Monthly Archives: September 2010

The Cult of Customer Amazement

The Internet Show About Small Business Marketing

Shep Hyken Customer Experience

Podcast Episode #65: Amazing Customer Experiences with Shep Hyken


It’s easy to say “I want my customers to be loyal.” It’s tougher to actually achieve that goal. To earn your customers’ loyalty you have to earn their confidence. Without confidence, you cannot have loyalty. Confidence is a product of consistently delivering a better-than-average experience every time you interact with the customer. It’s not about being perfect, perfection is a goal that’s not reality. However, you can realistically amaze your customers by delivering an above-average experience.

In this episode of Power to the Small Business, customer service expert Shep Hyken joins host Jay Ehret to talk customer loyalty and amazement. Hyken believes that customer expectations are so low right now, that it doesn’t take much to exceed them. He believes you can build a cult of customer amazement.

Guest: Shep Hyken – Customer Service Speaker, St. Louis
Length: 28 minutes

Email subscribers and feed readers – If you don’t see the player, click here to listen to Power to the Small Business

You can also download the mp3 file here: Download Power to the Small Business #65 (for personal use only)


iTunes
To receive new episodes by email, use the link below and enter your email address. (We keep these private and don’t give or sell them to anyone)
Subscribe to Power to the Small Business Podcast by Email

SHOW NOTES

The Five Phases of the Customer

  1. The Cult of Uncertainty – The first time a customer does business with you, they’re not 100% sure what they’re going to get.
  2. The Cult of Alignment –Customers understand what you promise, what you deliver.
  3. The Cult of Experience – Customers experience what you promise.
  4. The Cult of Ownership – When it is experienced more than once, it become predictable and owned.
  5. The Cult of Amazement – If the predictable, owned experience is better than average.


Moment of misery:
That bad moment in the customer’s experience.

Moment of mediocrity: A moment in the customer’s experience that is average.

Moment of magic: That moment in the customer’s experience that is above average. The moment of magic is all about managing customer interactions for a positive experience, an above average experience.

SELECTED QUOTES FROM SHEP HYKEN

“The goal is, ‘what am I doing right now to make sure that customer’s going to want to come back the next time.’ And you focus on that thought, every time.”

“People think amazement has to be: ‘Blow me away. Wow! Fantastic! ’ …But the great companies…really are nothing more than better than average, all of the time.”

“In a small business, what they (the customer) has is access: access to the owner, access to the top employees. …I think access is a pretty cool thing.”

“The customer is not always right, but they are always the customer. You have to figure out a way to let them be wrong with dignity.”

SHOW LINKS

Shep Hyken’s Website: www.Hyken.com
Shep Hyken’s Book: The Cult of the Customer
Book referenced in show: Moments of Truth by Jan Carlzon

Episode 64: Marketers Roundtable 7 – Discussion of Current Marketing Issues

Current Marketing Issues Podcast

The Internet Show About Small Business Marketing

Podcast Episode #64: Marketers Roundtable


Hear ye, Hear ye! Interested citizens of The Internet, you are invited to the seventh gathering of the Marketers Roundtable.

Whereas marketers like to congregate and discuss marketing,

Therefore, let them gather at The Marketers RoundTable to discuss hot marketing topics for all to hear on Power to the Small Business .

Guests:
Shashi BellamkondaNetwork Solutions
Scott EllisTechnology Translated
Erica CampbellForRent.com
Jay Ehret The Marketing Spot (Podcast Host)

Length: 29 minutes

Email subscribers and feed readers – If you don’t see the player, click here to listen to Power to the Small Business

You can also download the mp3 file here: Download Power to the Small Business #64 (for personal use only)

iTunes

Selected quotes from the marketers:

ON USING YOUR OFFICE AS A NETWORKING TOOL

SCOTT ELLIS: “One of the biggest mistakes I see people making is pounding away at whatever social media outlets they’re using and not getting out there and making those personal connections.”

JAY EHRET:“Even though I’m constantly talking to other people on social media, I think I’m missing out on that personal face-to-face contact by being trapped in my home office.”

SHASHI BELLAMKONDA: “You can efficiently reach more people using these tools, but you shouldn’t forget the fact that you need to have face-to-face interaction.”

ERICA CAMPBELL: “It just makes for a stronger organization, rather than doing everything just online.“

ON ONLINE CONTENT ORGANIZATION

SHASHI BELLAMKONDA: “When a person comes to your website, they don’t have time to go through what you think is cool. They should be able to conduct their business as quickly and as efficiently as possible.”

SCOTT ELLIS: “It really behooves someone to spend quite a bit of time really thinking through all of the different types of content that are going to be on their site and how those things are going to impact what their goals are.”

ERICA CAMPBELL: “Look at it in five pieces where you’ve got your communication piece, your connect, your collecting, organizing and categorizing of your content, your customization, and your conversation.”

JAY EHRET: “What’s the most important thing I want my website to do? Take that as the starting point and say everything I do with this website should be organized around that one thing that I want people to do when they come to my website.”

ON SOCIAL MEDIA CONTESTS AND CONSUMER LOYALTY

SCOTT ELLIS: “The advantage, and the risk, with video is that the barriers to entry to producing a reasonably good quality video are just a little bit higher than they are for doing something as simple as writing a blog post or publishing a picture.”

ERICA CAMPBELL: “Another issue is coming up with what exactly your contest should be and what the consumer need is, because that will help unfold how successful your contest is.”

SHASHI BELLAMKONDA: “If you’re going to upload a picture on to your website or property. Make sure you can post it on other places also and use it commonly. You increase your audience a lot.”

JAY EHRET: “You still need to have something interesting happening in the contest… You need that engaging content, but at the same time you need people to participate too.”

ON THE COUPON AND DISCOUNT CRAZE

SCOTT ELLIS: “While you want to be reasonably priced for whatever you’re offering, you don’t want that to be your competitive differentiator. That just spells a long, slow death for most businesses.””

ERICA CAMPBELL: “…mobile coupons and location-based advertising coupons that you may find on Foursquare are really exciting.”

JAY EHRET: “I think in the long run…it could be a death spiral.

SHASHI BELLAMKONDA: “There will always be opportunities to keep trying things and see what works. I think people should definitely try it to see does this work for me or not.”

Show Links

Shashi Bellamkonda: GrowSmartBiz Conference@ShashiB on Twitter
Scott Ellis: VSEllis.com@vsellis on Twitter
Erica Campbell: ForRent.com@ericacampbell on Twitter
Jay Ehret: Free Word-of-Mouth Webinar@TheMarketingGuy on Twitter

To receive new episodes by email, enter your email address.
(We keep these private and do not give or sell them to anyone else)




Delivered by FeedBurner