How to Create a Customer Centric Culture in 6 Easy Steps

By Keith Schorah, CEO, SynGro

www.syngro.com

+44(0) 1506 592 224

Introduction

In this paper SynGro describes in six easy steps how to create a customer-centric culture. The paper includes insights on how organisations can use feedback to their advantage by driving vision and action enterprise-wide.

Oxford Brookes University claims that UK businesses are losing around 20 million customers each year due to poor customer service, equating to losses of 3.69 billion. It is no big secret that understanding what customers want is the best way to keep them happy. Organisations spend hundreds of thousands of pounds engaging with customers through multiple channels, whether through face to face interviews, outsourcing to call centres or creating web-based surveys, in a bid to gain their feedback and keep them as customers.

So why are so many customers still unhappy? Gartner Research identified that whilst 95% of companies collect customer feedback, just 10% actually use the data to make improvements. Warwick Business School highlighted that 75% of customer feedback remains unread as organisations struggle to manage the volume and complexity of customer insights.

Youre drowning in data but are you doing anything about it?

Not having a robust customer feedback management strategy is typical of many organisations that simply fail to understand the importance of taking action on the data that is collected. Organisations generate useful customer data and reporting outputs, but they do not actually do anything with this information to better their business. Using this data within an organisation, both operationally and strategically, to help drive business growth, is vital. Below are six steps for driving action from customer feedback that will help organisations improve customer satisfaction and retention and positively impact the bottom line.

Did you know

Top management priorities will shift over the year ahead from the costcutting focus of early 2009 towards retaining customers and improving existing relationships, according to Gartner.

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The six ingredients for a customer-centric culture

1. Sponsorship from the top CEO vision

Organisations will only succeed in their customer feedback programme if the CEO has a customer-centric vision - the customer must be at the heart of everything the company does. Executives who recently responded to Forrester Research analysis on customer experience programmes cited a lack of senior management involvement as one of the main obstacles for improving customer experience... When implementing a strategic customer feedback management programme, organisations must establish clear objectives from the top; customer engagement is an ongoing process which is aimed at creating a cultural change within an organisation to improve the customer experience.

Follow the customer,

if they change... we change

Sir Terry Leahy, Chief Executive Tesco Plc

2. Motivating employees to listen and act

Employees are an organisations greatest tool when it comes to ensuring a positive customer experience. Making sure that they are focused on the customer and fully motivated to provide exceptional customer service, is essential. Use a system that clearly defines what actions are required to rectify issues and respond to the customer. Create support hubs where employees can go to for guidance if dealing with a customer complaint.

Enhance the customer experience closing the loop

Low customer satisfaction score

Complaint

N
Client happy?
Record the system share around the organisation Understand reasons

Happy with fix?

Can I fix?

N Y
Fix immediately if possible

Allocate team to fix

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3. Staying ahead of the competition

In order to compete effectively, products and services should be benchmarked against those offered by competitors. Speaking to customers can help in understanding where your organisation fits in with the competition. The information gathered can then be used to drive various actions: to improve your offering or to help sales people when speaking to customers about a product or service.

4. Identifying key areas of risk and opportunity

Customer enquiries and complaints come with built-in opportunities that can help in understanding what the organisation is good at and where it can make improvements. With the insights that are gathered and communicated through an effective customer feedback management system, it is possible to identify and quickly address specific problems, spot trends and take advantage of emerging opportunities long before the competition. Fast, clear and specific actions can be taken to help running the business better, gaining competitive advantages and driving growth.

5. Busting the silos, creating synergy and results

Customer feedback must be reviewed, analysed, reported upon and disseminated out to where it is most relevant within the organisation thereafter. Many organisations have a mound of customer feedback that is never properly reviewed or if it is, it takes weeks to gather into a meaningful report, by which time it will likely be somewhat out of date. Data should be stored centrally so that the information is accessible to all departments. A system should be set up that provides real-time reports which are distributed to the relevant people, allowing them to act on issues with all the knowledge available. Being better informed and sharing knowledge is the key to creating enterprise-wide best practices in dealing with customers and achieving the ultimate results from their feedback.

6. Integrating the voice of the customer into business operations

ALWAYS ensure that the feedback you obtain is actually used! Use it to identify patterns of customer dissatisfaction and to set up individual projects if necessary. Complaint management tools can be implemented to allow you to alert relevant people if complaints escalate. A follow up system will allow you to close the loop on each issue. Develop an action plan that focuses on building on what is working well, resolving any areas that are causing customers concern. Organisations that take the time to actively listen to customers, gather their feedback, and vitally take actions to improve their business, will not only survive, but also thrive when it comes to competing for and retaining customers.

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Conclusion

Creating and establishing a successful customer feedback programme requires commitment, vision and dedication from both top level management and employees. With the correct technology and services available to you, gathering feedback and analysing insights will become second nature, opening up a wealth of opportunity for organisations to become customer-centric creating a competitive edge, improving business processes and ultimately enhancing customer service. However it is important to always remember that taking action on customer feedback is the important aspect, as this is where the real value is delivered, creating happy customers who stay loyal.

About SynGro

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Founded in 2004, SynGro is a leading provider of customer feedback technology and customer retention programmes for large enterprise.

Working with complex organisations with large customer bases across the world, SynGro provides solutions to gather real-time customer feedback, and implement programmes to show organisations how best to act on data to help shape strategy, achieve continual business improvement and positively affect their bottom line.

Enterprise Feedback Management (EFM) is an emerging market and since its introduction more and more companies are striving to integrate customers closely into their business operations.

About the Author: Keith Schorah

Keith Schorah founded SynGro in 2004, following a distinguished career in sales and marketing within the IT, telecommunications and industrial sectors, and a long consulting background of designing and implementing customer service programmes in companies around the world. Keith holds a B.Eng Electrical Engineering from the University of Salford and an MBA in Marketing, Research, Strategy and Entrepreneurship from Bond University. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing and a longstanding member of the Institute of Directors (IoD).

Interested in learning more about SynGro? Learn how we can help you to create a customer centric culture from your customer feedback

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Copyright SynGro Limited 2010 - 2012

www.syngro.com

+44(0) 1506 592 224