What’s your Customer Service Mindset?
As far as I can see, there are only 3 mindsets here:
- I can learn from you and make things better for us.
- I can teach you something and make things better for us.
- Get lost.
How often have you met companies with Mindset 1? With Mindset 2? With Mindset 3?
What? No one have ever told you to Get lost!
Oh — that’s because they don’t have guts or talent to do so, and so they decided to take a rather longer route of:
- Keeping you on hold
- Telling you how it doesn’t work
- Blamed the billing department
- Referred to the front-desk
Mindset 1 is rare. Very rare. You must acknowledge first that customer is an asset, not a cost. It’s easier in smaller organization. Large bureaucratic organizations suck at it. They suck at it, because they fear that these customers can expose their already messed up decision makers… hence they prepare thick walls of hierarchies.
Mindset 2 is amazing. And mindset 2 is much easier in the world of internet. Manuals, how-to guides, videos, etc. makes customer education and training much easier. Design is important here. Intuitive design — not a sexy looking interface.
Sometimes, though, the power is actually disconnected to ensure safety of masses, the software has a bug that was nearly impossible to spot earlier, the weather just isn’t what it should be, the under-sea cable is broken and your line-person cannot swim and fix it, or the imported and sealed burger patty had a steel pin that reached your dining table. In that moment, education can help, but what matters more is clarity, respect and care.
I’ve realized one thing that most customers don’t actually expect miracles — but they certainly don’t expect Mindset 3.
Take up the responsibility of your own organization. Have you created an endless maze, designed to ignore customers…? What a waste!
If you engage with customers at any level, pick your mindset. Look at the cost… Look at the worth — and then do that.
Bonus:
Mindset 1 & 2 can thrive when we move from reactive to proactive.
Reactive customer service waits until something is broken. Customer must get annoyed to get our attention. And before getting our attention, they must find us, contact us, and contact us more, and they finally get the honor of talking to us.
It sucks. Big time.
It’s time to be proactive.
How many people on your team are actively advocating for the customer in advance? Educating and guiding so that most disappointments won’t even happen, which means we won’t have to fix them…
Is there any more effective way to engage with customers than to create products that don’t break their hearts and dreams!
