The real basis for customer complaints

What is customer loyalty? Let me tell you this story:

After spending a happy evening drinking together, two acquaintances promise to meet again in 10 years at the same bar, same time. Ten years later, the first guy walks in, looks around, and sure enough, his friend is there on a barstool. He clasps the old friend’s hand and cries, “The day we left, I didn’t think I’d really see you here!” The friend looks up, stares, sways slightly, and asks, “Who left?”1

Here is another story:

Customer to hotel busboy: “What does ‘Guests First’ on your button mean?”

Busboy: “I don’t know, but if I don’t wear it, I can’t work.”

“Which is more important,” I usually ask participants in my seminars, “Customer satisfaction or customer loyalty?” More often than not the answer would be “customer satisfaction”.

My stand has never changed over the years; Customer loyalty is, of course, more important than customer satisfaction.

If you’re shooting for customer satisfaction alone, then the moment your competitors – who are offering practically the same products or services – slash down their prices, your precious satisfied customers, for sure, would shift their patronage to the competition without even batting an eyelash. But if you’re shooting for customer loyalty, if you’re going the extra mile to develop a deeper relationship with your customers on top of bringing them satisfaction, then they will stick it out with you even when enticements and novelties come their way. At the very least, loyal customers will offer you an equal chance to compete.

This level of service – of shooting for customer loyalty – is what makes businesses profitable. New York restaurant owner Danny Meyer said, “Good service means never having to ask for anything.”

It’s hard to cultivate customer loyalty when the customer is angry. Statistics have shown that an unhappy guest tells an average of 12 people each about their bad experience. Each of those 12 people tells six of their friends who tell three of their friends each about it. Before you know it, nearly 380 people had heard about the bad service experience of one of your guests. (Multiply that by 100 if they have Internet access.) Never underestimate the power of an angry customer.

Can you shoot for 100 percent customer satisfaction all the time? Of course not. Accidents happen. Mistakes are made. Machines break down. Still, you can cultivate customer satisfaction and loyalty – when you know how to handle such situations in such a way that customers don’t end up getting mad. This is “service recovery”.

Here’s something every business establishment needs to know:

All customer complaints are linked to disrespect!

Maybe they’ve been kept waiting, or were passed on from one customer service rep to another, or maybe their call was never returned. Whatever the cause, when our customers are unhappy, it can be usually traced back to an element of disrespect, like rudeness, avoidance, attitude, failure to deliver on quality promises, etc.

So don’t just train your people on the techniques of the business. Make sure your people understand that the key to customer service is respect – treating customers the way they want to be treated. The biblical says as much.

(Spend two whole days with Francis Kong developing your leadership skills this April 25-26 at the EDSA Shangri-La Hotel. For further inquiries, contact Inspire Leadership Consultancy Inc. at 632-6872614 or 09178511115.)

Reader’s Digest 7/97