Better Process Management Through Improved Customer Service and Experience
Posted: Tue Jan 28, 2025 3:56 am
I talked to Roy Barnes, author of ‘Customer Experience for Dummies’ about the difference between customer service and customer experience and how better process improvement matters for both.
Roy, you have talked about realizing the difference between customer experience and customer service. Why can’t the customer experience be exceptional without exceptional customer service?
Delivering consistently good customer service should be a given. Its table stakes – a basic expectation. Good customer service processes are the foundation upon which great customer experience is built. Delivering mobile numbers list great customer experience requires a change in mindset, moving from a transactional to a relationship management view. It requires looking past just the individual pieces of customer interactions to managing them as a whole.
What’s the main reason that internal customer relations go badly?
Principally it stems from an almost complete lack of understanding how “other” functional areas within the business operate. Most employees focus their time, energy, and efforts on what’s going on in their silo, their department, or discipline. Sadly, most employees’ rewards and recognition comes not from working effectively across internal boundaries but from optimizing their piece of a larger effort. The basic organization structure of most business is one of the root causes of bad internal customer relations.
Investing in customer experience tools for internal customers sound like a big investment in time and resources. Do you have any advice on how to make the business case for this type of effort?
Improving internal customer experience doesn’t have to be a big investment. The effort starts with being clear about the internal experience you want to offer and then mapping your internal customer interactions. Next, make small, incremental changes over time. The key to creating a return on capital employed is to understand what the true costs are of not meeting internal customer performance metrics.
Roy, you have talked about realizing the difference between customer experience and customer service. Why can’t the customer experience be exceptional without exceptional customer service?
Delivering consistently good customer service should be a given. Its table stakes – a basic expectation. Good customer service processes are the foundation upon which great customer experience is built. Delivering mobile numbers list great customer experience requires a change in mindset, moving from a transactional to a relationship management view. It requires looking past just the individual pieces of customer interactions to managing them as a whole.
What’s the main reason that internal customer relations go badly?
Principally it stems from an almost complete lack of understanding how “other” functional areas within the business operate. Most employees focus their time, energy, and efforts on what’s going on in their silo, their department, or discipline. Sadly, most employees’ rewards and recognition comes not from working effectively across internal boundaries but from optimizing their piece of a larger effort. The basic organization structure of most business is one of the root causes of bad internal customer relations.
Investing in customer experience tools for internal customers sound like a big investment in time and resources. Do you have any advice on how to make the business case for this type of effort?
Improving internal customer experience doesn’t have to be a big investment. The effort starts with being clear about the internal experience you want to offer and then mapping your internal customer interactions. Next, make small, incremental changes over time. The key to creating a return on capital employed is to understand what the true costs are of not meeting internal customer performance metrics.