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Welcome to Loyalty MagazineLoyalty Magazine reports on customer retention,loyalty schemes, rewards, affinity, CRM, call centre issues, direct and viral marketing, mobile and internet channels for both B2B and B2C enterprises. It covers all global markets and business sectors, including retail, financial services, travel and hotels, telecoms and electronic commerce. |
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Tuesday, 10 August 2010 13:16 |
 Bridges to the Customer’s Heart
Customer service in a developing country
There is nothing to suggest that “Bridges to the Customer’s Heart” by Paul Uduk is going to be anything other than a standard, but useful customer service manual until you start browsing.
The difference is not immediately apparent. Uduk uses the concept of 100 bridges to reach the customer, such as ‘focus all decisions on the customer; ‘know that the customer is unique; and ‘anticipate the customer’s next need and provide it before he asks’.
He sprinkles the text with many quotations from customer service industry gurus, especially his hero Tom Peters, but also Covey, Drucker, Reichheld and others and his advice is solid, if at times rather beyond what is attainable.
But Uduk lives and works in Lagos, Nigeria, and obviously this makes a difference to his outlook on life.
As each ‘bridge’ chapter contains a personal anecdote concerning when this particular piece of customer service advice was or was not implemented, this book also gives a fascinating insight into life in his home country.
Take the electricity or example. This is intermittent in its supply, but additionally, the administrative infrastructure of the supply company is so bad, that it regularly cuts off customers who have paid their bills, and because the call centre is so busy, usually the only means of getting reconnected is to queue at the main office.
In another example, students usually have to wait a year for their exam results, and then have to pay a sizeable fee for their certificate, even though they have paid for their tuition.
StarComms, the biggest CDMA mobile telephone provider in Nigeria is a classic example of how not to do customer service, says Uduk. For a customer wishing to contact the company, the only numbers available are employee private numbers. If one of these is used, the individual makes it very clear that these numbers are not for use by customers.
Swan bottled water used to be the biggest in Nigeria, until the discovery was made that it was ‘faking’ the water, and actually filling the bottles from the ordinary tap. The surprise is that this Nigerian company still exists, despite the publicity. It is no longer number one.
There is also the company registration monopoly, which never answers the telephone, and whose website is never updated with new company information, and is rarely online anyway.
Uduk works for Diamond Bank, of which he is a fan. The bank introduced its CARE2000 customer service initiative programme, which then continued after the millennium as CARE2000+. This enables customers to vote after every interaction on whether they had received good service or not . He is also a fan of Zenith Bank, explaining how well the staff interacted with him during the long wait for a debit card due to the fact that the system was once again ‘hanging’.
Bridges to the Customer’s Heart is an interesting read, not least because Uduk lays his very high standards of customer service onto a country where even basic customer care seems well nigh impossible.
It is humbling that Uduk expects these standards, despite the infrastructure and service problems, when in more developed countries, customer service remains a challenge even without these handicaps.
“Bridges to the Customer’s Heart” by Paul Uduk is sub-titled “Commonsense Uncontested Strategies to Outsell, Outsmart, and Out-compete the Competition By Doing the Simle Things They Wouldn’t Do”. It is published by AuthorHouse, price £14.49. More info: www.authorhouse.com |
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Countries in the EU are currently working on their responses to the complex policy proposals suggested for the handling and storage of personal data. The legislative changes currently underway are of critical importance to the loyalty sector. Jeremy Henderson-Ross, legal director and general counsel – EMEA for Aimia suggests companies should play an active part in the discussions.