why are you still doing what your customers hate?

 

Transcript:

 hey

 everyone hey it's me how you doing you

 doing good I literally just took a sip

 of like 4our old coffee and

 uh it's okay it's okay you know when you

 uh when uh you're you're like at a party

 and you pick up what you think is your

 drink that is in a can and you take a

 sip of it and someone it was someone's

 ashtray yeah kind of like that minus the

 Ash and stuff but not the best not the

 best at all so what are we doing what

 are we doing today well after the

 beautiful Bean footage we'll get into it

 but for now I just want to hang out I

 just want to see how you're

 doing mhm

 okay

 no that's pretty

 interesting

 huh that is

 interesting I had no

 idea

 huh

 H you

 sure you sure that

 happened it's a I'm sure you're sure but

 that doesn't sound like them that

 doesn't sound like them at all I would

 know

 huh man that sucks but I'm sure you'll

 figure it out all

 right

 yeah okay okay yeah I got it yep no

 understood

 totally all right yep

 [Music]

 okay

 well

 yeah

 okay

 yeah all right I got to run all right

 now here's that beautiful Bean

 [Music]

 footage

 [Music]

 welcome back to another episode of

 caffeinated CX where we talk about

 customer experience and stuff all in a

 hyper caffeinated state I'm David the

 caffeinated cxo and I'm your host here

 on caffeinated CX because well it's my

 show the original the original

 caffeinated CX the

 OG

 yeah going back to like

 2021 all right all right and I got proof

 of that so what was that about about

 nothing don't worry about it but while

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 ramble about nothing why don't you go

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 grow yeah why wouldn't you want that I

 want that and I want what's best for

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 you but I'm not going to say one way or

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 other that's not up to me to

 decide it's up to you

 but

 anyway

 anyway what are we going to talk about

 today today we're going to talk

 about why companies why

 businesses why

 people keep on doing things that

 customers

 hate and we're talking about the same

 things that these people hate when it

 happens to them as a customer and yet

 their businesses and their companies and

 their departments and their teams keep

 on doing it to their own

 customers that's

 crazy that is

 insane and we're going to talk about it

 all right

 so so what are some things that

 customers hate

 well let's get the obvious ones out of

 the way right they hate to

 wait I don't know anybody that likes to

 wait hey is this a line awesome or oh

 boy I get to hear an hour of this hold

 music that's fun I had nothing else to

 do today I guess I will sit and wait on

 hold and listen to this beautiful

 beautiful

 song oh it's only 30 seconds of a song

 on

 Loop

 amazing why is it Bob

 Marley what is going on here where am

 I

 well that's a little crazy but it is it

 is true nobody likes to wait on hold so

 if you have people on

 hold you got to do something to fix that

 one probably the easiest but the most

 expensive would be to hire and staff

 appropriately what does that mean using

 the erlang C

 calculator go ahead and do the little

 formulas and see how many agents or how

 many staff you need to have on the phone

 to cover the call volume that you expect

 to

 have and then that wait time will go

 down to whatever you put into the

 formula

 amazing

 amazing crazy now that is one way to

 deal with it that is one way to deal

 with crazy high whole times right is

 just hiring your way out of it that's

 expensive that might not be in your

 budget so how do you get around that one

 you could have like an ivr setup where

 they press one to speak to a customer

 service rep they click two to get

 transferred to another department let's

 say you're in a department and you're in

 a call center and like let's say 6

 60% off of the calls that come in are

 vendor calls marketing

 calls this that and the other that don't

 contribute to the business in a

 meaningful Revenue driving sense right

 theoretically if these people press two

 and they get sent to a

 voicemail and someone actually checks

 that voicemail to make sure that

 customers didn't accidentally do

 it

 well there you go right easy peasy love

 and squeezy but the drawbacks of that

 are many one those customers going to

 that voicemail and just never calling

 back again and then whoever is

 responsible for checking that voicemail

 doesn't right and then you know the

 friction point of actually having to

 press one or two some customers are just

 going to drop off at that point right

 there's always a possibility no matter

 how rust it is for the ivr to die right

 and uh some people just don't

 like

 ivrs at all

 cool cool so that's that's an

 option

 right that's cool options are good

 options are

 neat

 but

 here are some other options one when

 someone's calling in and there's a hold

 time you can

 offer through your ivr through your hold

 system through whatever you have to call

 that customer back

 automatically

 cool that's a good one that one's been

 around for a while and then as soon as a

 agent frees up they don't lose their

 place in line they automatically get a

 call now what are the drawbacks of that

 customer may not answer the

 phone that sucks but isn't that the

 customer's fault no buddy that's your

 fault for having such a ridiculously

 long hold time you should get that fixed

 another option is to uh have like a

 selfs serve option on your website or on

 your a Facebook page do you have a

 Facebook page a little Facebook page you

 know if you don't all right but I'm sure

 you have a website and on that website

 you can have some selfs serve

 options right you can have an order

 online you can have a place your service

 order online you can schedule

 online maybe even have a little chat

 widget that is either powered by a real

 person or you know maybe a

 gen AI little chat bot thingy right

 they're not all

 trash and the likelihood of someone

 messing around with it enough for it to

 like write a poem about how bad your

 company is or you know someone getting

 it to like curse very very very small

 likelihood of that now it does happen

 and it has

 happened

 but such as

 life so I don't know man so that's one

 thing that customers hate long hold

 times right and I'm going to segue into

 more of a trades related thing but I'm

 sure a lot of you out there who are not

 in the trades

 can kind of understand right what do

 customers hate random

 fees what kind of random fees fees well

 cancellation

 fees life happens okay if someone's not

 going to make it to an

 appointment so

 what cancellation fee oh um since you

 didn't cancel within uh 24 hours of your

 hair appointment I'm going to have to

 charge you uh 50

 bucks and I know that's light 50 bucks

 for that cancelled appointment because I

 don't have any other one any other

 appointments I could bump up because I'm

 not good at filling my schedule I'm not

 good at

 sales another fee that a lot of people

 love especially in the industry that I

 work in is the dispatch fee the service

 fee the fee you charge just to go out to

 their house doesn't matter if you're

 late or not you still get charged the

 dispatch fee the dispatch fee

 Areno usually this is anywhere between

 like 30 and 130

 bucks and it is uh

 trash it's admitting that you're bad at

 converting

 sales oh uh well it's for our time well

 that's literally your job your job is to

 go out there and fix people's

 stuff you don't have to charge to go out

 there you charge for fixing going out

 there is not part of the fixing portion

 of the

 bill yeah I know gas is expensive I know

 overhead is

 expensive I know there's been some

 studies where conversion rats rise if

 you have a dispatch fee well no

 crap no crap of course they do because

 they're already paying might as well

 have you do the work no matter how good

 or bad you are at sales here's a little

 tip get better at sales and you won't

 have to worry about your little dispatch

 F

 arino

 craziness craziness customers hate fees

 you as a customer hate fees if you had

 to put a deposit down to get a table at

 a restaurant chances are

 if you're like most people you wouldn't

 really go to that establishment if you

 had to put a down payment on a

 table for the honor and the privilege of

 eating food that you're going to pay

 for or if there's a cancellation fee if

 you book on Open Table and you can't

 make it cuz your mom got into a car

 accident

 right oh sorry uh we're going to have to

 charge you a cancellation fee for your

 table because again we can't fill our

 own schedule and we're really bad at

 managing time so this is your fault this

 is your problem give us money no that's

 crazy that is nuts and you should feel

 bad for even considering

 that crazy crazy

 crazy what do uh what are some other

 things that customers hate well I can

 think of a

 lot being transferred around to uh

 multiple departments to multiple people

 and uh none of those people can help you

 I know it's an old joke in fact

 it's overused but it is still valid

 because it still happens right you get

 transferred to one place you get

 transferred to another place you get

 transferred to this person you get

 transferred to that

 person and what's the point what's the

 big

 idea oh well I just wanted to uh update

 and upgrade my

 package but I also have a question about

 my bill why do you have to speak to two

 separate

 departments why that's

 crazy train your people up on

 everything is that going to cause you to

 have to pay people a little bit more

 maybe but then you don't have to waste

 time through uh hold times and save

 money that way right another thing that

 customers hate is when instead of

 maximizing efficiency instead of

 capitalizing on being more

 efficient companies cut

 costs so and when companies cut costs

 who

 suffers usually the

 employees

 and the

 customer they are the ones who suffer

 when companies cut costs instead of

 saving money through efficiency through

 automation so cutting cost is like oh

 yeah my favorite is when a c when a

 company was like oh we're customer

 Centric customer centricity is the name

 of the game look in a meeting we even

 have a chair with the word customer on a

 piece of paper taped to it oh oh

 no oh oh our profits are a little down

 what are we going to do get more

 efficient not buy another

 yacht no no no no we're going to cut our

 customer service

 department that's fine that's

 fine because

 well we're cutting

 costs and

 well well it is what it is instead of

 automating some stuff instead of maybe

 getting better at

 sales we'll just cut off the thing that

 we uh

 said was in our lifeblood the

 thing that we used to say was a

 competitive

 Advantage customer

 centricity now it's cost

 centricity I just like the word

 centricity okay so

 today I was reading a book well more

 like going through a book more

 like flipping through the pages

 and I think well I think I'd share a

 little bit the name of the book is

 crushing the competition with service by

 and I'm going to butcher this and I

 apologize Hank Ebling I

 fourth very fancy and you know it's a

 pretty thin book it's not a long book

 but there's some pretty good stuff in

 here I guess it's uh more towards gym

 owners but it is what it is

 because here's the thing no matter what

 industry you're in you have customer

 overlap with a lot of other Industries

 right you have a lot of overlap if

 you're a grocery store your customers

 have an overlap with gas

 stations and they have an overlap with

 plumbers and they have an overlap with I

 don't know the Gap right people don't

 just shop for one thing and one thing

 only there is customer overlap and

 that's okay which means

 that

 well your customers are their customers

 and what works in their industry might

 with some tweaking work in

 yours it's

 okay so we're going to go

 through some um now let's take I'm

 reading from the book uh now let's take

 a look at some very industry specific

 examples of ideas that have worked for

 other businesses and are some ideas that

 you could Implement financial planners

 and insurance

 agents all right boring no offense all

 right then restaurants have a

 valet hire more

 hosts

 yeah retail keep track of customer

 favorite purchases and

 styles this way when new items come into

 your store you can contact those

 customers

 and let them know that you just received

 some new items you feel they would like

 and are going to hold them to ensure

 they get the first chance to check them

 out hey hey George hey it's me at the

 clothes store we got a new

 pair we got a new pair of jeans in think

 you like them that just seems weird but

 it probably works at more uh not where I

 shop

 for clothes so real estate agents salons

 medical professionals that's all in here

 car

 dealerships and then we get down to

 trade workers electricians

 plumbers

 [Music]

 carpenters and let me read Verbatim what

 it says this is a direct quote from the

 book unfortunately in these fields of

 work Cs and CX that's customer service

 and customer experience by the way if

 you're listening to this you probably

 know that tens to be lacking you can set

 yourself apart in a huge way in these

 industries by applying some basic

 tactics one big thing is to make sure

 you only take on jobs that you know you

 can actually finish and finish in a Time

 family manner quote job slightly on the

 higher end so you are more likely to

 finish the job for Less which will look

 better to the customer than having to

 charge them more than you originally

 thought show up on time and return

 inquiry phone calls make sure to give

 customers a heads up with who is showing

 up to service their home and try to

 avoid the dreaded large time Windows

 nobody likes to hear you will show up

 sometime between 1 and 5 5

 p.m. when you figure out the problem and

 fix it to make sure to break down the

 problem as basically as you can when

 discussing with the customer check in

 after a few days and make sure there are

 no issues with what you worked on if

 there are go back free of charge and fix

 it just the way that section starts off

 unfortun

 in these fields of work Cs and CX tends

 to be

 lacking and then it goes on to massage

 therapists moving

 companies yeah so there's that you know

 so it is what it

 is and I wouldn't have it any other way

 yes the trades have a bad rrap

 bad rep with uh Cs and CX let's face it

 it's

 true

 but are we going to let that set the

 standards no are we going to keep

 doing what customers

 hate probably well probably most

 will because there's this thing and it's

 a thing and it's about convenience and

 most people are only care they only care

 about

 convenience for

 themselves not the convenience for

 others if having a 4our Time arrival

 window is convenient for

 them screw it it's convenient for the

 customer too screw it when in reality we

 all know it's not

 or if they only uh take one form of

 payment and it needs to be collected on

 site they can't go to a little web

 widget on the website to pay their bill

 well that's uh that's an

 issue that's convenient for the company

 but not convenient for the for the

 customer the key is to make it so so

 easy to do business with your

 company that there's no friction points

 there's

 no hurdles because here's one thing

 about human psychology that I think we

 all need to remember human beings by

 default in general are

 lazy and that's

 okay we will always go

 towards we will

 always go towards the path of least

 resistance and if you're trying to give

 money to a company that has

 resistance chances are if you go through

 with using them the first time you won't

 be using them a second time they could

 do the best job in the

 world they

 could everything they touch physically

 could turn to Gold but if it was hard to

 schedule the appointment if it was hard

 to get out there right because they gave

 you a six-h hour window and then there

 was a dispatch fee on top of that and a

 can consolation fee on top of that and

 paying them was a pain in the

 butt you probably won't be using them a

 second

 time and as we all

 know customer

 loyalty is one of the most important

 metrics that a company can measure and

 if you don't have company loyal if you

 don't have customer

 loyalty what do you have eventually

 you're going to run out of new

 customers so make it convenient to do

 business with your

 company make it

 easy make it

 simple

 simple have it be the simplest thing

 have multiple ways to reach out but not

 too

 much because that would be

 crazy and your customer service

 department who are already probably

 underst staffed well adding too much

 adding too many channels

 detrimental

 detrimental they won't be able to serve

 as the customer the right way I have

 always opted and

 gone for and

 proclaim the art of

 three the rule of

 three

 voice

 chat self

 serve you don't need more than

 that and have it all come in to the same

 system so you don't you have to toggle

 through screens you don't have to open

 up different

 systems no have it all in one all in one

 CRM cuz it's crazy not to be it's crazy

 not to do that right don't let people

 sit on

 hold don't transfer people all over the

 place to multiple

 departments to multiple people no first

 call resolution whatever first call

 resolution means to

 you anything else you're going to lose

 customers and you don't want

 that not in this

 economy not in this econom Marino so I

 don't know that's the episode stop doing

 what customers hate stop doing to your

 customers that which you hate as a

 customer of someone else's

 company make it convenient for the

 customer who cares if it's slightly less

 convenient for you and get rid of the

 garbage

 fees

 and that's today's episode of

 caffeinated CX I'll see you next time

 [Music]

 bye