Customer Service in the New Economy

Hello Everyone!!

This is my first blog entry - so bear with me if I ramble (I promise they will get better).

I have always been a customer focus NUT!! I think I own every book that Tom Peters wrote. Ken Blanchard? A virtual messiah of customer service. RAVING FANS!!! What an amazing concept. The idea that satisfied customers was not enough - but to have customers who were so utterly taken by your service that they actually became your fans, telling all of their friends. That is amazing!!!

Now - think back to the day you had. How many encounters that you had today came anywhere near creating a raving fan out of you??

I'm not an economist. I just talk about what I see. And what I see during the course of my day is that more and more merging of businesses is happening. And what this does is create an hourglass look to all of the industries in America. We all hear about more and more people starting their own business (whether by desire or necessity). This is creating a larger and larger base of small companies. Mergers tend to be a large corporation with another large one, or medium sized companies combining to become a larger one. Everyone needs to be very large to create so called efficiencies - or very small so they don't have the overhead. So what happens to the mid-sized companies?

Ok - so I said I tend to ramble, and by now if you are still reading, you're wonder what this has to do with customer service. My question for everyone is - what happens to customer service in this new economy?? As I go through my day, I usually feel like the big guys could care less about customer service - and the small guys don't have the resources or time to devote to it either. So - does customer service not matter anymore?

Think about the up and coming society. Anyone else notice the sense of entitlement running rampant in todays youth? Check out the reviews on the internet and what do you see? 10 bad reviews for every 1 good one - maybe!!!

So what about customer service? Is anyone out there trying to create Raving Fans? Wal-Mart recently announced that in order to try and keep their more upscale shoppers, they were going to try and make their stores more appealing and their staff friendlier. Sounds like they managed to get to be a $300 BILLION dollar company without really worrying about customer service much. PRICE is their main selling point!!!!

So I want to know - do you worry about customer service in your business? I'm sure no one is going to say they could care less about their customers. But do you worry about creating Raving Fans? Everyone wants repeat business. But how hard do you work to get it? Think about it. Do you ever stop to ask yourself - why me?? In other words - assuming you are not the only one who does whatever it is you do, do you ever wonder why your customers choose you? In other words - WHY ME??

Thanks for your time. Feel free to email me at sschiano@aptivaonline.com with any questions.

All the best -

Stephen Schiano