It’s some of the best advice anyone can receive when it comes to customer service — think of people beyond their data points. While it may be trendy at the moment to think about “big data” and how that affects your business’ bottom line. It’s no substitute for genuinely listening to what the customer has to say about your products and services.
This is also the point where you make a distinction between the idea of customer service and customer excellence. That subtle nuance can speak volumes in how you approach people. A thoughtful article on the CMS Wire website addresses these differences, while another one on Harvard Business Review explores the data vs. personality view of customer excellence, and how you can achieve the right balance.
Becoming a truly great listener
The HBR story is written by Graham Kenny, the CEO of Strategic Factors, who performs performance management for companies. He writes that the real insights into what your customers want and how they react are formed through their own experiences, not necessarily from the data you retrieve from them. “You will only ever get that by truly engaging with customers and listening to their stories,” he writes.
This doesn’t mean that you can’t reach a high level of customer excellence without “big data.” Finding the hard numbers that point to patterns in buying behavior is a powerful tool. It’s just not the whole picture.
“The data is historic and static,” Kenny explains. “It’s historic because it’s about the past. Your customers have most likely moved on from what the data capture. And it’s static because, as with any computer modeling, it can never answer a question that you didn’t think to ask.”
That can only be arrived at with real points of contact. Kenny gave the example of Adobe, which has a set of guidelines for reaching out to customers. The focus there is on the wants of a customer, not your own interests.
Seeking excellence
In his piece on customer excellence, Anthony Macciola — Chief Innovation Officer for the digital intelligence company ABBYY — advocates for businesses to shift from changing customer service to changing the entire experience in order to build true customer excellence. Among his ideas is to focus more on the processes with customers in order to make them centered on outcomes that affect them, not just on how to be more efficient.
“Process workflows are commonly built on how people think they should flow and fail to reflect how employees actually interact with customers, systems and applications,” he writes. “Incorporating technology can help provide an unbiased mirror of how business processes are working, one that won’t be influenced by opinion or internal politics.”
He also agrees with Kenny that a blend of data and a personal touch is what can effect great change for companies wanting to enhance their customers’ experiences.
“t’s important to remember that technology should augment and assist people, not replace them,” Macciola writes. “The key to delivering a great customer experience is human intelligence. By knowing where process bottleneck or deviations are occurring, you can revise steps or retrain staff to ensure optimal outcomes occur.”
This blend of technology and good, old-fashioned conversation may lead to some improved results, as well as a sense that you’re truly doing the right thing for your customers and business at the same time. At ARO, we’ve made it our goal to bring empathy to all of our touchpoints within a customer base, while still helping businesses reach their fullest potential. Find out more about what we have to offer businesses at our website.
