Well, here’s a great story of overcoming that from Norway, and it’s from a bank!

Norwegian bank DNB sponsors the Norwegian Broadcasting Boy’s Choir and got them to sing the call options, and balances!

The impact was amazing and the result was over 2 million calls to the phone line in December – the population of Norway is only 4.9 million!

No, I’m not expecting my bank manager to sing to me next time I call (although it would certainly make me smile!), but it does show the impact of doing something ‘Dramatically and Demonstrably Differently’, even if it is just ‘answering the phone’!

You can listen to them here…..

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Andy is speaking at this breakfast event organised by Kier and Sheffield City Council.

Learn the lessons from businesses who are winning, even in these difficult times! Andy will be sharing stimulating, practical and pragmatic ideas to help you maximise your performance, your potential and your profits!

Venue: Sheffield Town Hall, Reception Rooms
Date: 24 February 2012
Time: 8am – 9.15am

Please reserve your place by 17 February with KFS.townhallevents&weddings@kier.co.uk or Tel. 0114 273 4582

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They experimented with it last year, and apparently, it’s been so successful, they are now rolling it out across the fleet. The ‘app provides information about individual passengers on things such as airline club status, ticket class and special dietary requirements. They can even tell if there are several employees from the same company on a flight, even if they aren’t sitting together – not sure if that means that customers in economy can put the drinks bill on the managing director’s bill if they are in first class!

It’s a great example of utilising customer information to create a personalised experience and definitely sets a benchmark, whether you are in the airline industry or not.

How well do you know your customers? Crucially, how well do you maximise this information to create a ‘remarkable’ experience for your customers?

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The Slides – if you require a powerpoint copy, please email me direct and we’ll get them to you

The 7 Characteristics Of ‘Remarkable’ Businessess – a paper highlighting many of the things we discussed during the day

What Exactly Is Customer Delight? – a paper highlighting the key ingredients of ‘customer delight’

Any questions or comments about anything we discussed (or didn’t!), please don’t hesitate to get in touch!

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Links:

Social Media – It’s Adult Material!

For Great Customer Experiences, Get ‘Engaged’!

Subscribe via iTunes

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I distinctly remember when we got our first colour television – it was the early summer of 1972 for the Munich Olympics! I was so so excited – No longer did I have to go round to Kevin Smith’s house to watch things ‘in colour’ which for a 9 year old was important! It was a significant and memorable step – A whole new ‘colour’ world was suddenly open to me, there in our living room!

Another memorable ‘life changer’ was the ability to listen to the music that I liked when I wanted to, where I wanted to! My 11th birthday present was a Philips cassette recorder and suddenly I could hear The Sweet, Mud and Slade when I felt like it. OK, I often heard my mum and sister chattering in the background of the recordings, because they could not be quiet while I was trying to tape Top Of The Pops! But it did provide ‘freedom’ and the ability for me to choose – I had my own ‘independence’ (or that’s certainly what it felt like!).

My first mobile phone brought that exciting feeling back again in the mid 90′s. Even as an adult, the ‘thrill’ of calling people from ‘outside’ gave me a buzz “No, I’m actually not in my house, honest!” Again, it was all about ‘independence’ and ‘flexibility’.

The Internet was obviously a ‘game (and life!) changer’, although it did seem to creep in on my life – the ‘wow’ moment for me came when we went to the Fast Company conference in San Diego in 1998. Before we set off’ they sent us an email with a link to the restaurant that the first evening’s ‘social’ was taking place and we could see the menu!!!!!! All that way away!

The conference was buzzing with hundreds of ambitious entrepreneurs and ‘techie’ people – we came back saying ‘We’ve got to get a website – it’s the future!’ We didn’t have a clue what to do with it , but we knew we needed one!

There have been lots of other changes in ‘technology’ as life has gone on but most of it seems to have eased it’s way in to the way we did things, and doesn’t seem to be as impactful – maybe that’s because we take a lot of it for granted!

However, I got that ‘excitement’ back ‘big style’ yesterday! My Christmas present was a new iPad2 and it has completely changed my life!!! I know, I’ve only had it 9 or 10 hours, but I’ve already got some books downloaded on to my Kindle, sorted out all my emails, got all my ‘Twittering’ organised, got the Christmas TV programmes I missed to watch on my iPlayer, co-ordinated my bank accounts, watched Celtic versus Rangers while sitting on the toilet (sorry, but had to test it!), read the Times online and done their sudukos before breakfast this morning and am now doing my first ‘blog’! Very very exciting!

As well as it being a quality ‘product’, it’s given me a great ‘feeling’! It’s difficult to quantify, but it’s all about ‘excitement’, ’freedom’, connectivity’, ‘instantness’, ’independence, and ‘speed’! What’s even more impressive is the ‘ease’ of use! I can’t help feeling that being ‘easy to deal with’ is becoming an even more critical element of the customer experience – something that Apple seem to deliver – consistently!

I’ll be reading the new Steve Jobs biography by Walter Isaacson(another Christmas present – aren’t I a lucky boy?!) with even more admiration over the New Year!

Right, back to getting some more ‘apps’!!!

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They also report:

• 42% of customers feel they know more about products and services they have than their provider does
• Only 2% of respondents actually trust the answers they receive back from organisations (Companies, however, perceive things very differently with 74% believing that customers trust most if not all of their responses!)
• 28% don’t feel service providers value time spent talking to them on the phone

Why does this happen? Well one factor appears to be whether staff are given the information that they need to deliver a ‘personlised’ customer experience. Apparently almost half of customer-facing staff (45%) cannot see all accounts and products for customers on a single screen, or previous     communications, and 6% cannot see any information at all!!!!

Information is good, but it’s what you do with it that counts! It’s clear that in ‘remarkable’ businesses, front line staff have access to, and crucially use, information to ‘personalise’ the customer experience. It’s called Empowerment and it’s an integral element of 3D Characteristic #6 – establishing an UBER culture.

How well do your people know your customers? Crucially, how good are they at ‘Demonstrating’ that they know?
 

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Anyway, to commemorate the 25 years, he has put out an appeal to his ‘customers’ to contribute their thoughts, memories and momentos….

It’s a very simple way of ‘engaging’ people (3D Characteristic#5: ‘Dialogue, Not Diatribes’)

It’s really got me thinking about how we could ‘engage’ our clients better – and no, I’m not asking for photographs of you when you attended one of our programmes and seminars back in the 90′s!

Saying that…. Why Not? If you did, I’d love to know what you remember, and crucially, what you did as a result!

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Links:

Barclays Boss Says ‘No Jerks’!

Customer Service Levels Are At An All Time Low!

The 12 Most Effective Ways To Avoid Scriptease In Your Business!

How Successful Businesses Win - A FREE White Paper!

Introducing…The 12 Ways Of Difference!

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In a recent interview he said “Everyone gets stressed from time to time but no one should ever not be nice. You know what a jerk is when you see it,” The rule applies to bankers considered to be prima donnas, too greedy, too ostentatious or poor team players and he said he had already kicked out 30 staff for breaking his new ethics rule.

“If someone can’t behave with their colleagues and can’t be part of the culture, it doesn’t matter how good they are at what they do, they have to be asked to leave,” he said.

It’s a great example of establishing an UBER culture:

The key ingredients of an UBER culture are:

• Everyone Understands what’s expected of them and behaves accordingly and consistently as a result
• Systems and processes are Built to create consistently great customer experiences and reinforce that culture
• People are Engaged, Empowered and Encouraged to deliver them
• People are Rewarded and Recognised for doing it!

You can click here to read an article I wrote about on Management Issues about UBER Culture.

Although this is definitely NOT about putting posters up, I do hope there’s a poster up in Barclays head office saying ‘No Jerks Here’!

What do you do with ‘jerks’ in your business?

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