My best learning on Customer Services and Experiences

My best learning on Customer Services and Experiences

I learnt my best customer complaint resolution experience at Tea stall.  While sipping the tea along with my friends, we  heard a person complaining to tea shop owner 'bhaiyya aaj aapki chai acchi  nahi bani hai’. We all were amused as it is the same in taste which we were having for so many years. Then why this person is complaining. To our utter surprise the shop owner acknowledged the problem and said yes there seems to be some problem and he will rectify it. Once the complaining customer left the stall we asked the tea shop owner “bhaiyya kya problem thee” and he smiled that there was no problem and the tea is same as it had been for many years. Then we enquired why did he agreed to complaint, to which he replied if we need to get the answer then we need to be there tomorrow same time when the complaining customer come again at shop to have his tea.

We all were eager to know about it and were keen to find the answer. Next day, thanks to our curiosity we reached at shop again and waited for the complaining customer to come. The customer came ordered his tea and started sipping that. Then The tea owner asked 'bhaiyya aaj to chai theek hai naa’. and the customer nodded in affirmation and said “haan aaj majedar hai”. We also ordered the tea and again experienced the same taste and quality which we had last night. The customer seemed quite satisfied from tea and left the store.

We again asked the  chai wala 'bhaiyya what is the difference between yesterday’s and today’s tea, as we could not find any difference. The tea vendor said that their is no difference. He said, he did not changed anything. We again asked him then how did the customer felt difference. To which he answered that this is the same tea he has been drinking for years . I could make out that yesterday he was not happy with something and hence could not enjoy the tea.  If i would have resisted to the complaint, customer could have more angry and then probably I would have lost the customer.

This taught me some very important lessons for handling the customer:

• Always hear the customer patiently
• Greet & Reply him with a smile
• Be Courteous always

Most of us before listening to customers we start making them understand about the problem, sometimes it is better to listen them patiently and then make them feel as you are always there to help them. Once we make him feel comfortable, he can really contribute a lot to our business via word of mouth communication. Hence while dealing with customers, we must also remember followings:

• Try to resolve the customer ASAP, immediately would be best.
• .One must be courteous, admit the problem and try to be helpful, all of above must have knowledge about product/services while guiding the customer
• Offer Quality Service 24X7
• You can always offer the customer for Free product training and support
• Exceed Customer Satisfaction through proactive support

If one can follow the above said rules, the customer experience will surely be great!

How active are your customers?

How active are your customers:

For a sales manager it is important to know how many of their customers are active and how much efforts they should put in to make their customers active. One way to identify the activeness of customers is Recency.

Recency is the state of being recent. In sales actions means, when did the customer last time purchased from you. Recency helps in identifying the chances if customers will buy again from you? The customer who has bought material in recent time is more likely to buy from you again. The recency can be defined on the basis of the product consumption cycle. The product consumption cycle is the period in which a product will be consumed and the customer shall be again at store to buy. For example for a bread, it can be consumed in a day time & hence the consumption cycle would be a day while for a Salt packet it might be 30 days.

If the consumption cycle of a bread pack is one day then on the basis of recency the customers can be divided in following categories:

Active Customers are those who have bought the material in recent times and are most likely to buy again. For Bread pack those will be who has bought it yesterday.

Warm Customers who has bought material a little late than the recent past and will buy products on intermittent basis. For a bread pack, The customers who has bought in last 2 weeks will fall in the category

Cold Customers are those who have bought material some time back and would have shifted to competition, for a bread pack they might be someone who has bought a month back

Inactive Customers are those who have bought it long back and not thinking to buy again your products,  for Bread packet, someone who has not bought your products for last 2 months.

The Active Customers are likely to buy more often and regularly as compared to old customers and hence you might need more resources to keep them interested in your brand.

People who have not come back to your stores might have shifted to competition and need more efforts to bring back and hence require attractive sales pitch. While the cold customers are not happy with you and hence probably switched the brand and thus gives you a chance to introspect and analyse why did you lost them.

The Active customers require regular visit by sales team and need to be monitored & followed up with more promotion, while Inactive Customers can be touch based once in a while to know their interest in brand.  But if someone is very important and large customer and he has gone to cold or Inactive mode, then you need to put large amount of promotional efforts.

Hence while recency helps you to segmentise your market and help you in resource allocation, it also helps you to identify the important customers and track them.

The recency phenomenon can also be used to segment the market and for utilisation of your resources.