Category: examples

Even Goliath embraces customer centricity

In this CNET article, Tom Krazit explains how Intel is turning a new page (a page out of its competitors strategy book) & becoming more customer centric. Even the behemoth recognizes the need to be customer centric.

You would think Intel with its market share & clout can push its way through. Pushing did work for a while, but then things changed – competitively & in their customers’ markets. Intel is now going out of its way to understand how it can help its customers win by differentiating themselves.

It becomes interesting when you realize that the PC manufacturers are all trying to differentiate themselves using the same chip maker – Intel. What a position to be in – partneirng with all players in the PC market & helping them all compete against one another – whichever PC maker wins, Intel always wins.

When customer feedback goes awry

Over the last couple of years I have got my Mahindra Scorpio serviced at the same service station (Vijay Auto). The fact that this service station actively sought customer feedback (the mere act …let alone how they responded) was actually a source of satisfaction for me all along.


Until, a couple of incidents changed my opinion –

  • Quite a few of the cars that come for servicing are driver (chauffeur) driven. Accordingly, the cars are dropped & picked from the service station by the drivers. On a recent visit, I found that the service agents were treating the drivers extra nicely. The reasoning behind this nice gesture became apparent when I saw the service agents cajoling the drivers to fill in the feedback forms. No efforts were spared to gain maximum mileage of the drivers providing feedback on behalf of the owners.

  • It was then my turn to provide feedback. This time it was their call center. Thanks for your business …hope it was nice …would like a couple of minutes of your precious time ..rate 5 different aspects of the service on scale of 1 (worst) – 10 (best). All fine so far. The issue started when I responded with a rating of 7 to the first question. I was quickly reminded that the company average was 8 & they were trying to increase the rating. I was given a chance to change my rating. No thanks ..lets proceed to the next question. My next response was a rating of 8. I was reminded all over again about the company average ..and an improvement needed a rating of more than 8!!

A very good example of good intent … being put to action too ..but teething problems in proper implementation would mean that the true benefits to the organization start accuring very late. Hope someone from Vijay Auto or M&M read this soon.

How could this have been avoided?

  • In all probability, the initiative has meant that maximizing customer feedback has made its entry into employee’s KPIs. Sadly the focus has been on feedback ratings only & not the true intent of the feedback mechanism.
  • It would be a great idea for sponsors of such initiatives to actually experince the feedback mechanism every once in a while.
  • I was pretty surprised by the number of hits when I Googled Vijay Auto. Obviously a lot of people are providing feedback here. Vijay Auto need to periodically monitor this space.

Apologies from a CEO

(Photo from stockxpert)
Thanks to global sentiments & a mega local IPO, the Indian stock markets witnessed choppy times over the last few days (it still continues in the same vein for now). The market swung crazily between new highs & lows. Accordingly, investors had a hectic time on the floor.
 
Here is an example of the cheif executive of an online trading portal apologizing to its customers about loss & lack of its service during various points the last couple of weeks.
+es
  • Who doesn’t falter!! But how many accept they falter!! This is the difference that an act like this highlights. Publicly accepting the short fall is the first step in one’s efforts to avoiding the same being repeated.
  • With this note, the CEO is setting a good example to his team – its oki to say sorry as long as there are genuine attempts to avoid repeats. This is also a public affirmation that the business values its customers.
-es (could’ve done better)
  • Going by my experince, many have had monetary losses of varying magnitude due to Sharekhan’s loss of service. Maybe Sharekhan should have explored material ways of compensating – even if it were to be a token act. Maybe a brokerage free day / hour / transaction, or a gift hamper, or a charge free service from the Sharekhan portfolio.
  • I would be delighted to see a Tarun Shah follow up mail a few weeks from now enquiring on levels of service. And Sharekhan should try & ensure there is a marked improvement in service during this period.

Have to say though that I am glad I am a Sharekhan customer. And glad to see a services organization raising the bar wrt customer focus in this space.

A lot more Indian services companies need to cover a lot of ground in this area – not because their service is bad, but more so because this segment intends to be world beaters.

—–
Dear Customer,

 

The last few days took all of us off guard. To make things worse, a lot of you faced issues with our service levels. Some of the issues faced by customers were trading system downtime, customer service cell not responding, fund transfer not happening etc. We don’t want to offer any excuses on why this happened as there can be no justification for the hardship you have undergone.

 

We apologize for the inconvenience caused to all of you. We will strive to make amendments in all the areas concerned to improve the service delivery to you. We exist because of you- our customers. It’s the confidence that you have placed in us that has resulted in us doing more than 4 lacs transactions per day and adding 45,000 new customers this month. We accept that we were found wanting on service delivery due to the sudden spurt in transactions/queries caused by this fall. We commit to improve upon the same in the days to come.

 

Warm Regards,
Tarun Shah
CEO
—–

Bose delivers customer delight

Just came across this post on the Fast Company blog about how Bose is delighting their customers individually one after the other w/o the hype & hoopla around product recalls.

My thoughts on this incident –
  • Anyone rooting for companies to be more customer focused should be spreading the word about such positive actions taken by any company.
  • What Bose has done here is to introduce an excitement factor (from Prof Kano’s Customer Satisfaction Model) into their customers experince. They proactively took reinforcing action that most customers wouldn’t have expected. Any organization focused on their customer initiatives ought to be treating product shortfalls as opportunities to try the excitement factor & thus increase loyalty.
  • Bose not only replaced free of cost the product short coming, but have also promised additional goodies to make up for the initial pain. Now how many companies that we regularly buy from would do this!! Good gesture – but they have to deliver on their promise. If they don’t, this would be a good example of someone digging their own grave.
Also check an earlier post with more information on the Kano Model.