Embedding the customer in the center of our organizations

In a world where product differentiation is no longer an advantages it is very important that an organization differentiates in how good it delivers the promised customer services.  Most customers today are expecting only the very best service, even if that price for service is dirt cheap. Let's say I dine in an Island in the Philippines, I pay 10$ for an excellent meal coupled with an excellent friendly service so if I dine in London and spends 100$ I will expect the same level of service. If I don't get a good service I might not come back again or might give a bad rating for the place in Yelp or any other social channels. You see I am not the only one with this way of thinking. Do you think the same? Talking of London, I have been to Nobu and to Ramsey's I was surprise to spend less in Ramsey's where the service was a lot better and the food was excellent… Now I can say that Ramsey's is a very good example of providing a wonderful customer service, you leave happy and want to be back again as soon as you can.

All customer experiences are rooted to the people who provides them. When it comes to businesses, the customer experience is all that matters, most specially on service industries like Telecom. So the question to most if not all executives is "How do you embed customer centricity in your organizations?". There is no easy answer to this, there are no shortcuts. Its true that we train our front line staff to deliver a good service, but delivering a good service is no longer just a service, it is giving a positive experience that counts. To ensure that we provide positive experiences, our customers expects us to take the extra mile, go a bit further to give them delight and happiness. Doing should not break the bank either, after all as a business we aim for profitability and as executives we are judge on profitability by our shareholders. In April, at the CEM Summit in Dubai, Liz McSorley of du (VP  Customer Experience) will share how they do it in du.

For a product and technology led company like AmanziTel, we ensure that customer centricity is embedded in our corporate DNA by ensuring that each and every one of us understand and embrace customer centricity and the importance of ensuring happiness to our customers. We do this in various ways

• Customer centricity starts from the top, from our board members to our CEO down to our software developers.

• We hire resources who are naturally service and innovation oriented, so no matter how difficult our deployments get we continue to strive to provide happiness to each and everyone of them.

• It is embedded in our product and service design. When we design a product, especially new innovations and ground breaking product, in every decision we take our customer needs and happiness are taken into consideration. We call that customer driven development.

• We treat every customer request with utmost care and respect. Its like having your own baby being born when customer request arrives and ensuring that he or she is always happy and that he or she is raised and developed the right way.

• In times when we are not perfect, we ensure that we make up for our shortcomings by continuously delighting our customers in our own little ways and make that extra effort.. Walk the extra mile…

• We empower our front line resources to make key decisions in delivering customer happiness when they are put on those awkward situations.

• We always keep in mind that our customers are serving Billions of subscribers that at the end of the day each of our customers will have to deliver that happiness to their billions of subscribers

• For each and every one of us in the company we will always ensure our customer's happiness in our own little ways

And since its Valentine's day let me say we love our customers and we love the billions of subscribers they have.

CEM Awards - Telecoms, last chance to nominate your favorites

At the end of March  prestigious awards will be given to deserving individuals, teams or organizations who excel in promoting and providing superior customer experiences. This award on excellence in Customer Experience Management will be handed during the CEM Telecom Middle East Summit in Dubai. There are several categories which you can nominate your favorite entries:

 Like any award there are criteria:

Best CEM Brand I think should go to a company who give the best impression of proving excellent Customer Experiences, where their brand alone echos of satisfied customers. Of course winners are not up to me but a group of judges  

--> from the CMO Council Middle East, Peppers & Rogers and First Gulf Bank. So I will be submitting my entries but not going to tell you who I am nominating :-D but definitely not SAS and not Apple Store in Helsingborg, Sweden. 

How are you giving happiness to your customers?

While in London I got to observe how we in the Telco industry perceive improving experiences though better service delivery, improved processes and consistency in varying channels. In the beginning of April there is another CEM for Telecoms Summit tin Dubai, organized by IQPC. As you see the Middle East is a perfect example as to where customer experience should be improve by more importantly give telco customers a better way to connect with customer service by eliminating waiting time. Next time you call a customer service number,  or join a customer service chat, why not demand not to wait? And demand that the customer service representative not ask you tons of questions but tell you directly how to fix problems you experienced?

One thing telco customers will never see or experience with their service providers are the bad and rude services provided by SAS. I flew an SAS flight to London, not only the flight attendants were very rude but also the cabin seals came off during landing. On the way back to Copenhagen, its the same constant experience.. The cabin crew is very rude. At least SAS consistently give you a very bad experience… I think they should send their customer experience representatives to a CEM Summit to learn a thing  or to on how mobile operators are providing delight to their customers.

As an ordinary consumer, are we able to bring delight to others and at the same time bring happiness to ourselves? Last week we were exploring Augmented Reality, some brought the idea forwards, after several days of discussions a product concept is born, a few weeks from now I assume it will be released publicly. Once it is released anyone of us can manipulate reality the way we always wanted it, not just to impress our friends but more importantly bring happiness to others who are beneficiaries of this augmented reality. Just imagine making someone smile by including them on an exhilarating experience you are having…. Or let them experience the joy you are currently experiencing and then share it on social media real time.