9 Principles for Driving a Service Culture

Delivering awesome customer service involves nine principles. Customer service is not complicated. It is the execution of some fundamentals that make a huge difference. It must start at the top and involve every employee. Remember that 99% of customer contact with your employees is with your frontline employees.

1) Relentless strategy. Focus on strategy. You must be Relentless, and it must be a way of life. Very few executives understand how fast you can grow your business when you master this service strategy.

2) Reduce friction. Remove stupid rules, policies and procedures. Make it easy to buy from you. Does a live person answer the call 24/7 in 1 or 2 rings? Do you have hours convenient to the customer or the owner?

3) Empowerment. Empowerment is the backbone of great service. Everyone must be empowered. Empowerment must happen on the front line. It dramatically increases your costs every time you move it up the chain of command.

4) Speed. People today expect and want speed. You must drastically reduce the time for everything you do. Reduce the time by 90 % if you want to separate yourself from your competition.

5) Training. All employees must be trained on customer service with something new and fresh every few months. Ninety-nine percent of customer interaction is with your frontline employees. They are the least trained, least valued, least paid, and the face of your organization.

6) Remember your name. The most precious thing to a customer is their name. Remember it and use it. It costs you nothing and takes no additional time. Fewer than 1% of companies use this skill.

7) Service recovery. When you screw up you must do all you can to keep the customer. All employees must practice the four skills of service recovery: act quickly, take responsibility, be empowered, and compensate.

8) Reduce costs. Price is critical with all customers. Service leaders are frugal and always looking for ways to reduce costs. All my research shows service leaders are aggressive at eliminating waste and costs.

9) Measure results. To keep top management passionate about this process and the financial investment and time required, you must measure the results of creating a service culture. What is your NPS score?

John Tschohl is president and founder of Service Quality Institute, with operations in more than 40 countries. He is considered one of the foremost authorities on service strategy, success, empowerment, and customer service. His monthly strategic newsletter is available online at no charge. Contact him at 800-548-0538, WhatsApp at 612-382-5636, or email John@servicequality.com. He also can be reached on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.