Are we falling or flying … and will we ever know?

Life, the universe, technology, project management, and why change management is so incredibly hard.

Posts Tagged ‘customers’

Customer Experience, Part II

July 1st, 2009

A t-shirt popular within the Apple Computer team building v.1 of Quicktime read “Apple: 80 hours a week, and loving it!”

So much for work | life balance.

At the same time, I think Steve Jobs gets a lot of things right – including not making decisions for the short term without fully understanding the long term implications of those choices.

Jobs also knows loyalty is a two way street; customers and employees will forgive an occasional misstep or two if they feel a product and company are worthy and relevant for the long term:

The cure for Apple is not cost-cutting. The cure for Apple is to innovate its way out of its current predicament.
Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.
Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.
Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100 times more on R&D. It’s not about money. It’s about the people you have, how you’re led, and how much you get it.
Quality is more important than quantity. One home run is much better than two doubles.
You hire good people who will challenge each other every day to make the best products possible.
When I got back, Apple had forgotten who we were. Remember that “Think Different” ad campaign we ran? It was certainly for customers, but it was even more for Apple. That ad was to remind us of who our heroes are and who we are. Companies sometimes do forget. Fortunately, we woke up.

I’m not yet ready to move Cupertino, especially since I think the Northwest can – and should – do better. After all -we’re also

“…the crazy ones, the misfits, the rebels, the troublemakers, the round pegs in the square holes… the ones who see things differently — they’re not fond of rules… You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but the only thing you can’t do is ignore them because they change things… they push the human race forward, and while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius, because the ones who are crazy enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do.”

Or – innovate or die.

Success – and Failure – Really Do Depend on the Customer Experience.

June 29th, 2009

And, customers experience your company in a lot more ways than you realize.

Every day, and via multiple mediums, customers receive some kind of experience, ranging from positive to negative; with customer experience being defined as the sum total of conscious events/experiences. A company’s ability to deliver an experience that sets it apart in the eyes of its customers serves to inspire loyalty to its brand, products, and services.

People are customers without yet having purchased or used a company’s product or service; word of mouth (both good and bad) is a very powerful influencer; it takes a lot of future customers to a new product or service “the new, new thing;” only a few unhappy ones can and will deter 4x as many others from trying/buying.

I was an extremely unhappy Hyundai owner during the first years they were sold in the US; fifteen years later, I still won’t consider ever buying another. I replaced way too many defective rubber engine seals on that manual transmission car, each time at an out of pocket cost of $500 (in 1990’s $$).

On the other hand, my aunt loves her Lexus, and my cousins adore their Hondas; each which incurred very minimal maintenance expenses.

Hmmm. The only way I’ll ever own another Hyundai is if it was free *AND* came with a free 100% parts and service warranty for the first 10 years of ownership.

Similarly, several years ago a friend was in the market to purchase a new Volkswagen. The dealer nearest her house assured her over the phone they had the exact model, color etc. she sought, and that car was available for her to drive home that day as she went with a certified bank check in hand to pay for the car in full.

After arriving, she discovered the sales rep did not have that model or color in stock, that day or even recently.

Even worse, that sales team strung her along for several hours, first trying to locate that desired car from other dealers; then trying to persuade her to purchase one of the cars that was in stock, but not at all comparable to the model she’d researched and already selected.

End result? She purchased her new Volkswagen from another dealer, and also spent exactly the same amount of time sharing her experience with that dealer with her friends, co workers, and others. Including travel time, the dealer had wasted approximately 3 1/2 hours of her time. And, she knows a lot of people.

I used to work in corporate staffing orgs as a recruiter, almost always in the role of headhunter/outbound recruiter. Depending on the company I worked for, I sometimes faced substantial resistance from potential senior candidates, who ten years before had worked together on an Industry Standards committee with several of that company’s employees.

Their interactions with those folks were so bad ten years later it was a serious uphill struggle to persuade them to consider a job opportunity with a totally different, and really good team.

Similarly, I already know my next smart phone won’t be the same brand I currently own; not because of a bad customer experience with the product, but because of an unprofessional experience I had while being recruited to work for that company.

People think elephants have amazing memories; but unhappy customers do too. And sadly, too few companies realize how broad and how powerful a customer’s experience is or can be; or understand almost all of us are customers in some way – either past, present, or future.

Thoughts to ponder, compliments of Customer Focus Inc.:

95% of senior business leaders believe that the next competitive differentiator is customer experience.
Eighty percent of companies believe they deliver a superior customer experience. But only eight percent of their customers agree.
Only 22% of respondents agreed that companies “currently provide an excellent customer experience.”
Almost every U.S. consumer surveyed (96 percent) had a negative service experience in the past year, with 80 percent subsequently severing the relationship.