I’ve found that most CEOs and senior executives believe their company provides excellent customer service. If you asked all 330 million people in the United States to name five leaders in customer service, most wouldn’t name five.

I started developing Feelings, the world’s first customer service program, in 1979. It was launched in January 1980 and was based on a very simple concept. If you have fantastic customer service, customers will come back, spend more money and bring their friends. If you have bad customer service, customers won’t buy your product or service or recommend it to their friends. I believe customer service is worse today than it was in 1979. Covid gave everyone an excuse to give up on customer service.

The economy is likely to tighten and become more difficult. The easiest way to combat this is to have well-trained employees who provide excellent customer service. There are no educational institutions anywhere in the world that teach customer service. There is little chance that a previous employer has trained your employees in customer service. The customer service course employees took 5-10 years ago is out of sight and out of mind.

Most employees think they’re doing a great job. The customer service surveys most companies conduct are a waste of time and money. Nobody reads them or does anything with them. Many of the questions aren’t relevant. Most employees aren’t engaged and just come to work.

What would happen if people asked for a company with great customer service and everyone recommended it? That’s word of mouth. It’s 100 times cheaper than paid advertising and 100 times more effective.

You can start training your staff in customer service now. September is the time when everyone loves to start training their staff. The kids are back in school and the holidays are over. If you lay the foundations for great customer service now, it will pay off in the future by increasing sales and repeat business.

For more information about John Tschohl and the Service Quality Institute, visit customer-service.com.

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