The Home & Phone of Good Customer Service
After a couple of columns worth of bad news, how about some good news? How about a couple of companies that are doing things right?
I’ve complained almost tirelessly about the phone company over the years. If you’re a faithful follower of this column, or a reader of my latest book, How To Market Your Crap When The Economy Is In The Toilet, you’ve been an eye witness of my rants about poor customer service from the prominent telephone company, most of us are stuck with.
Well, I recently found an option. I’ve switched my business lines to Integra Telecom and, so far, the experience has been gratifying.
It started with personal attention. They sent a real live salesperson directly to my office to explain their products and services. Imagine that! Somebody who thought I was important enough to talk to face-to-face.
When I made the decision to make the switch – not a difficult call because the pricing is substantially better and I didn’t feel like the service could possibly be worse – they told me exactly what I could expect in terms of the switch-over process.
But things did not go smoothly. There were some bumps in the road. Some places where I got a little confused and a little concerned. At each challenge I had good communication with the company. Their customer service people were on the phone, patiently taking care of me. They had answers and I didn’t get shuffled off to other departments. No buck-passing.
They even gave me a 90-day guarantee that said if I was unsatisfied during that time I could opt out of my contract.
Incidentally, by comparison, within two weeks of terminating my relationship with Qwest, they sent me to collections for my final bill. I’m not kidding. Two weeks after termination, I got a nasty call from a collection agency.
Meanwhile, my first bill came in from Integra. Less than half of what I had been paying the former vendor. Better pricing, less hassles and great customer service to boot. That is a winning combination for marketing success in a challenged economy.
Now, on to story number two, which will prove that not just agile little competitors can accommodate needs and win the battle for customer loyalty.
You can’t get much bigger than The Home Depot. And here’s my story.
I am finishing my basement… finally.
I had contacted a company to do granite countertops for my kitchen and they – a good customer service story in their own right – completed the fabrication process far more quickly than I had anticipated. (Their competitors were seven to 12 weeks out. This outfit got my done in less than two weeks.) So these guys showed up to install the counters before I had a chance to buy a cooktop. So, it was off to The Home Depot to see what we could discover.
Timing was on our side as they were having a 10% off sale when we showed up. Nice. Ten percent isn’t meaningful when you’re buying a $40 pair of shoes, but it is when you’re buying a $600 cooktop.
The salesman, Larry, was very helpful, and when we determined what we wanted he indicated we could get an additional 10% off if we applied for a Home Depot credit card.
Only one problem. The Riverton store didn’t have any of the model we wanted in stock. Larry did what I would have expected, and checked the computer for other stores that might have one, and found one in American Fork, about 20 miles away. But it was almost closing time, so we determined to go there the next day.
So far, the customer service has been good, but not extraordinary. But this has only been the beginning of the story.
The next morning, just to make sure, I called the American Fork store to confirm that the product was, in fact, in stock. I asked for the appliance department, but somehow got transferred to Pam, the manager. Lucky me.
Pam personally checked the computer, only to find that, not only did they have none, but the computer said they were a negative four in inventory. I don’t know how you do that, but that’s what Pam’s computer said.
It could have ended there, but Pam didn’t quit. She walked the floor to the department and personally looked for a display model. No soap. Then she went to the back to check the reserve inventory. Still no luck.
Pam returned to the computer and checked all the stores in her district. Said she found only one at the 21st South store in Salt Lake City.
Again, she could have given me a phone number or sent me there on my own, but she didn’t. She got on the phone with the other store and found out that the one they had was their display model. She virtually ordered the store to sell me the display model, but when I heard that, I said, “Pam, the Riverton store had a display model. I didn’t know they’d sell me that.”
Pam said it was unusual to sell floor models and that the Riverton store was outside of her district where she had less influence, but she would call Riverton while I waited and see if they would. I overheard the conversation and to make a long story short, both parties were very accommodating and I was able to get the unit from Riverton, which was far closer to my home than going to downtown Salt Lake.
Then, to top it all off, we asked for an additional discount when we got to the Riverton store, because after all, it was a display model. No box. They gave us an extra $20 off.
This is what customer service is supposed to be. This is what it takes to cultivate rock solid customer loyalty.
I called Pam’s regional manager to let him know what a great job Pam had done for me. I also told him I’d be writing this column. He indicated that the example comes from the top down, giving credit to the Home Depot’s relatively new CEO – on the job less than three years– Frank Blake, who has refocused the company on the customer.
A great lesson for the rest of us in business. What is your greatest asset? It’s not your product or service. It’s not your systems, your inventory or even your people. It is your customers, clients or patients. Remember that, and build everything around that concept and you’ll be well poised to compete in this economy or any.
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