It comes to something when consumers believe an animated nodding dog is a better ambassador for customer service than you are, so well done to the bosses of Ryanair and Tesco - Michael O'Leary and Terry Leahy - who scored lower than the dog who fronts the ad campaigns for insurance firm Churchill in a poll by the Institute of Customer Service (ICS), with O'Leary in the bottom spot.
Richard Branson was voted the best ambassador of customer service in the survey conducted as part of National Customer Service Week, which begins today. Amazon boss Jeff Bezos took second place. According to ICS chief exec Jo Causon: “Sir Richard is often prepared to take the customer’s side, while Jeff Bezos broke the mould with Amazon by developing the blueprint for effective, personalised, online customer service."
Speaking of online customer service, you might also want to take heed of other research which has revealed that it doesn't matter if you have the best looking website in the world, online shoppers are becoming an inpatient lot. The new threshold for the average online shopper's expectation for a web page to load is just two seconds, with 40% of shoppers only prepared to hang around for three seconds before abandoning a retail site altogether.
This is in contrast to a similar study carried out by tech firm Akamai in 2006, which showed that four seconds or less was acceptable for the majority.
Furthermore, over half of the shoppers surveyed said quick page loading is important to site loyalty - especially for high-spend consumers - up 12% from the previous figures. If it takes too long, 14% will begin shopping on another site and 23% will walk away. In terms of lost sales, 79% of shoppers said a dissastisfying experience on a retail or travel site meant they the would be less likely to visit the site again (up 17%).
But that's just part of the picture. Overall, Causon says she believes customer service is the vital differentiator in business today. Those firms who recognise the talents and contributions of all their staff will motivate their people, improve customer loyalty and boost profits.
“The key to success is to treat customer service as a culture, not a department," she adds. "You must listen to your customers, deliver on your promises, invest in your staff and be prepared to evolve to meet the changing needs of your customers. "
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