Customer expectations and the Social Business
According to Esteben Kolsky, former Gartner analyst and founder of ThinkJar, it is not enough for social businesses to simply meet customer expectations. Social business, which refers to business with aspirations to leverage social channels, should always strive to exceed customer expectations.
You may be wondering, why the “social business”? Isn’t it imperative for all types of businesses exceed customer expectations?
Yes. But social businesses focus on solving the problem of lack of collaboration between customers and companies. It’s been proven that business that collaborate with customers and let them participate in the product or service development process have higher customer retention and loyalty rates.
Surprise customers by exceeding their expectations
In his blog post on CustomerThink, Kolsky explains why it’s important for social businesses to meet customer expectations.
1. Competition: “If you only meet your customers’ expectations, then your competitors will find out what they want and take them.”
2. Loyalty: “The consistent over-delivery is what creates a bond with the experience that makes customers move from rational to emotional loyalty.”
3. Long-term strategy: Kolsky explains that “Customer service and experiences is not a destination; it is something you will continue to do until the day you close your business.” He illustrates this with a real-life example. “When JetBlue was faced with apologizing for keeping people in a locked airplane in the tarmac for some ungodly number of hours (was it eight? 12?) a couple of years ago, they could have just said ‘we are sorry, here is a voucher’ – as most other airlines would have done. Instead, they changed their systems and procedures to make sure it never happened again. Customers, accustomed to what the airline industry had to offer, never expected that. As a result, over 90% of them intended to continue flying with JetBlue. JetBlue did not just want to meet expectations – they wanted to blow them out of the water.”
Exceed customer expectations with OneDesk
In order to retain customers and build long-term relationships, social businesses typically turn to SCRM systems to encourage collaboration. “Loyalty falls apart without the two-sided collaboration,” says Kolsky.
OneDesk facilitates the two-way collaboration needed to foster a social business. Through it’s customer portal and suite of collaboration tools, companies can easily reach out to customers, discover their needs, and work on exceeding customer expectations. Find out more by reading our related tutorials and blog posts below.