Customer Loyalty: Priceless

By Pablo J Perez, Executive and Corporate Team Coach

Last summer, during a deserved break from my coaching activities, I decided to spend four days with my family at a beautiful resort on the west coast of Florida. The experience was “ok”, except for the speed of the checking-in and out processes, pool services and other services. In a nutshell, overall service was satisfactory but not memorable. If asked, I would relate to the resort that “I was a satisfied customer”.

However, would I stay at this resort in the future? Would I recommend the resort to my family and friends? The answers to both these questions are a resounding “no.” In conclusion, I was a “satisfied” customer but not a “loyal” customer.

According to Jeffrey Gitomer of Customer Satisfation is Worthless: Customer Loyalty is Priceless, “Satisfaction is not longer the acceptable measurement of Customer service success”. The Gallup Organization’s research also concludes that no matter how an organization thinks its customers are satisfied, if it hasn’t made an emotional connection with its customers to develop a long-term relationship, satisfaction will ultimately be worthless.

During my summer experience, there lacked an emotional connection with the resort, resulting in a loss of desire to return to the resort.
Great customer service is all about bringing customers back. And about sending them away happy – happy enough to pass positive feedback about your business along to others, who may then try the product or service you offer for themselves and in their turn become repeat customers.
Customers will come back and will bring family and friends to do business with you, if:
1. The “emotion” experienced at every “point of connection” during the buying process is so strong that it leaves a mark on their memories.
2. The relationship is based on “trust”. Customer will seek your personal assistance, and they are willing to pay for it.
3. They feel you really care about their needs. Always put your Customer’s interests and needs ahead of yours.
Here are some statistics
• A typical dissatisfied customer will tell 6-10 people about the problem. A typical satisfied customer will tell 1-2 people.
• It costs 6 times more to attract a new customer than it does to keep an old one.
• Of those customers who quit, 68% do so because of an attitude of indifference by the company or a specific individual.
• About 7 of 10 complaining customers will do business with you again if you resolve the complaint in their favor.
• If you resolve a complaint on the spot, 95% of customers will do business with you again.

What happens to angry customers?

• 91% of any business's angry customers will never come back.
• 96% will never tell you the reason that they left.
• 80% will do business with you again if their problem was handled quickly and to their satisfaction.

If the problem was quite bad, they will tell stories about it for years and years to come.

"Who is typically to blame when you lose a customer?" Most customer service providers will answer that it is the customer's fault! (and here is the scariest percentage) .. 99% of the time that customer service provider only needs to look in the mirror to see who is truly at fault!”

From a scale of 1-10, how likely are your Customers to recommend your organization to someone else? If your answer is below 7 or you don’t know the answer, it is time to think about developing a Customer Loyalty Strategy to start creating the “emotion” not only on your External Customer but also on the Internal ones (employees).

If you want to learn more details about our Customer Loyalty Development Program and how valuable for your organization it might be, please review our website at www.activategroupinc.com, call Pablo J. Perez at (305)722-7215 or send an e-mail to pjperez@activategroupinc.com.

Reference and excerpts taken with permission from Customer Loyalty by Resource Associates Corporation.