses. Plaza managers are also required to attend training sessions. Simpson states that complaints dropped from 100 at this point last year to 72. Most complaints were profanity and inappropriate comments. Punishments range from verbal written warnings to suspensions.

According to Simpson, the customer service training is working. Now toll collectors are getting compliments for helping drivers when their vehicles have broken down or someone needs medical aid while on the roads. Toll collectors are doing charity work as ways to connect with the public and improve their public images.

And as far as paying with pennies? Drivers are permitted to pay with pennies, but now must wait until the collector counts them out. I still think it’s more convenient to pay with passes than with cash, but it’s bound to be more pleasant with less sass.

photo credit: 300td.org

The follow-up in real estate transactions can make or break one’s real estate career since so much of one’s business is based on referrals. The most important aspect of being a “stand out” real estate agent is for you to gain a customer’s trust.

And after the sale, asking for post sales feedback will help you to improve and make your customers feel special ensuring them that you are always working on your professional ethics. Ask them what they liked about you and what needs to be improved.

Staying in touch is important, but you want your communication to be viewed as helpful and not just another annoying phone call or piece of junk mail. Everyone appreciates a personal thank you note acknowledging their loyalty and business, follow-up phone calls, e-newsletters of timely and informative nature, and snail mail keeping your property owners updated on the latest news of the community. While you are at it, send tips about selling or buying, ideas about home improvements, gardening, mortgage rates, the economy, and other relevant news.

In the world of the real estate agent, it’s all about getting personal with your sellers and buyers. Don’t hesitate to send out anniversary cards celebrating the first year and thereafter of their home purchase and greeting cards at holiday times. One sales representative from my office organizes a picnic event every year and supplies hot dogs and hamburgers in a community park area. It shows people he cares about them.

Have lunch with your buyers and sellers, get to know their hobbies and when you show people that you really care about them, you can be quite sure they will keep coming back.

photo credit: ChrisBohn

A lot of people say that customer service departments should under promise and over deliver. The goal is logical and practical. Customers will become disappointed if you over promise and under deliver, but they’ll become delighted if you under promise and over deliver. One of the many ways to apply this thought process to your customer service operations is by letting customers know about what you’re doing even if you don’t have to.

For example, say I email a company asking about special pricing for a service. A conscientious company would reply back in a timely manner and let me know that they are looking into the special pricing and inform me that they will get back to me within a set of amount of time, say three days. If the company replied in two days, they would be over delivering and I’d be happy.

But what if I checked my email 24 hours later and saw a simple email that said something like, “Just to let you know, I am in contact with our sales director to secure this special pricing for you. Thank you for your patience.” That would be going an extra mile while simultaneously raising the bar. There is a good chance that the frontline sales person would go through this process anyway, but by letting the customer know exactly what process he or she is going through, that helps show the customer that the company cares about him or her and is working to get the necessary answers.

It is a very simple thing, but it can make a significant difference. As a company and service provider, you have to consider the line between giving customer useful updates and being annoying. It isn’t worth trying to define a set of rules or guidelines (simply use your best judgment), but it is important to keep in mind that there is such a thing of contacting a customer too frequently.

If you have that in mind when you reach out to customers and inform them of your progress, you’ll continue to over deliver.

No one is expected to know everything. If you expect every one of your employees to know the answers to every question that could possibly be asked, you will be in for disappointment. At most companies, there is simply too much to know and a nearly limitless number of questions that potential and existing customers can ask.

Even with that fact of life and of customer service in mind, the answer of “I don’t know” is completely unacceptable. Any employee who says “I don’t know” and leaves it at that is actually an employee who does not care. Especially with technology and the Internet, looking up answers to problems and questions is even easier than before. It isn’t difficult to IM, call, or find a supervisor or another employee. It also isn’t difficult to Google a problem and figure out what it might be. It isn’t at all difficult to send the customer in the right direction with a few web links.

The point is that customers don’t want to be left at “I don’t know.” They want to hear “I don’t know that off hand, but I will be more than happy to find out for you.” As a service provider, you can offer to get back to the customer with the answer or ask them if they’d like to wait. Some customers will want to wait, others will want an email or a call back.

Do whichever they ask and do your best regardless of which way they prefer. Ask who you need to and look up what you have to look up. The goal is to find an answer for the customer that is both useful and accurate. If it isn’t useful or if it isn’t accurate, it doesn’t do the customer much good. If there is no direct answer that you can find, offer up alternative solutions (“X might not be possible, but Y is certainly possible”). Whatever you do, never leave the customer at “I don’t know.” “I can find out” is much better for you and the customer.

Not that long ago a reader asked me to write a post following up after a sale to thank the customer and then offer any help. This is an issue I sort of talk about in a post I wrote about closing the sale on a good note, but not exactly the same.

A lot of companies incorrectly assume that when the customer has paid and gets his or her product, the sale is over. This is anything but true. When the customer’s credit card has cleared and they’re received their product, the company shouldn’t forget about the customer. They should be making an effort to ensure that the post-sales experience is remarkable.

It isn’t hard to set a reminder up to ask a customer about their experience and order a couple of weeks after the order is “completed.” When contacting the customer, take some time to talk to them about their experience ordering, what they think of the product / service, and if you can be of any help. You could send something like:

Hi Bob,

This is John from Company XYZ. I just wanted to thank you again for your order and make sure your Product 1000 arrived and is working as expected. I’d also be curious to hear any feedback you might have about the ordering experience. We’re always looking to improve and feedback from customers is the best way to help us do that.

If you have any questions or comments whatsoever, please don’t hesitate to contact me. I’m more than happy to help you however I can.

Warm regards,

John Smith
Customer Service
Phone: 212-123-4567 x 123
Email: jsmith@companyxyz.com

This is just a draft and should obviously be customized appropriately for each company, each product, and each customer. If it gets too generic, you’ll be defeating the purpose. You want it to be personal.

An important part of this interaction is not to sell the customer anything. Unless they start asking you about other products or services, don’t try to sell them. If you try to sell them new products or services, you’ll lose a lot of the customer’s trust.

If you do this, though, you’ll earn a lot of customer trust. They will appreciate you taking the time to reach out to them without any (apparent) ulterior motive. Of course, the long term goal is to generate repeat sales and increase customer loyalty, but for each call, the goal is to help the customer.

This is a terrific guest writer post by Jean MacDonald from SmileOnMyMac. I wrote about the company’s awesome newsletters back in October.

Offering a free trial to download is a standard technique in the software business. The trial may be limited in timeframe or features, but the idea is the same: get potential customers to try out the product. When they see how useful it is for them, they’ll happily purchase it.

But downloading and installing software is not the same as trying it. Many people, myself included, might download something that looks interesting one day, but never make time to actually try it out. This is a gaping pothole on the road to a sale. To fill it in, we decided to try out a technique known as the “autoresponder”.

With the help of our email marketing service company eROI, we set up a series of email tips that customers would receive on a regular basis after they installed the software. The first time they launched the software, an alert appears, asking for a name and email address. The tip emails were designed to say, “Hey, remember me? I’m that useful application you installed. By the way, here’s something cool you can do with it.”

I admit that I was a little skeptical about what kind of response we’d get. People are already suffering from inbox overload — would they really voluntarily sign up for more email?

They did sign up. Not only that, we started getting fan mail for the tips. Nice notes like these:

“Thank you so much for your helpful emails re: DiscLabel.  I like the program and your
support makes buying the program even more appealing.  I’m on my way to download the paid version right now.”

“Just wanted to let you know that I find the mailing list tips for PDFpen and TextExpander enormously useful. What a great idea!”

“The e-mailed tips are welcome, they are interesting and useful, and they do give the impression that you care – even to a cynic like me!”

And some even blogged about [including here at Service Untitled] how helpful the emails were and how they demonstrated our commitment to a great customer experience.

What had started out as a strategy for encouraging more purchases became recognized as a great resource for people who had already purchased. Customers love to find more uses for something they already own. The reason these emails appeal to potential buyers and current customers alike is that they are truly useful. They are not just a sales pitch. Here are some guidelines to help you write tip emails that your customers will find valuable.

Find out what questions your customers are really asking.
Before deciding on the topics for tip emails, it’s important to make sure that your content will be relevant. In my case, the company co-founders are also our lead developers and customer support representatives. We looked at what questions kept coming up again and again.

Find out what questions they don’t know to ask.
When we start planning a new version of one of our software programs, I will survey our current users. I always ask them about how often they use the various features of the software, and one of the options is “I didn’t know I could do that.” If a significant percentage of customers say they didn’t know about a certain feature, that makes it a good candidate for a tip email.

Make it brief.
Focus in on a specific topic and try to keep the length to 150-200 words. It needs to be brief enough for the user to read in less than a minute. A longer email might prompt some folks to say “I’ll read that later when I have time,” significantly reducing the chance they’ll read it at all. If a couple emails pile up without being read, not only will your customers not get the benefit of your tips, they might even unsubscribe from all your emails.

Use an illustration or two, but don’t overdo it on graphics.
Include a screenshot or other graphic that helps explain your tip. It is important to remember, though, that many people don’t load images into their email by default. Your tip need make sense without any illustration.

We just use a small company logo in the signature of our tips. Much more than that, and your tip might be mistaken for a sales pitch. This is not what your customer signed up for, making it more likely they’ll unsubscribe or, even worse, click the “Spam” button.

Encourage sharing.
In a P.S., we ask users to send us their own tips, which we post on our blog. And we get ideas that help shape future tip emails!

Writer Bio:
Jean MacDonald is the Marketing Director at SmileOnMyMac, a software company that develops productivity tools for Mac OS X. Before joining the company, she was the principal of Well-Tempered Web, a web design and internet marketing firm in Portland, Oregon.

I read this post today on Dell’s corporate blog and I smiled. I told myself (out loud) – “I think Dell is starting to get it.” They are a large company that is finally catching on to the whole “listen to the customer” thing.

The quick story is that Dell is going to offer Linux (Ubuntu) on certain systems. They formed a partnership with a company called Canonical, which is the company of sorts behind Ubuntu. Judging from their press release, Ubuntu is happy about it. There is a lot of positive feedback for Dell as well.

The more interesting part, though, is that Dell openly asks for feedback through their IdeaStorm site. The idea related to pre-installed Ubuntu had over 131,000 votes. It’s hard to ignore that, but kudos to Dell for 1) giving users a place to voice that feedback and 2) actually listening and acting on it. Here are the other top suggestions (in order of most positive votes – what’s in brackets are my comments):

• Ability to have OpenOffice pre-installed
• Have Firefox pre-installed as default browser
• No Extra Software Option [this is available to XPS customers, and Dell is expanding the option to other lines in the future]
• Option to have no Operating System pre-loaded [they sort of offer this, but from what I gather, not in the sense that the votes on IdeaStorm want]

I have no idea whether or not Dell will do any of those (I imagine they conflict with some of Dell’s agreements with Microsoft and other companies, especially the first three), but it will be interesting to watch.

Dell has been working really hard on improving their image and listening to customers. They have been sending people around the blogosphere to respond to comments, created their IdeaStorm site, worked quite hard on their blog, and more. To top it off, the company lists what they’ve done so far on their “Ideas in Action” site.

That is a lot more than HP or Lenovo does. It’s a lot more than many of the larger Web 2.0 companies do as well. Dell’s moves towards listening to customers is very progressive and they seem to be doing it at least somewhat right.

Granted, Dell still has a lot of room for improvement. They are getting much, much better at responding to feedback, but I hear the actual customer service they are providing is not improving nearly as much. Improving the actual customer service provided is a lot harder and a lot more costly. However, I think their actions so far show that Dell is motivated and they are working hard on improving.

Here are some quick things we can learn from Dell:

• Go all out. If you are currently regarded as a company that doesn’t really listen to customers or respond to feedback, go all out. Start a blog, have people respond to comments, create an “IdeaStrom” like site.
• Stay with it. Going all out for three months doesn’t count. You have to remain dedicated. Dell has dedicated more than a few employees (some of whom I have interacted with) to their “respond to feedback” cause. These people are working all the time on these types of issues.
• Provide customers with a way to voice their opinions. Dell has their blog, the IdeaStorm site, and responds to comments on other people’s blogs as well.
• Watch what people say about you. I’ve talked about this plenty! Use software to monitor what people are saying about your company. Then, respond to it.

This is a related post (entitled: Corporate Transparency) here at Service Untitled that you might find interesting.

Here are some suggestions about responding to customer issues that Robert Stephens of the Geek Squad and Best Buy told me (his words – only minor style edits by me):

• Companies need to make it easier to communicate (all companies that have a phone number should adopt GetHuman standards)
• It’s worth the investment in time. Whether you get 10 or 100,000 inquiries – deal with every one of them. Divide and conquer – meaning – the larger of a group you are, the more you should enlist in helping to respond to customer inquiries.
• It’s therapeutic.  Executives often are too removed from the real action. Even handling 3-4 customer incidents a month really helps me to “stay alert” and keep a person fueled to constantly review every part of the experience and work to improve it. 
• Every reaction should lead to action. I use every letter, e-mail, phone call, or blog entry as the beginning of an almost forensic process of 4 stages:
  • 1. what the customer reported. Should then cause:
  • 2. What was done to resolve it to the customers complete satisfaction, which then leads us to:
  • 3. What caused the problem and finally to answer:
  • 4. What will we do to prevent this from ever happening again.

Who would think there would be a day when a customer service person would say we can learn something from Dell.