Customer Service and the Inconvenient Truths
A recent survey conducted and published by the Dubai based 7Days newspaper indicates that 80% of the respondents believe that customer service is getting worse in Dubai. This is of course a very scary percentage especially for a city that has built its name on attracting multi-national corporations and the finest caliber of expats.
But how come the quality of service is declining while almost every bank, telecommunications operator, auto dealer and even local government departments are spending millions of Dollars on aggressive customer relationship management (CRM) projects?
The answer is simple; CRM alone cannot and will not improve your customer service levels for customer service is above all a corporate culture, not something that can be bought regardless to how fat your check book is. Many chief executives think that deploying a good CRM system is a good recipe for improving customer services.
Well, let me share with you the inconvenient truths:
- CRM alone will not improve your customer service;
in fact it is likely to make it worse
- Unless you start and personally sponsor a broad
program to improve your service quality, a CRM project will be a waste of your
company’s valuable financial resources and human effort
- Customer service is not the responsibility of
your call center or service department alone
- Using the current recessionary conditions as an
excuse for poor service is not something that your customers will appreciate or will ever forget
- CRM vendors want to you believe that their product and their product alone will fix your customer service problem, the fact is the product constitutes part of the recipe, it is not the recipe
- The economic downturn is the best time to
strategize and get ready for the next growth wave. Those who miss the opportunity
won’t be able to ride the next wave
That is why many smart CEOs are busy right now working on their strategies and cleverly investing in programs and technologies that will prepare their enterprises for the next wave, while not so smart CEOs and ducking down and adopting a wait and see approach.
On-Track Arabia is very well placed to help you rebuild your customer service so that your business is ready to gain the biggest market share as the economic conditions improve. Let us work with you on your strategy in order to infuse your corporate culture with customer orientation, sense of urgency and as part of the process support the selection and deployment of the right CRM solution accompanied by a well coordinated change management program.
Don’t wait until it’s too late .. contact us now
But customer service levels are going down because of the economic conditions. Companies cannot afford customer service staff while their revenues are suffering. Don't you think it would be prudent for businesses to rationalize in order to survive?
Reply to this
Hi Josh,
I think of we allow our selves to use the recessionary conditions as an excuse for poor customer service we will be putting our businesses on a slow but certain death .. because one day the recession will end .. and my and your customers will remember that we did not pay attention to them .. sure they will look around for a better supplier.
On the other point you mentioned, when customers say that customer service levels are going down, they are not necessarily referring to the performance for your customer service or call center agents ... they are referring to the overall sense of service they are getting from your organization .. and that gets us back to my article, customer service is above all a corporate culture and is the responsibility of every employee .. not just those answering the phone. So, improving customer service may have nothing to do with hiring more customer service people but with turning every one in an organization into a customer focused, service oriented team member .. not easy but necessary!
Reply to this