Is Your Customer Service Killing Customer Loyalty?

As marketers, we spend a lot of time, money, energy and brain power designing and building programs that will drive inquiries, close sales or increase brand engagement. And once a sale is secured, we move into loyalty mode, lovingly nurturing that customer to buy more and buy more often in order to derive a long term revenue stream and ROI for the marketing investment. So what the hell is wrong with the customer service folks? Didn't they get the memo that says, "Our customers are those people who make sure you get your paycheck. So let's treat them with respect, concern and understanding. Because if we do, they'll keep buying from us again, and again and again."? Apparently, the customer service folks at Dell never got the memo—and shame on them, because they've now lost my business for life. Granted, I run a smaller agency and my lack of future purchases will not put Dell out of business. But I think there's a big lesson that many companies can learn from my experience, and that's to take a moment to really examine what goes on inside these departments. For the record, we've been purchasing Dell products for well over 10 years now. Laptops, towers, printers, screens ... you name it. My IT guy likes the ease of ordering online and the ability to carefully customize each of our purchases for the user. So when we recently did a little expansion by hiring a new employee, we turned once again to Dell for a new desktop PC. Little did we know it would be the last transaction we'd ever make with them—and all because of how we were treated when something went wrong with the order. Here's a quick factual summary: Friday, Aug. 24: Order placed online. Monday, Aug. 27: Order ships. Tuesday, Sept. 4: According to the FedEx tracking number, the order was delivered and signed for—unfortunately, FedEx delivered it to the wrong company at the wrong address! Thursday, Sept. 6: FedEx reroutes package to us. It arrives and appears to have been opened and resealed. Since this is a PC, I don't want an opened box, so we try to refuse the delivery. FedEx persists and requires us to contact their customer service to arrange a return to sender. Monday, Sept 10: FedEx picks up tower. Monday, Sept 10: Alert Dell; they promise to "expedite" a replacement order. Friday, Sept 14: Dell informs us the PC is still "being built." I must interrupt the facts to say "Wha--?" When we ordered the first time, it took them 2 days to build it. But when we ordered our replacement, it's now taking more than 5 days to build the same computer? It only gets better ... Monday, Sept. 17: Dells says, "Still building." What on earth are they building for us? We try to reach a "customer care" rep. (BTW, I HATE that term. I wish organizations would call a spade a spade— it's plain old customer service. Or perhaps since "service" doesn't seem to be part of the equation, that's why they changed it. So they "care" but they cannot "service"?) Net-net, phone numbers we are provided don't work. (Ring, ring, ring... apparently Dell hasn't heard of that new-fangled technology called voicemail.) Emails go unanswered, emails to the supervisor bounce back as "out of the office." Did I mention my new employee is twiddling thumbs doing idle work as she can only get so much done on her smart phone? Tuesday, Sept. 18: Dell emails us saying the order will now be "escalated" and we'll be kept aware of the status. Okay Dell. It's been 25 days since I placed my order and there is still no confirmed delivery date is sight. I give up. I cancel the order and buy from a local retailer. No apologies from Dell to try and retain my business. No offers on a future purchase. Nothing. Nada. Apparently Dell's customer care folks forgot that those marketing millions spent on driving in leads, nurturing relationships and transacting sales have all been an investment in their job security. Not only did Dell blow it, but I won't even attempt to make another purchase from them—ever. As a customer, I get infuriated just thinking about this incident. As a marketer, I cringe. If you are responsible for marketing in your organization, do you spend any time at all investigating what goes on in "customer care"? You should—because it may be the reason you're not making your marketing and sales goals.

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Is Your Customer Service Killing Customer Loyalty?

Carolyn Goodman

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Carolyn Goodman