Providing good service on time every time isn’t good enough, claims management guru and best selling business author Ken Blanchard. He insists that you can only be guaranteed to beat the competition if you create ‘Raving Fan Customers.’ In this exclusive article for Customer Management, he reveals who they are and how you can get them.
‘Customer satisfaction’ may be all the rage, but here’s the stark truth. If your customers say they are ‘satisfied’ with the service you offer then your service isn’t good enough. A satisfied customer isn’t going to tell everyone what a great experience they had with your company. They won’t make sure they don’t do business with anyone else but you ever again. A satisfied customer may not complain and may not quibble about payment but you can bet your bottom dollar they will try and get a better deal at a better price somewhere else next time. So forget about satisfying customers because satisfying them won’t help you make it in the increasingly competitive business world.
To do that you need to create ‘Raving Fan Customers;’ customers who are so devoted to your products and services that they wouldn’t dream of taking their business elsewhere and will sing from the rooftops about just how good you are.
It’s rather a hackneyed phrase, but this is only possible if you believe genuinely that the customer is “King” and focus on the customer in everything you do, from planning your company vision to developing business strategies and setting goals. Initiating a customer service programme is a doomed exercise if you haven’t already done this. I suspect this is why a recent survey by this magazine showed that 60% of us think customer service is getting worse, despite the fact there is more media and management attention focussed on this subject than ever before. If organisational culture and vision isn’t