4 Things You Should Know About Customer Satisfaction

From Wikipedia:
According to Jamier L. Scott. (2002), “Customer service is a series of activities designed to enhance the level of customer satisfaction – that is, the feeling that a product or service has met the customer expectation."

From "Star Trek: The Next Generation: Relics (#6.4)" (1992)

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Look, Mr. Scott, I'd love to explain everything to you, but the Captain wants this spectrographic analysis done by 1300 hours.
[La Forge goes back to work; Scotty follows slowly]

Scotty: Do you mind a little advice? Starfleet captains are like children. They want everything right now and they want it their way. But the secret is to give them only what they need, not what they want.

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Yeah, well, I told the Captain I'd have this analysis done in an hour.

Scotty: How long will it really take?

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: An hour!

Scotty: Oh, you didn't tell him how long it would *really* take, did ya?

Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge: Well, of course I did.

Scotty: Oh, laddie. You've got a lot to learn if you want people to think of you as a miracle worker.


The concept of under-promising and over-delivering isn’t new; and while we’d all like to be considered miracle workers by our customers and clients, it’s pretty unlikely that we will. Why is that? It’s mainly because it’s hard to be a miracle worker when you don’t have any magic powers. The onus is on us, i.e. as business owners, to develop and manage expectations based on what we can reasonably provide. Because most customers know what they want – based on their ever-evolving experiences - and can get pretty upset when their expectations are not met.

1. Expectations can change.

I remember the first time I encountered a pay-first gas station. It was in Michigan and I was mutely livid (there was no one handy to rant at) that I should have to deal with such a ridiculous condition and vowed never to return. Unfortunately, virtually every other gas station known to man followed suit shortly thereafter. My reaction at the second encounter was, “Oh, so this is how it’s going to be. This is the new norm.” I wasn’t angry, I was resigned. My expectations had changed, at least when it came to fuelling up at gas stations.

2. Policies don’t produce customer satisfaction

And while we all have our favourite customer satisfaction horror stories, one of the most famous was back in July of 2009 when Dave Carroll uploaded his United Breaks Guitar Video to YouTube. It quickly went ‘viral’ (9.7 million hits and counting) and began one of the most effective social media campaigns ever. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo For those of you that haven’t seen the videos (there are several), Dave Carroll is a musician that was travelling to a gig and United Airlines broke his guitar during transit. Initially, they refused to offer any compensation but once Dave’s video garnered national media attention, they relented. Dave was compensated for his guitar (almost two years after the fact), and United has changed their policies and procedures thanks to Dave’s genius.

We all know that the squeaky wheel gets the oil but not all the time and frequently not right away. It has to drive us crazy first. What’s interesting is that most businesses have a ton of policies in place to try and dictate customer relations. Instead of enabling people on the front lines to make decisions, it’s generally someone from the back office dictating “policy”. To be fair, in most cases they’re the ones that understand the” big picture” but that doesn’t negate the fact that there are always exceptions to every rule. Businesses are generally predictable in how they react and one could argue they have actually conditioned customers to complain. It’s their policy.

3. Make your customers feel special

So how does a business owner effectively achieve great customer satisfaction while managing customer expectations? The simple answer is to understand and exceed those expectations. You make your customers feel special and there are some really simple and effective ways to do that. The most common and obvious is to address the customer by name. Most people love to hear the sound of their own name (it is more personalized and makes the person feel recognized and important). The first person to think of it probably made a huge impression. In today’s world, where CRM (Customer Relationship Management) systems are standard, most people standing in front of a service representative with a computer can be expected to be addressed by their first names. But at the end of the day, it’s still that little something extra. Although, I must admit I find it vaguely annoying when I’ve literally never met the person before and they repeatedly call me by name. Personally, I find it a little too familiar.

For small business owners, the most common method to deliver customer satisfaction is to give a lot of time and attention to their customers. It’s a great strategy when you have time but not sustainable as a company grows and gets busier. There are only so many hours in a day and the busier it gets the less time that can be spent on an individual.

The caveat is that if you built your business based on the time and attention given to your customers and it’s why they do business with you - you need to be careful about how you proceed. Changing or fine- tuning how you offer your product or service can work. Businesses do it all the time. In fact, it can be argued that it’s necessary and that if you don’t, you will be left behind. But you need to clearly identify and understand your customer’s needs and then provide a solution that resonates with them even though the “solution” may vary.

4. It’s all in your perspective.

Here’s my favourite customer satisfaction story. When I was taking my coaching training in Toronto, I would stop at a Tim Hortons near Bloor & Yonge for my morning tea and bagel. An apparently homeless, long haired, middle- aged Ted Nugent look-alike would open the door for me, smile and cheerily say good morning. The first time it happened, I was taken aback and wondered why the Tim Horton’s allowed him to play the part of ‘greeter’. But it didn’t take long for me to start giving him loonies and I doubt I was the only one. I often wanted to ask him about his ‘methodology’ (and life story) but of course I never did. In hindsight, I think his ‘methodology’ was as simple as it was obvious: he did it because it worked. He was consistently respectful and kind and appeared to expect nothing but would graciously accept whatever money was offered. In fact, the first time I gave him a loonie he seemed surprised. And if I didn’t offer him a loonie on a particular day, he didn’t seem to care. It was fascinating! Here was a man who was completely focused on “his customers” to the point of appearing completely selfless. And even though he was apparently homeless and I suspect suffering both physically and mentally, he was still able to consistently treat people with graciousness. It was impressive.

As customers, often we feel ignored or invisible or worse. As a business owner, I know it’s hard to be up all the time but if a down- and- out, homeless man can do it – then the rest of us should be able to follow his fine example.