Are customers’ expectations higher today than they were 10 years ago? What about five years ago? What about two years ago? I’m sure you would agree that customers’ expectations have risen exponentially over the past years with the growth of information gathering, smartphones, and savvy consumers. This is the age of customer capitalism. Today, the power has shifted from the seller to the buyer. It’s a buyer’s world now, and each buyer has a voice and an ability to communicate with each other through social media. The customer is now in command. The shift goes beyond the firm paying more attention to customer service. Everyone in the firm must be oriented on providing more value to customers sooner.
People expect quality products and service. We’ve been asked by a lot of people how we’ve grown so quickly, and the answer is actually really simple: We’ve aligned the entire organization around one mission — to provide the best customer service possible. Internally, we call this our wow philosophy. Customer service is now a department — it’s a state of mind. It’s a personal responsibility of not only customer service representatives (CSRs), but of everyone in the organization. From the top down, even if you never speak to a customer, you need to treat everyone, including your vendors, creditors, suppliers, and so on, with sincerity and respect. Every time a customer comes into contact with your business, whether in person, on the phone, or on your website, it’s a moment of truth. Your reputation is about to get either better or worse.