The 60 Second Customer Experience Evaluation

It’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day actions and forget to step back and see the big picture of customer experience.

We often hear that we need to stop and evaluate, but if you’re like me, you don’t feel like you have time to stop. But reviewing customer experience is critical to maintaining focus on exceptional focus.

Your customer has needs, your boss has needs, your team members all have needs. Luckily, you CAN take time to step back, review, and make plans for improving customer service and recharging the customer experience. All it takes is 60 seconds, and you’re ready to take action. I recently caught the AllBusiness guide to evaluations and I want to share how to apply it to customer experience evaluation.

The 60 Second Customer Experience Evaluation

In 60 seconds, you can see exactly where you are in the customer experience journey, and how you’re using customer service to develop loyal customers by answering these simple questions.

0:60 – Is customer experience and service part of your business culture?

Take a look around you right now. Do you see customer experience, customer service, and customer focus integrated into what you’re doing right now? If you were to freeze time right now, would each individual in the organization be thinking about the customer experience? Acting with customer focus? It’s this mentality that determines if customer experience is part of our business culture.

Customer service and customer experience often become routine, day-to-day, go through the motions, actions. It’s inevitable since it’s the essence of what you do. Work with customers. But even though it’s common place, it’s crucial to the ongoing success of your organization. Customer experience in the groundwork for future customer relationships.

0:50 – Do you have a customer experience advantage?

When asked what we offer, or what we do, we typically begin long-winded explanations of business processes, service, or products. But are you communicating this effectively to your entire organization? If your team consistent with your customer experience advantage?

Can you break down your unique customer offering into a 1 minute pitch? How about 30 seconds? 15 seconds? 10 seconds? 5 seconds? Get the idea?

Break down what you do, what you offer, you value statement into long, medium, and short pitches. Communicate that to your organization. Get people involved, committed, and connected with it.

0:35 – Is customer communication part of your customer experience?

Take a few seconds and look around at your team. How are they communicating with your customers? Are your customers able to reach you? Access information? Get resolution? Think of the touch points between your organization and your customer. Is your interaction satisfactory to your customers? Do your customers wish for more? Easier access? Better results?

An 800 number and an IVR maze or phone queue isn’t communication. It’s frustration. Effective customer experience involves having communication channels available to customers, with competent and qualified team members who can take action to meet customer needs.

0:25 – How quickly does your customer service respond to customers?

We live in a digital age. We have instant Internet access, instant messaging, instant coffee. So why do we still wait 20+ minutes on hold when we call customer service?

In our previous question we talked about communication channels, but now we’re digging down and evaluating those channels at meeting the needs and wants of customers. Are we doing that?

• Is our personal communication instant?
• How long are customers on hold on the phone before speaking to someone?
• How long do they wait before chatting?
• How long before their emails get a reply?
• How long do they search your site before they find the information they need?

0:15 – Do you use customer service to let customers know you appreciate them?

In a time where customers feel more and more ignored, where customer service is becoming more generic, impersonal, and robotic, what better way to differentiate yourself from the competition and set your customer experience apart from the crowd than by taking time to thank your customers. Don’t have time? Me either, but the time spent in thanking customers goes a long way to solidify the customer’s relationship with your people and your brand.

The simple fact is, very few businesses stop and take the time to thank their customers.  When they do, it exceeds our expectations and stands out above other experiences.

-Becky Carroll, CustomersRock!

Thanks in business may seem like a natural, but too often it’s not genuine. Thanking customers rarely is part of a business plan. Thanking customers is often absent from marketing plans. Thanking customers is seldom genuine. Stand out by making thanking customers a part of your operation. Make thanking customers part of your culture. Make thanking customers your competitive advantage.

0:05 – Does your customer experience include customer feedback?

The CEO may sign your paycheck, but it’s the customer who funds the business. The customer is your ultimate boss. Are you listening to what they have to say? Feedback isn’t a right, it’s a privilege. Customer feedback is the way you stay in touch with customer needs and customer wants.

Getting and using feedback is part of the customer experience. Be willing to listen, and MOST IMPORTANT…do something about the feedback your customers give.

How did you do?

After these 60 seconds you should have a good idea of how you’re currently doing in implementing customer service to develop an exceptional customer experience that creates sustained growth and loyal customers. By answering these quick questions, you should now know what customer experience areas need development, what needs to be changed, and what you can tackle to put the focus of work back on the customer.