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The Art of Customer Service
Guy Kawasaki of How to Change the World | December 17th, 2008 - 12:18 AM
(213) found this useful. Do you? 
To care for anyone else enough to make their problems one’s own, is ever the beginning of one’s real ethical development. Felix Adler
One day last week I was sitting in a small conference room is Moscow waiting to give a speech. In walks this guy with an unnatural shade of blonde hair and big smile. I said to myself, “Self, this really looks like Richard Branson.” My self said back, “It is Richard Branson.” So we got to talking because you never know when you need help retrieving lost baggage or upgrading from coach! He asked me if I’ve ever flown on Virgin. Me being the Global Services United Airlines customer that I am, I told him that I never have, but “If the Richard Branson is asking me, I guess I will have to.”
At that point, he got on his knee and starting polishing my shoes with his jacket. Ironically, on my United flight over to Russia, the lights didn’t work properly so the whole cabin was either lit or unlit, but people couldn’t make a seat-by-seat decision. For this inconvenience, if I filled out a form (which I think I lost), United was going to give me 10,000 Mileage Plus miles or a $150 credit on a future flight.
This got me thinking about customer service, so I’m providing you with a chapter of my book, Reality Check, that explains the Art of Customer Service.
- Start at the top. The CEO’s attitude toward customer service determines the quality of service that a company delivers. If the CEO thinks that customers are a pain in the ass, her company will provide lousy service. If the CEO thinks customers are treasured assets, it will provide great service. If you’re not the CEO, either change her mind, quit, or learn to live with mediocrity—in that order.
I’m pretty sure you can check this box off at Virgin.
- Put the customer in control. The best customer service happens when management enables employees to put the customer in control. Th is requires two leaps of faith: first, trusting customers to not take advantage of the situation; second, trusting employees to make sound decisions. If you can make these leaps, then the quality of your customer service will zoom; if not … well, there is nothing more frustrating than working for a firm that cops the attitude that something is “against company policy.”
- Take responsibility for your shortcomings. Companies that take responsibility for their shortcomings garner good customer-service reputations because they have acknowledged that the problem is their fault and their responsibility to fix. Most people understand that “shiitake happens,” but it’s aggravating when companies deny that the problem is their fault and responsibility. Th at’s when you hear people say, “It’s the principle.”
- Don’t point the finger. This is the flip side of taking responsibility. For example, when a computer program doesn’t work, vendors resort to finger pointing: “It’s Apple’s system software.” “It’s Microsoft’s application.” “It’s Adobe’s PDF format.” A great customer-service company doesn’t point the finger; it figures out what the solution is, regardless of whose fault the problem is, and makes the customer happy. As my mother used to say, quoting Eldrige Cleaver, “You’re either part of the solution or you’re part of the problem.” (By the way, as a rule of thumb, the company with the largest market capitalization is the one at fault.)
- Don’t finger the pointer. Great customer service companies don’t shoot the messenger. It could be a customer, an employee, a vendor, or a consultant who’s doing the pointing. The goal is not to silence the messenger, but to fix the problem so that the messenger never has to bring that message again.
- Don’t be paranoid. One of the most common justifications for lousy service is “What if everyone did this?” For example, to cite the often-told, perhaps apocryphal, story of a customer returning a tire to Nordstrom even though Nordstrom doesn’t sell tires: What if everyone started returning tires to Nordstrom? However, the worst case is seldom the common case. There will be abusers, but generally people are reasonable.
- Hire the right kind of people. To put it mildly, customer service is not a job for everyone. The ideal customer-service person derives great satisfaction by helping people and solving problems. Th is cannot be said of every job candidate. It’s the company’s responsibility to hire the right kind of people for this job, because it is a bad experience for the employee and the customer when you hire folks without a service orientation.
- Underpromise and overdeliver. The goal is to delight a customer. For example, the signs in the lines at Disneyland that tell you how long you’ll have to wait from each point are purposely overstated. When you get to the ride in less time, you’re delighted. Imagine if the signs were understated— you’d be angry because Disneyland lied to you.
- Integrate customer service into the mainstream. Let’s see: Salespeople make the big bucks. Marketers do the fun stuff. Engineers: You leave them alone in their dark caves. Accounting cuts the paychecks. And customer service? They handle angry people when something isn’t working, and something isn’t working all the time. Customer service largely determines the company’s reputation, so do not consider it a profit-sucking necessary evil.
- Don’t give them a sales pitch. Never give customers a sales pitch unless they’re calling your sales department. When customers call for customer service or technical support, they are hardly in a mood for a sales pitch. If you sell anything, you’re in danger of losing the customer, so you certainly should not ask customers to shell out more money to fix problems that they perceive as the company’s fault. And don’t even think about offering more free defective products as a token of your appreciation for their business.
- Use operating procedures, not scripts. You’ve probably called at least a few companies and been sure the representative is reading a script—it’s annoying and certainly not personal. Have standard operating procedures for common things, like cancellations and product returns, to ensure the job is done properly, but never ask or train your representatives to read from a script.
- Use operators. Use people, not PBX systems (the push 1 for sales, 2 for billing). Make it so the operator can answer basic questions (like How do I sign up?), collect information about problems, assign a ticket number or reference ID, and find an available representative to take the call. If you must use a PBX system, keep it to one level with three or four options, as well as an option to be connected immediately to an operator.
- Use a callback system. A few companies have a callback system by which they offer the option of calling you back at a set time rather than making you wait on hold. The first time I encountered one of these systems, I hesitated, thinking I might lose my place in the queue, but it really worked, and I’ve been a believer ever since.
- Keep customers in the loop. Customers should never have to ask what you are doing. Let them know what’s happening as you’re doing things like looking up their account or researching an issue. Extending this concept, you can post information about outages right on your Web site, so people don’t have to call to figure out what’s happening. Be honest: Tell them if there’s a problem and what’s causing it, when service will be restored, and what you’re doing to prevent it from happening again.
- Make customers feel important. Train your employees to make customers feel important. If a customer makes a suggestion, the representative should note it and let the customer know he’s noted it. Don’t hesitate to do things like give credits or say things like “because you’re a valued customer, we can do this for you.” Customers are usually frustrated when they call customer service or support, so try to make them feel good.
- Follow up. The biggest difference between acceptable and great customer service is how often and how well the customer-service department follows up on requests. Give customers a call or send them an e-mail with the result of their complaint or request. If a customer calls with a problem and you believe it’s resolved, call or send an e-mail to ask if the issue has been resolved to their satisfaction.
The irony of customer service is that at an intuitive level, most people know that it largely determines a company’s reputation, but companies spend less money on it than sales and marketing. The double irony of customer service is that nothing I’ve listed is particularly expensive. Now you know what to do, how to do it, and how cheap it is to do, so you have absolutely no excuses for poor customer service.
And the next time I fly to London or Las Vegas, I’m going to give Sir Richard’s airline a shot especially because there’s WiFi in some of his planes.
Other than the stuff about Richard Branson, this is reprinted by permission from Reality Check: The Irreverent Guide to Outsmarting, Outmanaging, and Outmarketing Your Competition.
If you liked this chapter, there are ninety-three more where this came from. It may help to know that you and Richard Branson are reading the same book—although he got his copy for just a shoe shine.The Richard Branson photo was massively fixed up by Fixmyphotos.com because auto focus was turned off when the photo was shot. I was amazed at what the company was able to do. Check these sites for more information about customer service, travel, and aviation.
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James Quinn-Hawtin | December 17th, 2008 at 12:33 am
Hi Guy, Can you explain #2 a bit further? Not sure what you’re driving at. Other than that, I enjoyed your article. Thanks, James
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Chadwick | December 17th, 2008 at 11:40 am
That is way too cool - Richard Branson treating you like he had absolutely no customers and you were the only one he wanted… Oh that we should learn from this example.
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Itamar | December 17th, 2008 at 11:55 am
16 simple rules that could make a real difference.
I would add one: “17. Learn from your consumers”
IVR (what you refer as PBX systems) is widely used to reduce cost. You filter a large share of your calls by giving them an automated answer and therefore reduce cost. WRONG ! If your CS cost is too low, your product is BAD. Instead of setting up a 25th level in your IVR, fix your product, upgrade your web page, improve the wording, launch an email campagin. Improve your product and communicate proactively to your consumer.
Cheers,
- Itamar
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Leela | December 17th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Care about the customer and at least try to fix my problem. Calling customer service today about a large purchase, I have a question about the order. The clerk left me on hold for 13 minutes while she tried to transfer me elsewhere, that didn’t work. When she came back I said “You can help me, I have a simple question and the answer is in your computer in notes on my account.” she replied that she was too busy to listen to my question because there were people there and the phones were ringing! I’m still waiting for a call back.
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DB | December 18th, 2008 at 10:56 pm
Guy - you really are my hero. Not only are you an incredible entrepreneur and great businessman, but you’re also Global Services with United.
Jock you.
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Rachel Happe | December 19th, 2008 at 3:02 am
Great playbook for dealing with customer relations. Reminds me of Tony Hsieh’s approach at Zappos. And really, who is more important to your business than the customer? Without them there is nothing.
Rachel
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Hoyt Mann | December 22nd, 2008 at 8:46 pm
I heartily agree with #11. This is a problem I blogged about awhile back (http://www.phaseware.com/blog/bid/6525/Why-I-Would-Call-It-Quits-Too),
having had this issue with my ISP.
And you know what?
A manager responded stating that while empowering a support agent might sound like a good idea, when he, as manager had to “cut costs out of a cost center” namely the support center, he lowered wages and enlisted the best of his current agents to write scripts for the new hires.
It seems his company still sees customer support as an administrative cost center with no clue about how this makes the company seem to their customers. He also stated that it is “just not possible to offer a competetively priced service while having direct support provided by experienced engineers trying to get technical details out of a non-technical person…”
Whatever happened to training people to liase between the two when needed yet have enough training and knowhow to fix problems more collaboratively with a customer? Just because a customer perhaps didn’t actually do what he said doesn’t mean he should be spoken to as though he was an idiot or liar.
All of this could be done without resorting to scripts.
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Tajah | December 27th, 2008 at 6:23 pm
The ironies you state at the end are absolutely true and supremely frustrating to anyone working in customer service and sales (as I do). The position requires talent, skill, talent, and education - yet is the least rewarded by companies. It’s frustrating and disappointing to have real passion and skill at your profession but not be able to make a living wage without being in sales.
Companies want stellar customer service and account management reps, but don’t want to pay for them. Sales may bring in the money, but service keeps it with the organization.
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Tatyana Gann | December 29th, 2008 at 12:59 am
First of all I am impressed with you Guy and your talents. I agree with number #8 which is underpromise and overdeliver. It is not just in dealing with customers but it could be anywhere from being a great teacher to being the best employee who gives more of himself.
I also believe that we must have a right attitude toward our clients and treat everyone as million dollar customer. Our customers are our assets.
Tatyana
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Eric Liao | December 29th, 2008 at 4:12 am
As usual, I enjoy the insight and comments that you have Guy. I’m still digging through your latest book.
But I do have to say that I’m a little disappointed that Alltop doesn’t have a “contact us” page. The “contact us” links are all embedded in the FAQ section. It should be more obvious to users/customers how to provide feedback and suggestions for the website.
This came up because I wanted to suggest an Ipod/Iphone app for Alltop but didn’t know how to convey the suggestion.
Anyways, just a thought.
-eric
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Solomon King | January 2nd, 2009 at 5:45 pm
Great article Mr. Kawasaki.
There are some lessons small business owners have to learn the hard way, and customer service is high on the list. I started my business as a techie, and making transitions from design/code to management and customer support has been hard, but articles like this constantly keep giving me the heads up on which areas I should polish. I’ll definitely add this list to my guidelines.
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Shyam | January 12th, 2009 at 10:49 pm
I don’t see any reason why would Richard Branson should polish Guy’s shoes.
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Maryam Webster | January 15th, 2009 at 2:14 am
Hi Shyam,
My mind immediately went to the biblical parable of Jesus washing his disciple’s feet - which he did to show them that the paramount relationship is where we are all in service to each other. Richard was showing Guy in an albeit humorous way, that he was “in service” to him as a potential future customer. I say way to go, Richard. [making low obeisance] - yr CSR rocks!
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susaye | January 15th, 2009 at 2:26 am
Great article!
I can remember a time when the concept of “the customer is always right” was de rigueur. Of course, times have changed, but it is still common sense to make the customer happy; a road leading to success.
The picture is way cool!
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Jane Chambers | January 15th, 2009 at 3:35 am
I agree that customer service begins at the top of the company and belongs at number 1 in your list. Not only does the person at the top influence company policy on customer service, but also his or her attitude will permeate the firm. This is true in other areas as well, such as how the company views its employees.
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Manu Srikumar | January 15th, 2009 at 4:02 am
No wonder why Richard is admired all around the world!
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Phyllis R. Neill | January 15th, 2009 at 5:37 am
Especially good point about not making a sales pitch when someone is calling for support. I hate to point this out, but as a Gold Card member for over 20 years, American Express needs to follow this advice more themselves (love ya AmEx and couldn’t run my small business without you, but you know it’s true!)
Terrific article - I really enjoy your column here, Guy.
Phyllis R. Neill, http://www.shementor.com
Phyllis R. Neill, http://www.shementor.com
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Joanne | January 15th, 2009 at 8:13 am
Any problem is just a problem - Problems should be solved. When we take ownership -not blame- then we are focused on “the fix” which is moving forward. Need to act in the present and resolve the issue the customer sees and do what the customer says will fix the problem in their eyes. Simple. Simple. And of course not always easy not to attach ourselves to vicious upset customers in the moment of “drama”. The saying of walking a mile in someone elses shoes is the perfect mantra for resolving issues. Now, empowering Customer Service with a voice to carry the repetitive problems up the chain of command!! Leadership defined.
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Joanne | January 15th, 2009 at 8:24 am
Please please please will someone write about making the leadership choice that allows ALL PEOPLE to just say “I am not empowered to say yes therefore I can’t assume I can say no”. In business we allow anyone to say no and as a business owner that is just wrong! Look, if you can’t say yes then why would I accept your no? Just silly. Why would top CEOs and keen Managers block potential opportunities by allowing anyone at any level to say NO when they aren’t given the tools to say yes?
Just one woman’s opinion.
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AndiC | January 15th, 2009 at 9:15 am
Great article. For anyone who’s been in customer service, many points are common sense, but I guess not everyone uses common sense!
Customer service is so vital to creating and keeping clients - and can often be done with such little effort. My husband became an even more avid customer of Southwest when he received a $180 voucher from the airline. During some bad weather, his flight sat on the runway for two hours before it took off on his way home. Unexpected delay, could have been a worse delay - he figured it’s one of the challenges you face when you fly and didn’t complain to anyone. Two weeks later, he received a letter of apology from Southwest and the voucher. He used the voucher to take another trip where he happily spent more money on Southwest. Instant customer for life. Customer service does still exsist and makes businesses profitable.
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Haim Toeg | January 16th, 2009 at 3:53 pm
One more rule: your employees will treat your customers the same way they are treated.
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lewis | March 29th, 2009 at 1:15 am
Gain, I have to disagree with that. I worked as a CSR in a real “mushroom factory” (kept in the dark and fed ****) and I and my fellow CSRs still tried to do as much as we could for customers. New hires were taught that call-time was everything so would routinely disconnect callers. I remember one guy who started every shift by disconnecting the first ten calls. His low average led to his being promoted. Hire Slags, you get slags. Train for low call times and you get horrible CSRs (reinstall and call back-click). The good people are always trying to help the customers out regardless of how they get treated.
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