- Micah Solomon is a customer service expert, consultant, and the author of "Ignore Your Customer (And They'll Go Away): The Simple Playbook for Delivering the Ultimate Customer Service Experience."
- In today's oversaturated market, Solomon shows companies how stellar customer service can set them apart from the pack and create brand-loyal clients.
- For "wow" customer service, he encourages employers to recruit and train employees well, and give them the freedom to make their own on-the-spot decisions to impress customers.
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All humans, including the humans we call "customers," tend to remember what happens to us in our lives in terms of stories. The implication for any company striving to build customer engagement and loyalty is this: Merely satisfactory customer service, when everything is "just fine" but not extraordinary, may not be enough to lodge yourself indelibly in the memories of your customers. For this you'll need to step it up, at least in some interactions with your customer, in order to "wow" them in a way that will be truly memorable.
So, what is a "wow experience"? It's when a service provided to a customer goes beyond fulfilling basic expectations and does so in a creative, unexpected way. This results in an experience that is likely to connect emotionally with your customer and will live on in your customer's memory, as well as being shared enthusiastically with the customer's friends, family, coworkers, and potentially others through social media.
The act of creating "wow" moments, and the feeling of being empowered by the organization to do so, can inspire the employees involved and be a powerful tool for improving teamwork, employee retention, and company-wide morale.
Here's how to do it, in six straightforward steps. Creating these moments can make all the difference in the world for the sustainability of your business model as well as for the engagement of the employees on your team.
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1. Empower your employees to make on-the-spot "wow" decisions without having to run to a manager for approval
More than any other step on this list, this one is essential. You cannot unlock the creativity and discretionary effort of your employees if they always "need a moment to check with the manager" or have to worry that they're overstepping.
Herve Humler, cofounder of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, which has famously built intense customer loyalty via "wow" customer service, said that the company's employees "have total power, and all the resources of our organization, to create these moments, these stories, on their own, without needing to ask permission, without needing to involve management, without needing to worry that they're going too far. The time spent creating these stories isn't time taken out of their job; this time spent is their job."
2. Recognize and applaud your employees' efforts to wow customers
Take a close look at how you react when employees go the extra mile for your customers. You can either express your disapproval by punishing employees for what they did, on the grounds that the extra assistance they provided to a customer took extra time and reduced the employee's (narrowly defined) productivity, or you can celebrate and applaud their actions. The choice is yours, and it will make all the difference.
3. Encourage your employees to anticipate customers' needs
This means answering a question or fulfilling a need or desire that a customer hasn't even voiced — maybe because they're shy, they don't want to appear ignorant, or they don't know the extent of how you can help them. To use the terminology of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, strive to "serve even the unexpressed needs and wishes" of your customers. Anticipatory customer service is one of the most effective ways to create wow.
4. Be sensitive to when it's the right and wrong time to wow your customers
A customer who is in a rush or busy with a phone call isn't going to appreciate being disrupted, no matter the good intentions. New employees who are still getting used to delivering "wow" service are the most likely offenders here. Be sure that, if they do misfire in their early attempts, you set them straight gently, so you don't turn them off entirely to trying again the next time, when wow is in fact appropriate.
5. Remember that not all wow moments are the result of elaborate actions
They can also be created in small ways through an empathetic, memorable conversation with a customer, or a conversation that makes an emotional connection. For example, Zappos employees strive to make a connection on every single phone call by bonding over something relatively workaday (a love of pets) or dramatic (a more serious shared interest/concern) based on cues the employee picks up on from the customer.
6. Actively recruit and hire wow-capable employees
Although encouragement and empowerment can go a long way, do yourself a favor and start with the right raw material if you can. Make a point of aiming your recruitment and hiring efforts at identifying and hiring those potential employees who would delight in serving and wowing customers when opportunities arise. These are individuals, who exemplify warmth, empathy, teamwork, conscientiousness, and optimism.
Micah Solomon is a customer service turnaround expert, consultant, speaker, and the author of "Ignore Your Customer (And They'll Go Away): The Simple Playbook for Delivering the Ultimate Customer Service Experience."
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