A strange thing is happening to customer service. When just about everyone had to physically walk into a store to purchase anything, customers expected to get good service wherever they went. Today, with customer service in decline, shoppers don’t even expect to get good customer service anymore, especially in certain types of retail stores.
The results of a survey by Prosper Insights and Analytics, featured in a Forbes article, “Frightful, Not Delightful: Tales of Terrible Customer Service,” revealed that customers are more likely to expect excellent customer service from specialty stores, and that they have just about given up on getting the same type of service at discounters. Why the shift in expectations? From the “horror stories” in the article, it’s from customer experience.
Retailers should pay attention to the shift in customer perception, whether it is deserved or not. The article points out that fewer and fewer customers actually set foot in a store. You don’t need a survey to tell you that. Just walk into any of the big-box retailers and you’ll see empty aisles, darkened checkout lines and few employees roaming about. Where are all the shoppers? Clicking about online, doing research and making their purchases from the convenience of a laptop or Smartphone.
While discount stores offer lower prices to lure customers, the expectation of poor customer service drives them away. Some retailers, like Best Buy, are shrinking their floor space to accommodate the trend in online shopping and to save money. Some specialty stores, like Whole Foods, continue to build large stores and charge higher prices, but they still bring in the shoppers. True to the survey, customers are willing to shop a specialty store for the product and the expectation of a better customer service experience.
The “horror stories” in the article are surprisingly mundane. They are examples of poor service that just about every customer has experienced at one time or another. That’s where the horror comes in. Poor service has become the new normal for so many retailers. Try complaining to a manager at a discount store about poor service, and you’ll most likely be met with glazed eyes, a sigh and a half-hearted apology.
The article lists “uninvested employees” as the top offender. Gaggles of employees, milling around and talking to themselves instead of paying attention to a customer. Or totally ignoring a customer at checkout while holding a personal conversation with a co-worker or a personal phone call. Instead of actively engaging with customers to win them over, some employees are merely “serving their time” until they can clock out and go home. It doesn’t take customers long to realize they can get better treatment online, where at a mere click on a keypad they get instant attention and service.
The next, “a draining atmosphere,” is a common experience in so many retail stores. Online, there are no piles of unfolded sweaters or boxes opened up with a piece missing. Online stores are clean, neat and exciting. Lots of variety and it’s easy to find just what you’re looking for in your size and color. Not so in a retail store. It may be those “uninvested employees” chatting instead of straightening the merchandise, but stores with low lighting, trash on the floors, merchandise stacked up to the ceiling and not a sales clerk in sight can make a customer feel alone and bewildered. No “search” field to help you find what you want. Customers wander aimlessly through a store and never find what they need, or a knowledgeable sales person who can help them.
Small specialty stores have to deliver excellent customer service to match higher prices and limited product lines. A reputation for poor service won’t stop at the discount store’s physical doorway. Perception is reality, and customers put off by a poor personal service experience will apply that to the retailer’s online store as well.
Photo Source: Leon Brooks / Wikimedia
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