CHAPTER 9

CUSTOMER SERVICE
 What is Customer Service?
 Comes from the words: Customer, meaning one who buys
something; especially one who deals regularly at a given
establishment and Service, the occupation or function of
serving or the work performed by one that serves.

 The simplest definition is, being treated like you want to be

treated or it’s when you’re made to feel at home.
 CUSTOMER & SERVICE
When the two come together there are two possible
outcomes:
o They can form a collision that will leave the customer
frustrated and angry or
o It can be a comfortable joining together of two friends that
leave the customer satisfied and pleased.

CUSTOMER SERVICE IS ANY CONTACT, WHETHER

ACTIVE OR PASSIVE, BETWEEN A CUSTOMER AND A
COMPANY, THAT CAUSES A NEGATIVE OR POSITIVE
PERCEPTION BY A CUSTOMER.
 Standards of Service
 Customer focus, Customer friendly, Customers Service.
Whatever you call it, IT means one thing.
 Marketing and management must be equal and share the
same vision, mission and philosophy.
 Establishing standards for your service personnel. Standards
make for consistency for customers. That makes customers
comfortable with your operations, and that paves the ground
for repeat business. Standards have to be measurable,
focused on the customer, and ingrained into the employee’s
job description.
 Mixed Messages
 What kinds of messages are you sending to your staff when
you close the door as a matter of course? It sends out several
messages. All bad. When the door closes, it sends out the
clear message that the boss is either paranoid, insecure, or
just plain ridiculous – all negative.

 How often is privacy truly required? Not very often.

Certainly, not each time more than one person goes into
boss’s office or when the boss goes into ANY office.
 The influence of culture is very important.

 When morale declines, productivity declines equally.

 The negative culture breeds defensive working.

 The costs of a defensive work style are the employee’s

aggressiveness and their willingness to take chances and to
make the inevitable mistakes.
 Going Beyond Customer
Satisfaction
 Customer loyalty is also very important, more so than
customer satisfaction.
 The conventional thinking is that if you have satisfied
customers, you will have loyal customers.

What does it take to transform a satisfied customer into a

loyal customer?

 Loyalty develops when customers get involved with the

company above the normal transaction.
 This often takes the form of a problem that is solved in an
extraordinary way and forces the customer to recognize the
individual care.

 Others occur when employees form of a relationship with the

customer by providing individual service that elevates the
transaction from impersonal to the personal.
What are the characteristics of satisfied and loyal
customers?

Satisfied Customers:
 Will continue doing business until something better comes
along, whether better location, better price or better variety
 No relationship formed
 No personal interaction
 Sees business as impersonal, only doing business with a
company, not with a person.
Loyal customers:
 Forgives and understands minor problems
 Not price sensitive
 Will help sell the business with word of mouth advertising
 Will not jump at the next “pretty face”.

Don’t just “satisfy” your customers. It may be a little bit more

expensive, but in the long run it will pay off in multiples and
without the massive advertising expense required to lure back
customers that you’ve had.
Have the emphasis be on forming RELATIONSHIPS, not sales,
Sales will follow relationships.
 The Toughest Customer
Service
Employees of the service industry – the servers, grocery
clerks, taxi drivers, concierge, hair stylists, front desk
clerks, waiters and waitresses, secretaries, receptionists –
whose who earn their living by giving customer service, one
customer at a time.
 In the world of the service industry, each and every customer
has a face and a personality.
 Each transactions is personal
 Each shift exposes the service person’s attitudes and training.
 When training has taken place, it is immediately obvious
because service appears seamless, comfortable and without
effort.
 The most difficult part of training customer service in the
service industry is to get the attention of the management
that customer service is the most cost effective way to build
customer loyalty.

 Theeffectiveness of customer service reflects the

supervisor’s attitudes of their company, customers and their
employee’s.

 Once the attention is there, customer service has a chance to

take a foothold.
 Competitive Edge Training
 When information is not absorbed, training must be defined
as an expense.
 When training is effective it becomes an investment that
actually saves money by lowering turnover and reducing
recruitment and training pesos.
 It further pays dividends by increasing sales and building
customer loyalty.
Training is accomplished in two phases.

the first phase, basic training, enables employees to adequately

know their products, systems and procedures. After this initial
training, they should be able to “get the job done”.

The second phase, competitive edge training, increases the

level of training. Many companies believe that this level is too
expensive.
Raise the basic training bar. Chances are it is set too low and
not delivering “adequate” training.
Hire only employees who have the potential and drive to be
Competitive Edge employees.

Know your employees. What percentage are in the Basic and

Competitive Edge levels? Lower the first and raise the second.
Get beyond the mechanics of product knowledge, options
available, pricing value and benefits of the product or service.
Ensure that “soft” skills are taught including attitude.
Question: Why should people go out and pay
money for bad service when they can stay home and
get bad service for free?
 The Customer is Always Right
 Everyone in the service industry has seen customers who
have been wrong, sometimes blatantly wrong. But it really
isn’t whether the customer is right or wrong that is
important. It is attitude and trust towards the customer that
is important.

 Oneof the worst problems of the service industry is a

cynicism that can seep into the attitudes of even the most
dedicated people.

 One example is the “refund policy”.

Service personnel must trust the customer and believe they are
telling the truth. Ask these questions of your service employees.
• Do your employees and management believe their customers
when they return a product?
• Do they believe their customers are basically honest? Do
they believe that it is a very, very small percentage of
customers who actually try to scam?
• Do your employees get upset when someone returns an
obviously used printer or flashlight that hasn’t been in stock
for months, complain that it is not working properly and want
their money back?
• Do your managers believe the customer when they say their
dinner was terrible and there is only a little bit left on the
plate?
The first rule of customer satisfaction is to always assume
your customers are telling the truth. With that basic
assumption, interrogation is eliminated, the refund process is
simplified, and your customer goes away satisfied.

The overwhelming majority are honest and expect to be treated

with respect. The public knows which companies are trusting
and which are not. Trust transforms the public into loyal
customers.
 Why Customer Service Is Important
 In our personal lives, most of us would like to believe that
the more someone knows us, the more that person will like
us.

“To know me is to love me”

Interestingly enough, this is also the essence of customer

service. Customer loyalty develops as customers feel a
connection with a company.
 This is important because customer service does more than
simply provide a means to drive sales. When companies
have a commitment to customer service it raises the bar of
competition.
 The only way companies can effectively accomplish this is
through their employees.
 Having better employees is good for the individual
employees is good for the individual employee, good for the
company and very good for the customer.
 The emphasis of the company is its employees because they
are the customer contact point.
God Bless & Keep Safe !!!
Submitted by:

Antique, John Paul A.

Bureros, Noemee