Get Creative!

nlighten Blog_Get Creative_23 June 2017

Although this complex and digital “Selfie Era” is upon us, the number one key service driver in today’s world remains simple: Human Empathy.

It has become somewhat difficult to be able to not only offer service that is of a relevant standard, but also to offer service that is still a humanized experience.

Businesses have to adapt, but they also have to stay true to their customers by making that extra effort to show “care”. Particularly when it comes to having your customers take part in a feedback survey. Customer feedback is imperative in helping business leaders gain insights into how their customers feel about the brand/product and these insights are then used to improve the business and overall customer experience.

nlighten Blog_Get Creative_23 June 2017

Most companies’ average response rates, using traditional feedback methods, are between a miserable 5% and a crummy 10%. According to several studies, it has been shown that customers will participate in surveys if the company invests in the connection with them.

People appreciate effort; customers will always welcome creativity when trying to get their attention. They’ve had enough of the regular postcard feedback sheet and the generic “How was your experience with us?” email. A great example of using creativity to increase feedback response rates is what The Cape Grace Hotel have done; they have created a feedback form that is designed like a paper fortune-teller (also known as a “chatterbox”), which has increased their number of feedback responses exponentially. The simple redesign of the guest’s interaction with the feedback form has allowed for increased results. This is because the guest can empathise with the effort made in constructing this different little paper creation. The investment may be a bit costly, but if the business could use a single insight to improve the customer experience, the investment is worth it.

Sometimes, it’s not just about asking the right questions, it’s about asking them in the right way!


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: Hire The UX Guy!

nlighten. enhancing customer experience: www.nlightencx.com

Hire The UX Guy!

nlighten Blog_Hire the UX Guy_15 June 2017

We are all familiar with the buzzwords “Big Data” and “AI” (Artificial Intelligence), but have you heard of “Anomaly Detection” (AD)?

Anomaly Detection refers to the new age, cognitive method of tracking patterns in order to predict consumer behaviour. People believe that AI is going to take over the world, including marketing jobs, but some argue that people still do need human interactions in order to make the decisions based on the data extracted through AI.

nlighten Blog_Hire the UX Guy_15 June 2017We have debated Chatbots and their place in society quite a bit in the past, but the future seems to hold a generation of bots that are intuitive and predictive! With Anomaly Detection, targeting will be based on prediction rather than purely historical data (cookies).

Even banks are beginning to transform their typical banking environments into digital experiences to further convenience and satisfy customers. ABSA bank is currently working on several AI developments; customers will soon be able to order their cheque cards to their doorstep without having to step foot in a branch, which is probably everyone’s worst nightmare!

Companies are realising that they need to hire the UX guy. Yes, the guy with the tattoos, colourful socks and the man-bun! The longer the company has been around for, the more challenging the digital adaptation is. Start-ups are thriving as they have the whole AI/UX/AD mind-set to begin with, setting them up for success and getting to the Billion-dollar mark quickly, unlike older companies that have to reinvent themselves in this way.

Entire industries will soon be replaced with AI technologies according to several studies. Moore’s Law is often referred to in this regard, with to technologies doubling in capability every single year, making it even harder for old companies to keep up. To clarify, Moore’s Law refers to an observation made by Intel co-founder, Gordon Moore, who noticed that the number of transistors per square inch on integrated circuits doubled every year since their invention. Moore’s Law predicts the continuation of this trend in the future of Tech.

This Cognitive Era is redefining customer engagement and is initiating the concept of talking TO people rather than AT people. Siri and Alexa are great examples of this robotic, conversational and demand-driven assistant.

We are in the midst of the 4th Industrial Revolution where brand loyalty comes with disruptive technologies. Don’t fall behind. HIRE THE UX GUY!


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: Success is Simple! It’s in your DNA

nlighten. enhancing customer experience: www.nlightencx.com

Success is Simple! It’s in your DNA

nlighten Blog_Success is Simple! It’s in your DNA_25 May 2017

Your brand DNA is made up of several core components, such as the brand vision, mission and values.

We’ve all read that marketing strategy book.

However, when are we going to get real and realise that no one really studies your brand’s marketing story. No one cares about a lengthy, drawn-out marketing strategy document. Not even your employees.

If you keep your core values true, relevant and SIMPLE, they will be understandable and become a naturally adopted habit to your employees, as well as to your customers. Transparency is the key to loyalty, but what’s the use in being transparent while depicting a long and complex message? No one will read it.

Simplicity is everything. Big businesses, such as Apple, have kept it simple from day one. Steve Jobs was apposed all advertising that sounded like advertising. He wanted an authentic, clear and concise message representing the Apple brand. The single, strong and simple message then became; “Think different.” Those two little words defined what the brand had always been about since it began in Jobs’ garage.

The same simplicity was taken on when naming the machine iMac; the words “internet” and “Macintosh” = iMac. From the name down to the design, the overall common concept was simplicity.

nlighten Blog_Success is Simple! It’s in your DNA_25 May 2017

Whole Foods also embraced the simplified mentality and based their brand DNA around a particular consumer culture that is interested in, literally, whole foods that are organic, ethical and healthy. They told the world their vision, mission and core values in one statement; “Whole Foods. Whole People, Whole Planet.” This message and identity has attracted the right employees as well. By being employed at Whole Foods, they proudly represent this culture themselves.

Uber is another great example of simplicity in terms of the way in which it operates. Uber capitalises on people’s already very low expectations of the taxi/cab industry. Once a person experiences the Uber service, they usually cannot believe how easy that just was. Although there has been much recent debate around the direction in which the Uber brand is going, the initial brand DNA was perfect. Simple.

A local example of a top brand that has kept it simple since 2006 is Yuppie Chef. Yuppie Chef is a popular kitchen accessories e-tailer based in Cape Town that sells third-party products. Yuppie Chef has become South Africa’s leading e-commerce store, and how is that? You guessed it.

Yuppie Chef is online-based and they’ve kept their focus within this space by investing in content marketing. They have singled out key social media contact points because their core principal is creating a community. That’s it. Through this consistency in their message, delivery process as well as communication platforms, they’ve set realistic customer expectations and have therefore successfully built their online customer community.

Business leaders need to take a good look at the top successful brands in the world and notice how the majority of these brands are, and always have been, of a simple structure. Their identity, image, vision, mission, etc all have a single idea behind them. They never deviate from the initial drawing board. They understand the brand’s purpose and it is communicated so clearly across every single touch point.

Always take a step back and reiterate the brand purpose. To be a successful business, you need to go back to the basics and remember to always:

KEEP IT SIMPLE.


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: Final Boarding Call for CX

nlighten. enhancing customer experience: www.nlightencx.com

Final Boarding Call for CX

nlighten Blog_Final Boarding Call for CX _18 May 2017

According to Forrester Research, on average, US airlines sacrifice as much as $1.4 billion in annual revenue by not improving their customer experience (CX). United Airline’s recent brutal incident has been the latest headline-maker that airlines need to learn valuable CX lessons from.

To briefly sum up the incident, 4 passengers had to be removed from a United Airlines flight, with $1,000 compensation, due to overbooking of the flight. The airline selected 4 “volunteers” to give up their seats, one of which was a doctor who refused to get off of the flight due to medical commitments he had to attend to the following day. The United staff then called the police to handle the situation, who ended up forcing the passenger out of his seat. He then fell and hit his face on an arm rest. He was subsequently dragged off of the flight like a “rag doll”, limp and bloody. Witnessing passengers were traumatized and livid.

These are the 5 top lessons to take out of the event that now represents the opposite of customer-centricity as well as CX as a whole:

1. Never underestimate the power of word of mouth.
nlighten Blog_The Passenger Experience _18 May 2017

United’s scene was witnessed by many airline passengers, some of whom used social media platforms to ensure that the public was well aware of exactly what went down. Videos were released into the depth of digital space that United could never take control of or ever take back.

Later, the CEO took to social media to apologize for having to “re-accommodate passengers”. Which brings us to the next lesson:

2. Take accountability.

If you are a company leader or representative, it is your fault. Address the situation publically in a respectable and empathetic fashion. It is inevitable that every company, at one point or another, will ‘mess up’. Always prepare for the worst.

3. Don’t forget that you are in hospitality.nlighten Blog_The Passenger Experience _18 May 2017

As an airline representative, one is not working for an individual department that is separate from the passenger’s experience. Each department is directly responsible for the experience of all customers, just like at a hotel where the experience begins at booking your stay and ends after the checkout process. The sooner airlines understand this, the sooner the hospitality (even in economy) will become exceptional.

4. Empower your employees.

Speaking of hospitality, the Ritz-Carlton Hotels allow each one of their employees a budget of $2,000 PER GUEST in order to use to rectify potential incidents. Although this budget is rarely used, the freedom and autonomy of using this budget shows that the company has full trust in their staff and their independent decisions, empowering them to the highest degree.

5. Train your staff to deal with situations.

With United’s incident, their staff called the police to forcibly remove the paying customer. They essentially brought in the police as ‘tier-two’ customer support. Without much further explanation, instead of applying their own professional techniques to rectify the situation, they called upon these ‘customer service agents’ (police) who violently took the whole situation to the next level.

The day after this incident, which wasn’t the first United Airlines scandal that outraged the public, the airline’s stocks dropped by $1.4 billion.

After so many negative instances within the Aviation CX space, some airlines are making further efforts to satisfy customers and create extraordinary experiences.

Digital advancements such as inflight Wi-Fi as well as mobile inflight services, for meal ordering and TV channel operating through the use of a mobile device, have been adopted by several airlines such as Virgin America and FlyDubai.

nlighten Blog_The Passenger Experience _18 May 2017

Some airlines have implemented a little something extra to try and satisfy their passengers unexpectedly. Such as Lufthansa, who partnered with Nespresso to offer coffee to waiting passengers at the gates at main airports around Germany.

Digital leader, KLM, has taken the concept of transparency to the next level through their public sharing of real feedback (from their “Rate my Flight” feature) that they receive directly from passengers. Customers searching for a KLM flight, are now able to read reviews about the airline from previous passengers who have flown that very same flight in the past, based on reviews collected from KLM passengers using the airline’s ‘Rate My Flight’ feature.

Emirates has also become a CX frontrunner after recreating their lounge experience, which includes their ‘Barista experience’ that is available around the clock, with all sorts of coffees and coffee-accompanying treats on offer to passengers needing a bit of a wake up mid-journey.

The aviation industry has been given a huge CX wake-up call in 2017 and are required to live up to the expectations of their passengers, who now have more power than ever before!

Final boarding call for CX! The flight cannot take off without you…


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: The customer is always going to be right

nlighten. enhancing customer experience: www.nlightencx.com

The customer is always going to be right

nlighten Blog_The customer is always going to be right_11 May 2017

The clichéd statement, “the customer is always right”, has never been more true. Several studies over the years have shown that emotion is the top driver of loyalty and more and more businesses are seeing the value of listening to customer feedback in order to achieve great customer experiences, and ultimately, success. Whether in a B2B or a B2C environment, no matter where in the world you are, as a business, customer loyalty is the fuel to your engine.

Not only are businesses trying their best to meet customer experience expectations, but they are now also trying to predict what customers are going to want in order to exceed expectations beyond measure. This CX trend of creating a concierge-type service model is rapidly catching on especially in the U.S, China and other digitally leading countries.

A great example of this forward-thinking culture is that of the Citizen M(obile) Hotel, where the sophisticated yet comfortable atmosphere invites its guests to the future. From a mobile device, the hotel room can be completely controlled and customised. Lights, blinds as well as the television (which welcomes the guest by name) are all controlled through one’s own mobile device, and the settings are even saved for when the guest returns to the room later on. The entire stay, from check-in to checkout, is an efficient and seamless digital experience that satisfies guests’ “wants” that they didn’t even know they desired. Although the hotel is operated mainly through technological advancements, there still are staff members available for human service, should a guest require any other assistance. The staff team is made up of fewer members than that of other hotels, but this small group of people are of the highest of standards and are completely aligned with the brand of Citizen M, further adding to the efficiency of the holistic experience within the hotel. Constant, high speed free Wi-Fi, 24-hour food and beverage service, a rooftop bar with iconic panoramic views, accompanied by chic and modern interior design, this hotel really does live up to it’s standards described by their words: “where style meets luxury for a coffee (and a sneaky cocktail)”. The quirky hotel has been described as “exceptionally handy”, surpassing one’s already high expectations of a 5 star hotel stay.

In a world that is constantly progressing, the CX industry and its trends are too evolving at the same pace. Nowadays, CX doesn’t just stop at listening to feedback and rectifying problems, it has taken on a whole new level of preventing any customer dissatisfaction through intuitive and anticipatory conduct and serving customers with much more than they ever imagined.

This is it. Welcome to the future of CX.


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: S.O.S!!!

nlighten. enhancing customer experience – www.nlightencx.com

S.O.S!!!

nlighten Blog_S.O.S_26 April 2017

As a customer, sometimes trying to communicate with a company representative is like having dental surgery without anesthetic! The frustration alone of not being able to get hold of someone to help you is enough to deter one away from a company completely, without even enduring the pain of complaining.

Today, it has become a common topic about how rapidly our world is digitally advancing. These advances are supposed to make it easier for people to complain or contact the business, but sometimes, this increase in available platforms actually makes it more difficult for the business to keep track.

Quite a few big businesses are dealing with such teething problems as they have now implemented the contact points of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Live Chat, Skype, E-mail, etc.  With so many different pipelines feeding through so many different enquiries, are businesses complicating matters? And, in doing so, are they decreasing their level of efficiency and therefore losing the value of their customer’s experience?

Isn’t it ironic that while trying to improve the customer experience through “keeping up” and adopting all of the differing digital portals, the exact opposite may be the result? Businesses are trying to be more convenient by allowing the customer to communicate not just via email and telephone. But in some cases, the effort going into trying to speak to someone becomes an absolute inconvenience, completely missing the point of the advancement.

nlighten Blog_S.O.S_26 April 2017

It’s virtually impossible for every business to be completely READY for all of the platforms to be introduced and implemented effectively, but they don’t have a choice. Businesses HAVE to be relevant in order to be able to maintain success, so this change is practically forced onto big business and everybody has to try and be as prepared as possible.

Several businesses, such as Zendesk, have emerged through capitalising on this gap, and have been established in order to help companies manage their communication platforms using a single-view interface, where all of the customer enquiries can feed through from different platforms and into one system.

nlighten Blog_S.O.S_26 April 2017
Businesses need to hear feedback in order to improve. Attaining the feedback is therefore imperative.

Unfortunately, companies are expected by their customers to get it all right. This will come with time, but for now, business leaders need to ensure that they have the right staff equipped with the right skills to deal with the struggle of evolving and adapting.

The genuine effort needs to be really made for the business to HEAR its customers as best as possible. If this effort is made, it won’t go unnoticed. Customers will appreciate it and in return, give their loyalty.


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: The Carrot is Not Enough!

nlighten. enhancing customer experience – www.nlightencx.com

The Carrot is Not Enough!

Many studies across the globe support the fact that the engagement of employees is in direct relation to customer experiences.

Employees are the most important part of the business and they have needs. If these needs are not met and they are not kept happy and motivated, they will automatically become unproductive and deliver poorer service, resulting in customers not returning, and therefore, less profitability.

Happy employees equal happy customers. The delivery process of any company is the sole responsibility of the employees. So, as long as the employees’ satisfaction is upheld, the level of the customer experience delivery will be maintained.

The carrot and the stick.

People, like animals, respond very well to incentives. The concept of punishment and reward is a global unspoken truth, and people will always be driven by reward. But, in order to deliver the ultimate customer experience, and therefore, increase business profits, employees need to be emotionally invested in achieving the company’s goals and not only their own goals.

Employees are people.

As a business leader, one needs to care for and nurture the employed team. The employees need to feel valued through being given a real voice. Being asked for feedback and opinions naturally makes one feel a sense of being valued.

A recent survey showed that 65% of workers would prefer a new boss or manager over a raise. Without a leader’s motivation and respect, the “care” of the employee becomes lost. It’s simple: when your employees stop caring, the business suffers. When they do care, they perform well and so does the business.

Every human being wishes for his or her “Dream Job”. Most jobs are, unfortunately, not exactly so dreamy. Leaders need to make a concerted effort to make the employee’s position as “dreamy” as possible by treating them as partners. They are, and should feel as though they have embarked on a common mission with the business heads.

 Open communication.nlighten Blog_The Carrot is not enough. 19 April 2017

The more the employees are kept in the loop with regards to what is going on within the business, the more sense of ownership they will have, and this sense of accountability, in itself, is motivating and inspiring. The inspiration process should begin at the interview and should be maintained on a daily basis. The team needs to become emotionally invested in the company’s goals, and the only way to do this is through being transparent and open.

Every company should be employing people who “fit the profile”. If they DO fit the profile and share the company’s vision, then surely their opinions, suggestions and feedback matter? If they are not aligned with the company completely, they probably should not have been employed in the first place.

The idea of being “in it together” should always be communicated through really working together and sharing news, ideas and concerns openly. As a leader, one needs to facilitate this sort of mentality in order to achieve the full trust of the employees, and therefore, their loyalty and commitment to achieving the shared goals.

The carrot and the stick may work short-term, but treating your employees as partners in your business journey will ultimately grant the accomplishment of long-term objectives.


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: The Social Media Microphone

nlighten. enhancing customer experience – www.nlightencx.com

The Social Media Microphone

As we know, our world is digitally advancing at an increasingly rapid pace. Connecting to people and businesses has never been easier, and this worldwide shift in Customer Relationship Management has heightened the expectations of customers.

Businesses are recognizing the fact that social media is no longer just an effective marketing tool; it has formed a crucial part of the customer journey and it is where the customers are, quite literally, being social. They are sharing content, interests, and even negative brand experiences.

With social media being so prevalent in our daily lives, it has become a preferred channel for customers to speak to brands, and they now expect to be attended to faster than ever. Social platforms, like Facebook and Twitter, have made it so incredibly easy for customers to complain. 65% of customers prefer to complain via social media and over 1 million people view tweets about customer service every single week, and roughly 80% of those tweets are negative or critical in nature.

It takes a customer under a minute to post a public complaint and businesses are contested to keep up and respond and resolve the problem in a matter of minutes, as criticism reaches twice as many ears as positive experiences.

We now live in a promoter’s economy, where customers are 71% more likely to make a purchase based on social media referrals. Businesses are forced to be available online in order to mitigate bad word-of-mouth spreading like wildfire.

Social media has demanded a sense of urgency from brands in order to create an effortless customer experience. Keeping track of all customer comments and complaints is becoming more challenging for businesses, as a customer can post a tweet or Facebook status update from anywhere, and the speed of sharing a complaint with hundreds of people is something that more people are bothering to do because it takes such a short amount of time. The risk of losing so many potential customers is frightening to businesses and so; they have to be on their toes.

nlighten Blog_Social Media_The Online Microphone! 12 April 2017

Customer-centricity has adopted a whole new expectation avenue for brands to meet and companies have invested in entirely new departments to handle social online queries as well as track customer trends and behaviors.

On the flipside, social media is also incredibly valuable for customer research and, of course, for marketing purposes. Businesses need to take advantage of these channels to be relevant. The insights available from the customers are priceless! Brands can now ask questions, show gratitude and create more of a brand culture through the use of these social platforms, and at a lower cost than other advertising and marketing tools.

In conclusion, businesses need to comply with the times and recognize that these online touch points are an integral part of the customer journey. It is essential to use social media to perform better on this virtual stage and to hand the social media microphone over to the audience, the customers, in order to meet their expectations and ultimately improve customer experience.


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: Real Research

nlighten. enhancing customer experience – www.nlightencx.com

Real Research

nlighten Blog_Real Research! 5 April 2017

Research is the most powerful tool that drives valuable customer experience. Without research, businesses do not have sufficient information about the customer and therefore, cannot exceed the quality of the delivery expectation of the customer.

Any business-to-customer relationship should function as a loyal human-to-human friendship. Would you purchase a clothing item for your friend’s birthday present without intrinsic knowledge regarding what style or colour they like? No, you would not.

Businesses cannot lose sight of the FACT that their customers are human beings with individual likes and dislikes. Did you know that 70% of buying experiences are based on how the customer feels they are being treated? According to Genesys Global Survey, the most requested improvement, by far, is “better human service”.

If a business “gets to know” their customer as a person, the insights acted upon are guaranteed to improve the business and retain customers while attracting new ones. The best way of gaining these highly qualitative insights is by asking the customer through a third party. The reason you would have to involve a third party is in order to achieve the most valuable answers possible.

It is natural human behavior to be more comfortable complaining in detail to a third party rather than directly to the person or business that one is complaining about. If you received a piece of clothing from a friend for your birthday that you didn’t like, you wouldn’t usually express your dissatisfaction with the item directly, you would probably unleash the full extent of your disappointment onto another friend or family member.

Only 4% of dissatisfied customers bother to complain. These days, there are far too many available options for people. They don’t bother to complain because they don’t care for the business to fix anything, because there is another competitive option for them to select.

As a business owner, leader or manager, it is important to chase the customer for answers. They will not just come to you with complaints, especially if the business doesn’t make it easy to do so. Rather contract a third party to find out exactly what is going on in your “friend’s” (customer’s) mind and allow them to mediate the relationship while you trial and test anything and everything to make them as happy as possible, as often as possible.

nlighten Blog_Real Research! April 2017

Your customers are what keep the doors open, the lights on and the employees seated. Make no mistake about the fact that they can open the doors and turn the lights on for another team that is more inclusive, appreciative and loyal. Ask your customers for the truth; they are the most important people with the most important source of research in your business’ existence.


View the previous nlighten blog by Shani Sayag: The 10 Most Irritating Customer Experiences!

nlighten. enhancing customer experience – www.nlightencx.com

10 Most Irritating Customer Experiences!

nlighten Blog_10 Most Irritating Customer Experiences! March 2017"

10 Most Irritating Customer Experiences! Bad customer experience is something most companies work to avoid. Businesses depend on happy customers in order to reach or maintain a level of success. There are so many common mistakes that companies tend to make within the customer experience space, and these are the top 10:

  1. “Your call is important to us”

Is it though? Is my call really important to you? Hundreds of surveys done across the globe have shown that this is voted one of the highest customer experience annoyances. Coupled with that frustrating hold music that is designed to calm you down but only boils the blood as you begin to talk to yourself, hoping that you are being heard by SOMEONE as they’ve told you that “your call is being recorded”.

It is a FACT that customers perceive this statement as a big fat lie, and it simply makes them angrier.

  1. Employee Knowledge

How infuriating is it when a consultant is unable to answer a question of a customer? Someone who WORKS at an establishment, day in and day out, should be able to answer anything related to the business without hesitation. Companies need to ensure that they train their employees extremely well before communicating with customers unsupervised. It deters customers away from your company.

  1. Waiting…

Whether it is being kept on hold or standing in a queue, people hate waiting. A survey by Forrester found that 41% of customers expect a response to a customer support email within 6 hours. Only 36% of businesses actually responded with that sort of turn-around time. Nowadays with social media being available, people expect to be responded to within 30-60 minutes! Companies need to keep up because this sort of disgruntlement will make your customers eager to try out your competition in hope of better customer service.

  1. Being passed around.

This is also one of the aspects that tops the list in most surveys when it comes to bad customer experiences. Banks tend to do this all the time. Customers are thrown from department to department in order to solve an issue. By the time the customer has reached the 4th consultant they are ready to explode! Could you blame them? Why has the customer not been put through to the correct person in the first place? It is completely unfair and very damaging to the brand’s image.

  1. Obvious upselling.

Whether it’s in a retail store, at a restaurant or on the phone to a consultant, there are very few more annoying things than when someone is blatantly trying to take advantage of you and get more money out of you. This clearly demonstrates the lack of concern for the customer and lack of honesty. “No, I do not want another bottle of wine at the end of our meal, or the extra T-shirt when I’m already paying for my selected clothes at the till, or the extra insurance policy you are offering that your robot machine already told me about while I was on hold. THANKS!” Companies need to train their employees to be tactful and respectful towards their customers and to upsell in a way that is satisfying the customer appropriately and not in a greedy manner.

  1. Being followed around.

This mainly pertains to retail stores. It is so, so aggravating when you are trying to shop and have been offered assistance that you’ve politely declined for now, and then the person decides to hover over your shoulder in case you may urgently need help. It chases customers away and makes them feel very uncomfortable. Companies need to train retail staff in how to approach customers and general in-store self-conduct.

nlighten Blog_10 Most Irritating Customer Experiences! March 2017"

  1. Breaking promises.

All customers need to feel valued in order to retain them. Promising to call or email them back and not delivering that promise will repel your customers. Companies often place too much focus on the “glitz and glamour” of the business and they then fail to deliver on the most basic things. Committing to a turn around time and not delivering is not ok. Companies must make realistic promises and follow through with them. That is a fundamental aspect of a business as a whole; it is the essence of customer experience. According to the White House Office of Consumer affairs, news of bad customer service reaches twice as many ears as praise of good service experience. Remember that.

  1. Rude attitude.

How can a customer be made to feel blamed for the unhappy position that the company representative is in? Companies need to ensure that they employ people that are happy and proud to be there. Keeping your employees happy and training them with regards to their behavior towards customers is crucial in creating good customer experiences, as it is the employees that drive the business and deliver the experience to the customer.

  1. Being called at the most inconvenient times.

Companies need to research when would be the appropriate times to call their target market. It is so frustrating to be called by a company selling funeral cover first thing on a Monday morning! People are working. How could you think that they are able to talk to you about this at that time? Perhaps companies should even survey their own customers and see when they are most likely to be able to speak on the phone. Contacting customers needs to be tactful because it is this very act of tactlessness that will make them hate your business.

  1. No acceptance of responsibility.

Often, representatives of companies are quick to tell customers that “this is the company policy” and “it is what it is”. Employees need to treat their customers as they would like to be treated. There should be a respectful explanation to anything they want to know the reason for. Employees should be trained well enough to be able to understand and relay messages so that the customer does not have to be more dissatisfied and ask to speak to a supervisor or manager, which is usually the next step after being told to accept the policy.

Did you know that it takes 12 positive experiences to make up for 1 negative customer experience?

All businesses need to consider this when designing their customer journey and avoid these 10 infuriating aspects that so many businesses get wrong. Deliver respectful, human experiences and stand out; your customers will love you for it!


View the previous nlighten blog by Nathalie Schooling: A 5 Step Guide to Retaining Clients in a B2B Environment

nlighten. enhancing customer experience – www.nlightencx.com

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