As product and service availability, as well as price, begin to fade as competitive differentiators, customer service and engagement have quickly risen to take their place. Early customer-centric leaders such as Amazon and Zappos paved the way for the Age of the Customer, creating a top-down, across-the-board focus on customer service and engagement that propelled their success. But what these brands have made look easy is actually very challenging to accomplish.
A recent study by Bain & Company confirms that while 80% of companies believe they are delivering a superior experience to their customers, only 8% of customers agree.
Brand Promise: Talking the Talk
Talking the talk is easy. Most any brand or organization can create a customer-centric brand promise. Walking the walk, and creating a customer-centric road that everyone in the company helps to build, travels on and maintains at every turn is where most companies lose their way.
Product, Purchase, Post-Sales: Walking the Walk
While the brand promise prominently stands as the customer’s initial directional road sign, it’s the product, purchase experience and post-sales service that often lead customers in a different or wrong direction. Even if the road spanning the first three Ps (promise, product and purchase experience) is well-developed, if your brand or organization loses customers on the last P (post-sales experience – which many brands do), all the effort you’ve put into the previous three touch points has been all for naught – and the belief in your brand promise is lost.
In a recent 2014 State of Multichannel Customer Service Survey commissioned by Parature, 65% of 1,000 consumers surveyed said they’ve cut ties with a brand over a single poor customer service experience.
Creating a Satisfying Start-to-Finish Customer Experience
In a recent recorded webinar now available for viewing at your convenience, analyst Michael Krigsman discussed why companies need to become customer-focused, showing the weighting of promise, product, purchase and post-sales service when it comes to customer engagement, satisfaction and long-term brand loyalty.
Senior Director Bill Patterson of Parature explored how the four Ps (promise, product, purchase and post-sales experience) come together and where customer service comes in. Bill and Michael provided examples of well-known brands that are laggards and leaders (those currently using productive, proactive post-sales service to amplify the brand promise, along with product and purchase success).
Quark Software Vice-President of IT and Customer Support, Mark Lawler, also joined the conversation to share how Quark is building its brand around and has doubled its Net Promoter Score through a strong investment in customer service and engagement.
Whether you’re representing a commercial brand, government agency, or growing public-facing organization, watch this free webinar at your convenience to find out where your organization currently stands in start-to-finish customer engagement and where all brands and organizations should be heading.
