Sales Performance Help

Achieving Tri-Dimensional Customer Interface Excellence

The time is now to turn customer contact excellence "talk" into reality. There are many challenges facing businesses today. Product differentiation, which is short lived in today's business environment, continues to be a challenging pursuit. Technology makes it easier than ever to develop a product; therefore, replication of a unique product often occurs in months or less. Price differentiation is also a risky venture. Winning on price is easily replicated and if done carelessly, leads to a downward spiral of margins. Customer contact differentiation continues to be the most controllable aspect for organizations, but still, many organizations struggle with doing it well.

Through Business Efficacy's sales and service process design work, we have learned the proposition of providing customers with differentiated value is dependent on integrated execution. Customers demand interaction with knowledgeable, friendly, client-centric employees that provide what is needed now. We are in a time when one-stop-shop mentality prevails. Organizations must make sure their customer contact workflow aligns to this need. The tendency of many organizations is to believe this is too difficult to execute because of product complexity, quality control, employee talent, and distribution issues. This point of view tends to drive specialization which develops separation and complexity. This means many customers experience one-dimensional interactions and dissatisfaction. This is a major contributor to the continuing decline in customer satisfaction measures across most industries. This downward spiral will continue until organizations begin to demand and develop integrated performance in sales, service, and operations at each customer contact point. Customers do not care about internal execution challenges, nor should they be aware of any that exist. They just want a seamless buying and delivery experience. Employees who are in contact with your customers need to understand this and deliver it. Your employees must be great at sales, service, and operations during every customer contact. The way to achieve this is through disciplined tri-dimensional customer contact excellence.

Here are some ways to make tri-dimensional customer contact excellence happen. First, it only takes place if every manager drives it. There are no easy cures to get this to happen, but incentives, performance management reviews, etc., all help. However, the key is daily disciplined execution driven by every field-based manager. Management implementation steps for driving tri-dimensional excellence are:

Set Expectations.
The entire organization needs to know the importance of customers receiving excellence in service, sales, and operations at the point of contact. The objective is clear. Deliver service, sales, and operations excellence at every customer interaction. The mission is to deliver it every time, not sometimes. This expectation must be communicated clearly and often to the employees to ensure you are putting your differentiating factor to work for you.
Translate the Work.
Managers must provide employees with clear blueprints for customer contact tri-dimensional performance excellence. Every customer contact job needs to be translated into the steps and activities that distinctly describe what is to be done in the three dimensions of sales, service, and operations.
You will receive mission driven excellence when employees do the behaviors required to meet tri-dimensional execution. The secret of getting the employees to deliver this service is giving them the tools needed to know what and when to do something under different situations. Our experience is that companies and managers do not spend enough time in this area. Perhaps this is based on a belief that all reasonable people instinctively know how to provide great service and fulfill needs. Many satisfaction surveys we see seem to suggest otherwise.
Educate your Employees.
Develop learning in an integrated manner versus separately. It is important to teach the behavioral activities of each discipline. Most organizations do this. The change that is needed is to drive additional learning in the integrated application of sales, service, and operations. This can be easily done. It requires the use of more customer contact simulations. These simulations must call for typical tri-dimensional solutions and behavioral activity. Application driven learning is essential for tri-dimensional customer contact execution.
Coach for Execution.
Coaching is the sustenance of tri-dimensional customer contact excellence. Coaching is where fundamentals are driven into everyday reality. A coach must consistently and frequently make sure each employee puts the tri-dimensional expectation and activities into action. The coach needs to take accountability for tri-dimensional execution. One thing we think managers need to do is more drill and practice of required activities. Practice does make perfection possible and at the same time reinforces expectations. Remember: integration of sales, service, and operations takes practice. Managers need to provide opportunities for practice, daily, if possible.
Measure Results.
Measurement is the only way to tell if the right things are happening. Most businesses today are fairly efficient at measuring sales. Many are fairly sophisticated at measuring operational efficiency. There are also companies good at measuring customer satisfaction. But there are very few companies that measure customer contact effectiveness in all three dimensions. This is probably due to the difficulty of finding a system-driven measurement. This should not be an obstacle. Field-based managers have the opportunity to observe and subjectively measure customer contact performance. They are in the best position to know if the right things are happening. Consistent and frequent observation is the place to start measuring tri-dimensional effectiveness.

Tri-dimensional customer contact execution is a controllable differentiator that every organization can implement. The requirement is dedicated employees at all levels. It is worth it because it creates rewarding experiences for all once it is successful. Let's make this a priority - your customers deserve it.