| Background |
| A major Internet Marketing company had been experiencing a high level of Customer dissatisfaction with one of
their product lines following implementation. |
 |
| During the height of the Dotcom boom, the company had been selling hard and building its delivery capability
as fast as it could to keep up with the ever growing momentum. This had led to a lack of focus after the sale and meant that once a Customer had
made a purchase, they often had little more to rely on than help via email. |
|
| Achievements |
| The symptoms the company had been suffering from were primarily the result of Customers dissatisfaction
stemming from unrealistic expectations. |
|
| To resolve these issues, the James Lambert consultant set up an Account Management group and introduced a managed
implementation process so that expectations could be set correctly from the beginning of the relationship. Consequently, not only did the
Customers get a good first experience with the product, but the supplier's revenues and profits also increased as a result. which was able to successfully deal with these problems. |
|
| Additional benefits of the solution included allowing management to focus on moving the business forward whilst the Account
Managers dealt with any Customer issues. In addition, Customers were now more likely to become advocates of, and act as references for the
supplier, an important element in any sales effort. |
|
| The work done to resolve the issues of an unhappy Customer after the sale would now be agreed and carried out on a chargeable
basis during implementation, creating a much more positive result for both parties. |
|
| Challenges |
-
Information about the product was not clearly communicated before a purchase. This meant that the Customer naturally formed an unrealistically
high level of expectation.
-
In most cases the Customer's staff were not expert in their own business operations and so found it hard to learn and use the new product.
-
The help available via email and telephone from the supplier often had significant time zone delays, adding to the frustration of not being able
to rectify the situation. Frequently, even when the technical solution had been provided, the Customer felt the problems had not been dealt
with.
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In some cases Customers had been left with unresolved problems, real and perceived, for some time. These situations could become very
heated and tended to involve a significant amount of senior management time.
|
| Approach |
-
Management of Customer Situations
A group of Account Managers was formed in the
local time zone to improve Customer's access to help and support with their problems. Having someone to work directly with the
Customer allowed better understanding of the issues and it also helped to ensure that the problems were resolved in the Customers mind.
A process called Critical Situation Management was developed by the consultant for use in the most heated of cases. The two main
features of this process were (a) the introduction of a new dedicated Critical Situation Manager (CSM), and (b) the use of a highly structured communication plan
to
develop a very close relationship with the Customer.
This worked well because the CSM was not seen to be part of the
original problem by the Customer. By concentrating on communicating well, a level of trust could be developed which helped overcome any conflicts and move
the Customer towards a speedy resolution.
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Improved Product Implementation
To ensure the Customer's expectations of what the
product could do were set properly at the onset, the implementation process was started much earlier. Informed Project
Managers discussed the Customer requirements using the dialogue as an opportunity to communicate what was possible, and to design the best plan for
implementation with the Customer. This allowed the Customer to form a realistic expectation and helped maximise the potential of a successful implementation
the first time out.
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Customer Education
After initial installation, as the market developed new methods that had to be incorporated into the use of the product there was still potential for
issues to arise. The solution here involved setting up
events to provide Customers with the help they needed to adopt these new requirements into their working practices. These events also allowed the
supplier to set expectations about upcoming changes to the product, and perhaps more importantly, were a good networking opportunity for both for
the supplier and their Customers.
Events were not the
only an opportunity to provide help. The Account Managers would often organise consulting sessions to work with individual Customers on their
specific issues.
|
| Benefits |
| As can be seen, the vastly improved communication and customer service resulted in significant benefits to both the supplier and
their clients, and had a major positive impact on the company's bottom line. |
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