Customer Service Week
starts today and runs through October 10th. This event began back in
1992, thanks to both a Congressional proclamation and even earlier
support from the International Customer Service Association (
ICSA).
This year, particularly with the credit spigot turned off and the
economy circling the drain, appreciation for your customers is more
important than ever.
Last year, back before so much economic uncertainty, Doug Meacham asked a very important question in his post,
Shouldn’t Every Week Be National Customer Service Week?:
"To
use this week as the only time to 'let your customers know about your
commitment to customer satisfaction,' or to 'raise company-wide
awareness for the importance of CS,' leaves 51 other weeks of
opportunity on the table. What would happen to an organization’s
culture if they took advantage of that opportunity? What if the tag
line was 'Doing Our Best With Every Request, Every Day?'"
In his this quote from his 2007 post, Mr. Meacham refers to
CSWeek's Five Reasons to Celebrate Customer Service Week:
1. Boost morale, motivation and teamwork.
2. Reward frontline reps for the important work they do all year long.
3. Raise companywide awareness of the importance of customer service.
4. Thank other departments for their support.
5. Let customers know about your commitment to customer satisfaction.
Even
though customer service and support has changed substantially over the
last decade, CSWeek for some reason has offered up the same list year
after year.
So, inspired by Mr. Meacham plea to not leave 51
other weeks of opportunity on the table, we'd like to suggest Five New Reasons to Celebrate:
- Show, don't tell customers how committed you are to their satisfaction.
- Listen
to your customers -- be they in person, on the phone, online or
twittering -- and take action upon their complaints and suggestions.
- Create a customer-centric culture from the top down.
- Incentivise frontline reps all year long, not just the first full week in October.
- Employ
a CRM solution that not only manages Sales Force Automation (SFA) but
also the largest segment and most important part of customer
relationship management, Customer Service and Support (CS&S).
Throughout this week --
and throughout the year -- we'll be exploring each of these five reasons in individual posts. Please come back and we heartily encourage your comments.
