Remember when we were talking about Customer Service Fluidity? One of the biggest elements of being fluid in customers service is adapting to the customer or rather Customer Service Adaptability.
Each customer is an individual. There’s this thing called ‘individuality’ that we need to take note of.
Humans are creature that adapt to environments. This is simply the way of the world. As nature is more powerful than us. In our world – Customer Service – the customer is all powerful. They make or [can] break your business. Adapting to customers allows you the power to control the situation, but without taking the power away from the customer. Customer Service Adaptability makes them feel served and appreciated. That’s the point isn’t it?
Also read this article: Retail Customer Service: Reality of Retail Industry
Let’s look at a clip from the series called “The Two Ronnies.” Here we will see a foreign customer entering the store. He then tries to purchase items on his shopping list. However, the customer has a very different (or rather unique) way of pronouncing words. The store keeper, as most of us would – speaking any language – tries to correct the speaker. Let’s take a look at what happens…
Well that was a good laugh!
Adaptability
Let’s analyse what happen in that short clip. The first thing the shop keeper (or Owner) tried to do was to send the customer away. Without understanding the customer fully. That’s closing the door on an opportunity. But of course, in this case the customer said something that would sound like “mouse.” Who would think that he was looking “mousse.” Eventually the shop keeper comes to understand what the customer is looking for. However, can’t help but try to correct the customer on the pronunciation.
The moment the customer takes his money away, the shop keeper gives in. Allowing the customer to pronounce the word however he wants to say it. This happens again when the customer asks for Tomato Puree. The scene brazenly shows that customers will take their money away if they feel that they are not understood or not treated right.
What’s interesting though, is that the customer will give you the chance to try to understand them. A customer that feels that he/she is not understood will first try to be understood. Its human nature.
A bonus here is that we see the Shop keeper’s wife entering the scenario and how quickly she adapts to the customer’s quirky pronunciation.
Basically, your level of adaptability to your customer will give you more opportunities. Most companies do this by finding out what a majority of their targeted demographic think like. That information will give you the insight into how to adapt to your customers and dealing with possible scenarios that will arise.
Customer Service Adaptability will allow for better Customer Service Fluidity.
Talking of insights
That’s one thing we do here at AQ. We look for Insights that would make a customer’s experiences more pleasing or had made it unsatisfactory. To know more on these Insights that we often look out for, check out our interview with our Insights Manager. Yes, we have an Insights Manager, that’s how much we want to provide quality service.
Do let us know on our social media pages, whether you had an experience where you felt that a customer service staff adapted to you well and made you feel comfortable and appreciated, or otherwise.
Losing customers to the competition is one of the most frustrating aspects of business. Unfortunately, it’s also one of the most regular occurrences in every industry. With the increase in consumer empowerment through the Internet and the impact of globalization, people have more choice and more knowledge about what they want to be buying, where and when. Customers leave companies for all manner of reasons, from financial to personal. The important thing is to understand why in order to avoid losing more.
One customer jumping ship isn’t a big deal, but losing customers steadily or in a flood? That’s a problem. A serious one. It’s the sort of problem that can sink a company. It’s a symptom of a problem that needs to be addressed quickly, smoothly, and efficiently.
Thorough market research provides insights into shifts in the market, while mystery shopping solutions offer insights into customer mindsets. By learning to understand the subtle shifts in market demographics or simply the changes in customer requirements, a company can save its profit margin and steer itself in the corrected direction.
Mystery shopping, when performed on a regular basis throughout the year, can provide measurable data tracking the development and changes. This sort of regular testing can help a business choose the direction in which to turn – not in a month after the next strategy meeting, but immediately. Small changes, based on seemingly trivial feedback from mystery shopping solutions and opinion polls, can make all the difference if they are implemented quickly and correctly.
Businesses no longer have the luxury of sticking to a single battle plan for the next five years. The world is in the middle of an epic shift in dynamics, not just generational but technological – people change their minds from one week to the next, demands fluctuate, and needs shift accordingly. The world is a very different place from what it was two months ago, is your business keeping up? Often when a company starts losing customers it has little to do with the quality of their products or services, but more because the business strategy is out of touch with its demographic. This can be easily avoided with a quick checkup, a diagnostic, just to see if there are certain elements of a business that need immediate attention.
Something to keep in mind, especially this far into the holiday season where humanity is all about wanting and needing. Many people will make new year’s resolutions about taking better care of themselves, eating more salads, cutting back on the alcohol, maybe even to quit smoking. Congratulations and best of luck to everyone, but add another one to that list: to stop losing customers to the competition, to make your business the best business there is by taking a little more care of your customers.
To let people experience great service.
Different generations do things differently and bridging the generational gap can be a trick in itself. 2016 has experienced some major changes in how the different generations view each other. The year’s only half done.
We’ve witnessed a massive conflict generations in the United Kingdom with Brexit, in which the divide is pretty clearly split across the generational divide. The new (and successful!) Star Wars has allowed grandparents, parents and children to talk to each other about something other than changes in fashion, the price of bread, and ‘that horrible stuff you call music’.
And now there’s PokémonGo…
What is PokemonGo?
If you were a child anywhere after 1996, you’d have grown up with pokémon. There were cards to collect, video games to play, television series to keep track of, movies to watch and millions of dollars worth of merchandising that you just had to have. I myself still have the Pikachu stuffed animal that I insisted on having, and I’m pretty sure many of us still have the card decks we studiously collected, traded and won. Pokémon have been a Millennial obsession.
We now have competition for that obsession:
“Omg! The sweetest thing just happened! I was sitting here watching Netflix when all of a sudden I hear two cute little knocks at my front door. A boy and a girl, like 12. I asked what’s up? They said, “excuse me, sir, but there’s a pikachu in your backyard and my sister and I were wondering if we can go in and catch it?” I look down at these two young Pokémon trainers and see myself in the little boy. So I slam the door and run to the back yard. GUESS WHO HAS A PIKACHU…” [Source]
Which raises the question for the uninitiated: what in the name of all that is holy is PokémonGo?
First, we have to assume by this stage that you’ve been hiding under a rock the entire month, but we’ll forgive you and explain. Basically, it’s the latest outbreak of what’s been fondly referred to as ‘pokémania’ [source]. A free Android and iOS based game that involves using your phone to find and ‘catch’ pokémon in the real world.
Creating a Product that Closes the Generational Gap
When a new product or service is launched, marketers tend to target a specific demographic. We pick who, what, where, and why – it’s easier to track the impact this way and we can better guarantee positive outcomes.
Say we’re in charge of creating an advertisement campaign for the latest smartphone. We’ll be targeting the younger Millennial generation and Gen Zs, people who are ‘good’ at adapting to new technology and are eager to upgrade at every given opportunity. We might segment even further, maybe we’ll aim at the male population, specifically in western Europe and North America rather than Asia and Oceania. Every segmentation made will determine the style and design of the advertisement: what colours we’ll use, whether we use a voice-over – what type of voice we’ll use! – what message we really want to send. Why do we want you to buy this phone? Because it’s cool, and it’ll help you win the attention of gorgeous women like Scarlett Johansson.
How we market well we market the product will determine how many sales we make and that means knowing our target audience.
Now imagine we’re twenty years into the future when Gen Z is in full-swing and are baffled by the super-virtual-worlds of the Alpha Generation (assuming that’s what we’re going to call them! [source]). We come up with a brand new smartphone-equivalent that we Millennials find just as interesting and easy to get into as our Alpha grandkids.
Congratulations, we’ve successfully closed the generational gap and created an omni-generation product that sells to pretty much everyone on the planet. Nice work. Bonuses all around.
Entertainment values aside: This is what Star Wars: The Force Awakens accomplished. This is why everyone is talking about and playing PokémonGo.
What’s the big fuss?
The generational gap is often ignored because it can be incredibly difficult to bridge them. Why would you waste time, effort and money attempting to market to the entire world when you can narrow your target and generate better ROIs?
From a sales and marketing perspective both Star Wars and PokémonGo are powerful examples of the possibilities that are out there. Innovative ideas sprung out of ideas from the older generation can give rise to powerful opportunities to create better communication across the generational gap.
For those of us in business, understanding these innovations and really learning what makes them tick can give us deeper insight into our marketing and sales strategies.
And it never hurts to have a little fun on the side. Just remember, work first, pokémon later.
