Whether you're a sales manager, a marketer or run a business you owe it to yourself to read the report on customer service in July's issue of Consumer Reports.
Based on a nationwide CR survey, it chronicles the frustration leading to searing rage experienced more and more often by customers attempting to be serviced by the companies with whom they deal.
Among the gripes and statistics (some eyebrow-raising):
- The inability to get a human on the phone is the top-rated blood pressure generator, garnering an 8.9 our of 10 on the annoyance scale (10 = tremendously annoying)
- a not-surprising 64% hung up on customer service reps without having their problem solved, though a whopping 64% walked out on a store salesperson
- 65% have dealt with rude salespeople at least once in the previous year
- when it comes to online, only 2% like live chat to resolve an issue ... still fewer prefer email
- It took 6 hours for on AT&T subscriber to cancel his landline service.
On the other side of the teeter-totter though, there are bright spots: Apple, L.L. Bean, Dillard's, Crutchfield.com and Sony, to name a few.
I've been belligerently consistent (annoyingly so, I'm told) about stating one thing for years: marketing is not what a department does, it's the process of how the company defines itself to its customers. Good companies in it for the long haul court their customers, and see customer problems as the stepping stone to enriching their brands, building loyalty, and driving the top line. Good companies view customer service as a differentiator, not a cost that must be bludgeoned into submission during economic downturns.
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