customer service

Can I please say Thank You to someone?

Why is it so hard to say thank you to people? I don’t mean individuals per se but rather the people behind a company’s service, products or responses.

Consider for a moment the huge amounts of money we’re pouring into handling consumer’s complaints. Malaysia as a country is particularly well placed in the area of unhappy-customer-management.

Malaysia was ranked the 3rd most attractive investment destination by AT Kearney and McKinsey in 2005, and five Malaysian outsourcing companies made it onto the Global Services 100 list, a capabilities-driven assessment of IT and IT enabled service providers globally. The global worldwide SSO market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 15 per cent over the next few years, reaching USD 1.43 trillion by 2009 as compared to USD 930 billion in 2006. ICT services such as SSO contributed RM2.8 billion to the nation’s Gross Domestic Product of RM495.6 billion. That’s a lot of money that’s really being spent to answer questions and handle complaints.

What this means is that we’re a great place to place a call center. And yes, there are numerous other support functions performed by these excellent world class firms - but there is a fair amount of their work that goes towards taking, recording and responding to complaints as well. But are there hotlines to record how great the service was for a company?

That’s the bit we’re interested in.

The reason I was thinking about this was that over the past fortnight I’ve had the pleasure of being looked after by some amazing people.

Now, I normally have at least one halfway decent encounter with service staff every week or so - and by this I mean that they make a dreary day better, or make a rough day feel a little lighter through their smiles or just being plain friendly. But once in a while, you come across some amazing service levels - and this has been happening fairly frequently recently. First at the hotel where we were working on a project, and then in the carpark after the project, local vendors and over the past couple of weeks at some of the local eateries that we were trying.

Challenge is - how do I make sure that the people actually responsible for that great experience receive my thanks?

For instance - when you tell your waiter that you thought the food was excellent, how do you know if they did or did not tell the cooks? Or you’re organising a hugely sensitive event and the hotel’s staff go above and beyond both their job scope as well as their duties to make sure you have absolutely everything you could possibly need?

Sure, I could write a letter to the hotel and thank them for the great service - which I did. I could name the people in question … chances are the hotel’s PR person may get back with a response - but did the people who did the work really know how appreciated they were? And what about the times when you can’t thank the people directly?

Reading Fast Company recently, I was inspired by an article there to think about this again and what do you know - it IS hard to say thank you!

And it’s just sad. People crave appreciation. Look around you and you’ll be amazed just how obvious it is when you’re looking for it.

People will come for the money, but they stay for the recognition and relationship

Consider the joy on someone’s face when you simply thank them for doing something well. Or how you feel when your boss or colleagues acknowledge the work and the time you’re putting into your job. How you have that extra special spring in your step when someone compliments you on a doing something well or looking especially good.

They’re all part and parcel of the same human desire for appreciation, recognition and affection in some cases. Globally, the direct selling or multi level marketing industry, is a booming one. Amway. Mary Kay. Shaklee. GoldQuest. I bet you could name a hundred if not a thousand more like them. Different products. Different audiences. Different geographies.

But they all thrive on a business model built around rewarding an individual for work put in through (i) money and (ii) praise/ recognition. And based on years of looking at the direct selling industry from both sides of the fence, I have to say that the praise and recognition is often what people stay for - not just the money.

Imagine if you will what would happen if you made amazing products, or delivered great services that were recognised for being great -  now what if you could make sure the people who were responsible for that great product or service were able to hear that point of view from real customers?

Wouldn’t it be easier to attract and retain the best talent there was? And wouldn’t this inspire an ever greater level of customer service and satisfaction?

I know for a fact that whenever we get a thank you from our clients it helps raise the team’s spirit by just that much more. Now imagine if you could help happy customers easily tell you they were happy.

So what is your company doing to help customers say thank you to your people? Surveys, hotlines and email sent to a marketing or complaints department doesn’t count by the way.

Think about the possibilities - sure you’ll still hear complaints.

But instead of being constant streams of negativity, these support centres, help lines, emails and survey points might actually (i) let you know what you’re doing right; (ii) help your employees know that they matter and; (iii) help customers feel better about themselves for having done something nice for someone else.

Do you have an example of companies who make it easy for you to give them great feedback - as easily as they make it for you to complain?

© 2008 Journeys Through The Line.