Most people would rate word of mouth as a great way to grow a business and I would go so far as to say that apart from the initial seeding of your business into the marketplace you could grow a business completely from referrals from satisfied customers. It might take a bit longer that way though so probably not great to have this as your only strategy, but nevertheless putting great customer service high up on your marketing agenda is a must.
Now, great customer service is quite an all encompassing term and there are, of course, many facets of your business that contribute to the customer experience including the product, the price, the ease of purchase, the quality etc but today I’m focusing on the people bit of it and specifically on the subject of ‘dealing with customer issues’.
Yesterday I finally got round to looking into where my printer cartridge delivery was. It was all a bit random; I remembered placing an order and then I was vaguely aware that the order hadn’t arrive, as evidenced by having to send my husband on a print cartridge buying mission during some print critical project before Christmas. I just sort of assumed that the order was held up in the Christmas post. Yesterday I finally looked on the order history page of the website where I get my cartridges to find out that I had actually ordered them on the 10 November and they were apparently shipped to me on 13th.
My initial thought was that I was in for a battle as I had left things so long, and I was ready to put it down to experience. But, I emailed their customer service department and within an hour or so I had a response back that confirmed they had been shipped on the 13th but that they must have been lost in the post and that they would send some more. I was gobsmacked. What great customer service. No questions; no debate; no negotiation and/or mention of a gesture of goodwill. They just believed me and dealt with it. I responded immediately and complimented them on their service and thanked them and again I had a response, this time within a few minutes, saying “these things happen”.
Some of you will be thinking: that’s too trusting, customers could fleece me if I did that sort of thing. I come from the ‘believing that most people are good’ philosophy, and I think it’s great that this company does too. It will be paying them dividends.
And, what will I do now? Well, for one I will definitely continue to order my print cartridges from this company, and I will tell as many people as I can about their awesome customer service. What a simple and effective marketing strategy.
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