Wowing your customer with amazing customer service is the best way to keep customer retention rates high. Customer service is arguably the most important element to your business plan. Without customers you don’t really have a business. The leaders of an organization need to commit to not only meeting their customer’s expectations, but exceeding them.
Increasing competition is one reason to focus on excellent customer service. If you can’t provide your goods and services with outstanding customer service, there are most likely 5 or 6 other companies that are ready to grab your customers. Now, more than ever, companies need to make sure they don’t drop the ball when it comes to customer service.
Take Zappos.com for example. They are a Las Vegas based company that started in 1999 selling shoes online, and have grown to $1 billion per year. They are an extremely customer service oriented company. Here are some of their decisions;
- They encourage customers to order as many products as they want in order to “try them on” and then offer free return shipping for an entire year.
- They surprise many customers with a free upgrade to overnight shipping when the web site indicated 2-5 business days.
- Their call center received 5,000 calls a day because customers are encouraged to call about anything. The employees do now work with scripts, quotas or call limits.
- They decided to run their warehouse 24/7 to maintain super-fast turnaround on order, even though it is not an efficient way to run it.
