It’s easy to measure most elements of your business. You can pull up a chart or spreadsheet to get your sales numbers for the quarter or do some quick calculations to get your profit or total expenses for the year.
But what about more nebulous things like client satisfaction or customer service? How do you put numbers to those?
Just because they aren’t easily measured doesn’t mean they aren’t critical elements of your organization’s success. In fact, some of these softer aspects of the business are some of the most important. The Harvard Business Review notes that 82% of customers have stopped doing business with a company due to poor customer service.
While you can’t necessarily measure all metrics, NAVCO has developed three key indicators that identify NAVCO’s practice and commitment to customer satisfaction: 1,1 Trips to Resolution, 97% Picture Perfect Installation and a 99% Customer Retention. We review these numbers after every job and for every client.
Although you can determine what is good service and what isn’t, that doesn’t always create actionable steps to improve. But there are further ways to breakdown how to assess service. These parameters are useful in recognizing the good and bad elements of the customer service at your own institution so you can make progress, as well as what to expect from vendors and service professionals.
A True Listener
True listeners are rarer than we’d like to believe. We’ve all listened with half an ear to a friend’s story, just waiting for them to finish so we can share our experience next. The data backs this up; we are listening in a distracted, preoccupied, or forgetful state about 75% of the time.
A real listener doesn’t do anything else while they listen. They aren’t just waiting for their turn to reply or keying in on clues so they can sell you something later. Real listeners want to understand you so they can best meet your needs.
At NAVCO, we make sure we keep our listening ears on. Before the security system goes live or any team training takes place, we have a kick-off meeting with our clients to ensure we know exactly what their needs and preferences are so we can provide the best customer service possible.
Quick Response Time
Nobody likes to be kept waiting, especially when you’re waiting for a service professional to fix something that’s broken. Worse yet is when a technician shows up to help, but after hours of investigating and tinkering, they can’t diagnose the problem or have to come back in a few days with the right part or defer to a specialist.
Equipping customer response teams with the tools and resources to fix problems in a timely manner leaves a lasting impression on client relationships.
At NAVCO, we’re particularly proud that we are able to resolve issues in an average of 1.1 visits. (As a comparison, the national average is 3.) We recognize that our customers’ time is valuable, so we strive to honor it by solving the problem right — the first time.
Setting Expectations
Perception determines reality. It doesn’t matter if you have the most streamlined process in place for delivering your product. If your customer thinks you’re lagging, they’re not likely to return.
Setting appropriate expectations and meeting or exceeding them is the hallmark of great customer service. This is achieved by clear timelines, honesty, and transparency about internal processes. It’s easy for employees to forget that customers don’t have the same view of the inner workings of the company that they do, and they can inadvertently obscure or gloss over vital information.
Great Communication
Communication skills are the number one priority of hiring managers, so it’s not a wonder that customers demand the same. Customers need their vendors to not only listen but to clearly express what’s happening behind the scenes to address their needs and resolve their problems.
In our new client onboarding process, NAVCO has put client communication front and center. Within 10 days of becoming a NAVCO customer, you’ll meet with our accounting team to discuss your billing preferences.
Then, you receive a call from the service dispatch department to set up email and/or text message communication, as well as scheduling for required updates.
Finally, the installation manager will call to set a date for the full installation. They’ll send you a summary of what was discussed on the call, so you can be sure we heard and included all of your concerns and preferences.
Our Commitment to You
At NAVCO, we are determined to wow you with our top-notch customer service. We do all we can to set up your security system just the way you like it. We resolve any issues that arise in one trip so you’re not left unprotected. After all, that’s how we treat all customers. We want to them to become Raving Fans.
