At the beginning of the summer, I gave a clothing company feedback on jeans that were of poor quality. At first, the processing of my complaint was off to a rapid start but the company dropped the baton at the beginning of the holidays. When I enquired about the complaint, they apologised profusely, and a few hours later the issue was resolved.
In addition, their customer service telephoned me later and posted me a hefty coupon for compensation. My experience was favourable, they handled the situation extremely well.
A happy customer will return to buy more. ‘Customer experience’ might seem like a broad concept that is full of hot air, but, in the best case scenario, it translates to business growth. It is more cost-effective to keep the existing customers happy than to acquire new customers.
According to a Finnish proverb, a good bell is heard from far, a bad one still further. We can't afford to underestimate the importance of customer experience. In the best case, the customer is a walking business card and offers excellent development ideas.
I was impressed by the clothing company’s effective communication, transparent and rapid actions, apologies, compensation and, in particular, the personal contact. The company put a lot of effort into showing that they were interested in my opinion. They cared about the quality of the service and wanted to improve their operation based on my experience.
These building blocks familiar from consumer sales are also relevant in business-to-business sales. We are all people, after all. As customers, we expect similar basic pillars from services, regardless of whether we are wearing a jumpsuit or a jacket suit.
I’m glad to see that the health sector is taking customer experience seriously. Patients are called customers, and service paths are streamlined. Even if there is no actual competition at the moment, the market situation can change. If that happens, the winners will be the ones who have centred their operations around customers. To improve the customer experience, I believe that we should look into the future through a telescope, not at a photograph of the current situation.
Customer-oriented culture is the foundation for improving the customer experience. Customers should be heard and seen in the everyday operations of the company. When we aim to exceed expectations and to charm customers by bringing them added value time after time, we must plan our services based on customer needs.
Service operators must adapt to the customers’ world, not vice versa. The times are long gone when we first created products or services and only then started to consider whether they were suitable for our customers.
A strategy is built on top of the foundation. It is important that the management understands the value of customer experience – the word ‘customer’ should be mentioned several times in the management team’s meeting memos.
I’m glad that Tamro’s management is genuinely committed to improving the customer experience. Customers make daily decisions that affect the future of the company. If we lose the customers, we lose the foundation of the business.
Improving the customer experience means sharing experiences and thoughts, reviewing and learning from customer feedback, change management and internal and external communication. Development calls for learning motivation and innovative thinking from the entire organisation.
Develop, measure, change – and repeat. And remember to listen well. That is the formula for an outstanding customer experience, expressed in simple terms. Building and management are impossible without verifiable or measurable results. The gathering, interpreting and utilising of data is at the core when shaping the customer experience that Tamro offers.
Customers feel safe to do business with familiar service providers that are tried and tested. I won’t have any trouble choosing which clothing shop I will visit first when looking for a new winter jacket.
