Business was good. But it wasn't as good as it could be, Charlie felt. His products were just as good as anybody else's, maybe even better, but there had to be a factor other than product design that could help increase market share. He could always cut prices. But he hated the idea. He knew too many companies that cut prices to the point where they maximized market share and maximized deficit. There had to be a better way.
He studied several management books and enrolled in management courses. He came away with the key: customer service.
First, of course, he needed to increase product awareness. It was essential to let the marketplace know how wonderful his products were. So he changed the company's advertising. Instead of featuring test equipment, the ads spoke of measurement solutions. Instead of product photos, the ads showed happy engineers. Instead of citing the range of measurements, accuracy and stability, the ads hailed "true solutions to your problems," and "exactly the right mix of features." Where earlier advertisements specified the price, the new, improved ads spoke of "cost effectiveness," without burdening an engineer with a mention of dollars. And to summarize, the ads spoke of the instruments being widely recognized for their superiority and acknowledged leadership.
That took care of phase 1 of Charlie's campaign-product awareness. Next came customer support. If you don't treat customers well; if you don't provide genuine help; and if you don't show real concern for the customer's problems, he felt, the customer will go elsewhere. Most important, if you don't respond when the customer needs you, the customer will leave. Charlie had heard too many tales of customers being ignored when they needed help.
Here Charlie detected a weakness. He suspected that his people weren't adequately responsive to customer concerns. So he changed the name of the Customer Support group. With the stroke of a pen or, rather, a few keystrokes, the Customer Support group became the Customer Care group.
When he learned that his people weren't responding promptly and adequately to e-mail messages from customers, Charlie informed the world that he would accept customer e-mail messages.
That worked. Customers did indeed send him comments about his equipment and service, along with complaints, requests for technical support and valuable suggestions. This took up a lot of Charlie's time. So he created an automatic e-mail response, thanking customers for their comments and assuring them that their messages would certainly be read promptly. That was a really good idea; it gave him lots more free time.
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