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Tag: customer care

  • Service Gaps Model for Exceptional Customer Service

    I’m not a big fan of marketing and business development ‘models’ in general, but I do like the Service Gaps Model. It’s old-fashioned, perhaps, but still works for me and the many service businesses I deliver mentoring to.

    Essentially, the Service Gaps Model is a way of reviewing the performance of a business, as measured against what the customer had perceived the service would be before experiencing it.

    But crucially, it also measures performance against how management had declared it should be. In other words, actual performance is measured against both internal and external preconceptions.

    Let’s put some meat on this.

    Imagine a person walks into a restaurant and orders the full breakfast for Euro 8. She imagines that this would include not only the fry but also tea and toast. In fact, she is surprised to be charged an extra Euro 1 for this. This is a service gap.

    On the other hand, imagine the manager of the above restaurant prescribes that the breakfast should include two sausages and two rashers, along with the rest. In fact, there is a new recruit in the kitchen who has been putting three of each on the plate since he arrived yesterday. Again, this is a service gap.

    Service Gaps Model

    Service gaps can result in fluctuating margins and disappointed customers. And we all know that the disgruntled customer goes away and tells twenty friends about the experience…

    One of the Seven Ps of Marketing is People. While it’s clear that people are critical to the success of any business, this is particularly the case in services. Training of staff is important, but then so too is the role of management in determining the level of service that should be delivered to the customer and ensuring that it is both appropriate and delivered upon.

    Understanding the Service Gaps Model gives insight into how providing exceptional service that surpasses customer expectations can drive your business forward and make it stand out from others that have not given due consideration to this powerful marketing tool.

    Service Gaps Model – The 5 gaps you need to close :

    1. Customer perception of what they will receive (Expected Service) v Management perception of what the customer will expect.
    2. Management perception of what the customer will expect v Management specification of what the service should provide.
    3. Management specification of what the service should provide v What actually happens.
    4. What actually happens v What was ‘promised’ through communication and promotion.
    5. What actually happens in the eyes of the customer (Perceived Service) v Customer’s prior perception (Expected Service).

    Service Gaps Model – What you need to do to close gaps and deliver the type of outstanding customer care you’re aiming for :

    • Carry out marketing research, talk to your customers, ask questions and listen to what customers say and want.
    • Communicate clearly to your customer what he will receive and when. Do not over-promise and under-deliver and be sure that every marketing claim is justified.
    • Commit to service quality. Train and match the right people to the right job.
    • Preach uniformity, standardise tasks and levels to be delivered. Lead by example and do not cut corners.
    • Improve two-way internal communication between front-line staff and management, as well as between marketing, design and technical / production departments.
    • Work as a team towards a common branding goal, recognise and reward the delivery of quality service across your team.

  • Customer Care at the Cleaning Company

    It’s a few years since I met these people, but the client’s name recently popped up in a conversation. This cleaning company has been very successful over the years and I remember them as one of the most impressive small businesses I’ve come across.

    First, their business is spread quite widely across the country. Despite this, they retain excellent customer relations because they put it at the very core of everything they do. This is not just lip-service, but genuine quality customer care. They’re all the time talking with their customers, reviewing budgets and what can be achieved within the means of the people who employ their service. They talk to them as fellow humans, not as paying customers, and they’re not trying to sell a service the customer cannot afford.customer care at the cleaning company

    Second, they do as they say. With many services that call to the home nowadays – like the tv guy, boiler guy, phone and broadband guy – the customer receives no more than a vague “morning” or “afternoon” slot for the call around and is expected to just sit at home and wait. As if they had nothing else to do with their lives. Not so here. This service gives a tight one-hour window in which they will call around. Much more reasonable, much more acceptable, much more customer-centric.

    Third, the business keeps in touch via email. But not just any old humdrum marketing-heavy newsletter. No. These regular emails don’t mention the services of the business at all. There’s no pushiness; there’s no up-selling. It’s fantastic.

    Learn More

    If you’re in a service business, you could do a lot worse than consider the quality of customer care at the cleaning company. And while you’re at it, read this post on the importance of people in services marketing.

    Here’s a nice article on customer care from thebalance.com.

    Keep getting better.

  • A Flying Leopard Cannot Change Its Spots

    A few short years ago, amid great fanfare, Ryanair announced to the world that it was changing the way it did business. Changing its spots, if you will. The airline, declared Mr. O’Leary, would “try to eliminate things that unnecessarily piss people off”.

    Apparently, this change of heart was due to some significant shareholders being worried about the capacity of one of the world’s biggest airlines to grow yet further under its previous ‘customer service’ regime. Read this 2013 Conor Pope article.

    Now, I should declare at the outset that I’m a huge fan of Ryanair and thank it enormously for the massive expansion in the number of destinations we can all fly to non-stop from Ireland and, of course, for its low fares. The over-the-top rules and regulations that characterised its modus operandi never really bothered me. Indeed, I specifically bought a cabin bag that didn’t break its dimensions rule. I never allowed it to weigh more than the permitted 10kg. I never put a bag in the hold.

    But this year has seen that, it would appear, a flying leopard cannot change its spots.

    flying leopard cannot change its spots
    Screengrab of Ryanair’s Website

    Just a few short years into its new cuddly, friendly skin, Ryanair has reverted to type with its new, unnecessary splitting of groups (often, families) that book but don’t choose the option to pay for allocated seats.

    So, off to Girona we went this summer without taking up this option and, lo and behold, we were placed all over the plane. Not even two of the five of us were on the same row, on either the outward or homebound legs. And all the other families around us were complaining of the same. For that matter, neither flight was full, so that wasn’t the reason. Clearly, it’s policy. In the past, we never once paid for priority boarding or seat allocation, yet always got to sit together. No longer so, it would seem.

    Conor Pope wrote about this in the Irish Times in June 2017.

    Luckily, our youngest is now 13, so it’s not a big deal for us.

    You’ve heard it before, “don’t over-promise and under-deliver”.

    In your marketing communications, if you make some sort of promise or declaration about your customer service and the experience your customers will have, be sure that your customers will indeed have that experience.

    Oh, and try not to unnecessarily piss people off.

    And I haven’t even mentioned the outrageous cancellation of hundreds of flights this autumn …