Thoughts on "Customer Action Hero"

A few weeks ago, I discovered, through a friend, a wonderful website, www.changethis.com. This website provides manifestos from many different authors, most notably Tom Peter and Seth Godin. One such manifesto is titled "Customer Action Hero" by Jeanne Bliss.

As I am beginning to do some freelance consulting work, primarily in the area of marketing with a focus on the customer experience, this manifesto seemed as though it would be useful. Indeed it was, the manifesto outlines to 10 steps to becoming a Customer Action Hero. Its these ten steps and the philosophy behind them that I will reflect on.

The thesis of the article is that the CEO in any organization must be actively involved in understanding and tracking the customer interactions with the organization as well as purposely pushing toward an ever improving customer experience. In essence, the CEO must continually be asking questions about customers. These questions should arise out of customer metrics that track everything from the most profitable segments to customer complaints at each point of contact with the organization. Without a true focus and commitment the CEO and employees will only pay lip-service to necessary changes.

The first action step is to elevate your customers to an asset of the business by incorporating customer metrics into strategic decisions. Often companies are faced with the challenge of employees that are already too busy with 'work' to implement this additional hassle. Therefore, the decision and persistence must come from the top. The next step, which will likely come before the first, is to create a system to track complaints and comments. This tracking, and the results of it, must be incorporated into all levels of planning and acted upon.

The third step is to listen to front line employees. These people have interactions with customers on a daily basis and often have a strong, but quiet opinion on what customers are complaining about. Provide a safe and confidential forum for these issues to be brought into the open and some amazing new thoughts are likely to be brought to attention. Once the customer issues are brought into the open, you must prioritize and fix the top 10 things that are bugging your customers. After these priorities are set, assign accountability to each category of problems to senior people in your company.

When doing customer surveys it is also important to keep in mind that a company shouldn't ask any questions if it doesn't intend to act on the answers. This wastes both the companies and the customers time. Nor does it have to include only survey, there can be many, one such possible survey is the Customer Loss Survey. On a monthly or quarterly basis, gather a list of customers who have left then assign a person (the more senior the better) to call these people and find out why they left. This basic approach will uncover dangerous trends and problems faster and more precisely than from the overall customer survey.

To take advantage of the knowledge gained through these many interactions with customers, companies should create a Customer Room. This room is the meeting place for discussions and the gathering room for customer information. The walls are posted with the Top 10 Things Bugging Our Customers list as well as different communications for all employees to see. Are your customers worth a room? Certainly. Within this room that Annual Customer Plan can be developed. This plan should include the actions and objectives for the upcoming year as well as a review of the previous year. The sole purpose of this plan will be to improve the customers experience with the business. The last part of the Customer Action Plan is that the company must focus and direct funds towards these objectives. Talk only goes so far, money needs to make the commitment real.

Within most businesses there are Customer Action Hero's, find these people and let them loose. And remember, focus on the customer, not on the business. Find out what the customer wants, not what the business can provide (that will come after!).