December 19, 2009

Customer Service in the age of social media and analytics

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Ever fill your gas tank in New Jersey (ok, a bad question for a Garden State car owner)? As a native Hoosier, I for one get amazed every time I fill a tank passing through New Jersey on the way to New York. New Jersey, along with Oregon, does not permit self service at fuel stations. This throws off my typical routine at times, as I have fueled my car in many states of driving. Full service in general has declined in America, so the idea of letting someone pump my gas, but not wipe my windshield or offer anything else while I am sitting in my car is an enigma. This is "full service-ish" at best.

The variation of a shopper experience can lead to that same sort of "ish" I experience with Garden State fill ups. It can alter the expectation between a consumer and service provider to create the experience. What are my "duties" as a consumer? What responsibility does the business provide? With exposure to difference experiences, the answer each consumer and business owner comes to varies.

We are in a new age of consumer interaction, thanks to the growth of e-commerce and the increased capability of websites to deliver consumer information. A Technorati post by Doug Stephens talks about how the consumer's need for low price eliminated customer service in many cases. He references a survey in which respondents scored 1000 businesses at 48 points out of 100, a low score. I also agree with the article's claim that there is a trade off between price and customer service, as well as a low score brings opportunity to improve the customer service experience. From the blog post:

For most consumers it’s become a matter of making trades and concessions based on the type of product, the brand, or the store we choose to shop at. Just as we don’t expect the lowest price for a laptop at the Apple Store, we can’t in good conscience demand brilliant service at Sears, whose stores have become a virtual sea of sale banners. And if in fact we really can’t live with that trade-off, then I’m afraid we’ll need to rethink our definition of value as consumers and as a society.

However, getting consumers to agree to a collective consciousness of the consumer service trade offs is an endless pursuit. Moreover a quick glance of customer service questions in Linked In and other sites indicate the idea that in business it may be more profitable to eliminate annoying customers -- what is the yardstick to measure an annoying customer vs. an need to improve service?

A potential idea is to get businesses to state what the buying experience will generally be like. Apple has done a great job of this, setting the expectation through consistent behavior of product introduction and trained store experts, and further monitoring its results to create an experience rewarded by enthusiastic, loyal customers (Monitoring results is where analytics can support a business, small or large). For another successful example, read about Zappos and its customer service experience, mentioned in this Zimanablog post.

How has customer service changed for you, as a consumer or business, in the age of e-commerce.

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