Avionics News September 2015 - 48

BUSINESS BASICS

Continued from page 47

service - yet it's subjective. For
example, a customer who buys a new
navigator or flight display may not
understand that databases and software of new avionics need updating,
and that comes at a shop rate. When
he learns this, he may wonder what,
exactly, he paid for, and what you're
trying to pull.
Likewise, if he believes all he has
to do is sign a bid, deliver the airplane
and then pick it up, yet there's incremental steps to the process, he may
be disappointed that this is more time
consuming than you led him to believe.
5. Make it easy. Many companies
make doing business with them too
great a challenge. According to a
study in the Harvard Business Review

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by the Corporate Executive Board,
more than 60 percent said they had to
repeatedly contact a company to get
help for a problem or concern.
In that light, maybe this is the big service take-home point: Doing business
with you should be simple and efficient,
and your service should be designed to
make life easier for customers, not your
shop. Anything else potentially causes
emotion-sucking hassle.
When a customer doesn't have to
wait days for returned phone inquiries,
fumble around for answers on a poorly
structured website, or get passed from
one employee to another, you've created
an easy wow that you get to deliver.
In fact, according to a recent McKinsey survey, companies that focus on
providing a low-effort experience across
their customer journeys saw nearly 15
percent increases in revenue growth

and a 20 percent increase in customer
satisfaction.
6. Everyone's in "service delivery."
This means everyone in your shop should
understand your customer-experience
strategy - and that they're all a part of
it, regardless of their department and job
description.
When employees understand their connection to your quality of service, they feel
motivated to, for example, take a customer,
whose departure has been delayed by
weather, to a sporting goods store to buy
his child a birthday present, or simply find
a way to say "yes" when a customer makes
an unrealistic request that would otherwise
get a "no," according to Deborah Sweeney,
chief executive officer of small-business
consultancy MyCorporation.
7. Treat your customers like you
would want to be treated. Outside of
work, you're also a customer, and you've
experienced your share of bad service.
Recognize what you like, what you find
frustrating, and inject that awareness
into your service delivery. Go one more
step, and see your business through your
customers' eyes.
This will help your employees create
such "wow" moments as welcoming a
customer by name and coming forward to
greet him with a handshake and a cup of
coffee, as well as serving him promptly
and personally walking him to the door as
he leaves and saying thank you. It's also
what should motivate you to provide a
simple handwritten thank-you note after
each job. And it's what could inspire you
to be creative and provide a free online
training course for whatever piece of
avionics you've installed.
This is exactly what you want your
customers to feel when they experience
your shop's customer service. Yet getting there takes intentional effort to craft
your shop's service design so the customer never considers going anywhere
else. When you achieve that, you're
likely to find loyal customers calling for
more work, and that will be music to
your ears. q
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Avionics News September 2015
