How to adjust to new customer expectations

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The lone cashier answered the phone while she rang up another customer's purchase. She seemed detached from both interactions, as she split her focus between the customer in front of her and the one on the phone.

I could only hear one side of the phone conversation. "The truck comes in today," said the cashier. (Scans an item.)

"I don't know what's on it." (Scans another item.)

"About half will be stocked by tonight." (Scan.)

"I don't know what's on it." (Points out order total to customer in front of her.)

"It will be here in about an hour." (Mouths "thank you" to customer in front of her as she hands him a receipt.)

This has become a normal service interaction. Companies are woefully understaffed. Customers can't get the information they want. Inventory is unpredictable and shipments are frequently delayed.

Are customers okay with this? The short answer is, "No."

How customer expectations have shifted

I launched a LinkedIn poll to ask people whether their expectations as a customer had shifted during the pandemic. It's a small sample size, just 143 participants, but the responses are revealing.

The comments point to two general trends.

1. Customers are making a concerted effort to be more patient and empathetic.

2. They also expect businesses to continue treating them as valued customers, and do a better job of communicating changes to normal service levels.

Kate: "My empathy has increased. Maybe most of all for the farmers from whom I buy my food. But for everyone–I think it’s a safe assumption that every business or customer support person I interact with is struggling in some way, facing some hardship."

Rama: "I don't expect less–I do understand that every part of a transaction may have slowed down, but that just means I expect communication to be improved. Not necessarily more personal or faster; just complete information, even if it's in autoresponder format."

Margie: "I think I’m getting a bit tired of hearing from businesses, 'Well due to COVID our wait times will be longer...' 'Due to COVID..this and that...' It’s as if COVID is the excuse for everything. How long is this a viable excuse for service issues?"

Namecca: "My patience has drastically increased. As an efficiency lunatic, I used to see all the flaws in the process and get frustrated in traffic, in line, at the store, etc. Now it just is what it is. Flexible, more compassion and definitely more deliberate actions in my personal life. I still expect that people show up to do a good job but when they don't or can't I am more forgiving for sure."

Bryan: "It's heartbreaking to see so many businesses, mostly restaurants, fold during this time. I both respect and understand the levels of change they have to bring everyday to just survive."

Resources to improve service

Nearly every company was in some sort of survival mode in March. They were either fighting to stay in business, like restaurants, or were completely overwhelmed with business, like grocery stores.

Now we're more than five months into the pandemic. Companies need a better, more long-term solution. The alternative is losing even more customers to competitors that are better able to adapt.

The starting point is a customer service vision. This is a shared definition of outstanding service that gets everyone on the same page. If you want your team to be great, you must first define greatness.

These resources can help you:

• Guide: How to write your vision in a virtual meeting

• Video: Leading a customer-centric culture

• Book: The Service Culture Handbook

Another essential step is to better manage customer expectations. This includes clear, proactive communication to let customers know what's changed.

This LinkedIn Learning course can help you. You can access the course with your LinkedIn Learning subscription or get a 30-day trial.

Understand the impact of unpleasant surprises from Customer Service: Managing Customer Expectations by Jeff Toister

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How Demanding Extras Can Undermine Service Quality

It's interesting to read other people's customer service stories.

There's often a valuable lesson involved. But, I'm also fascinated by how these stories are written. They typically follow a three step logic process:

1. The author is a perfectly normal, reasonable customer.

2. Company X does something astonishingly bad.

3. Don't be like Company X.

It's the first point, "The author is a perfectly normal, reasonable customer" where many of these stories go off the rails. 

Unreasonable Customers

Here's an example from a well-respected author. She detailed a service failure where she was dining with her husband and had ordered a glass of wine with her meal. The author explained that she drank all the wine before finishing her meal, so she asked her server for a little more.

The author expected the wine to be free. 

She was incredulous that the server wanted to charge her for an additional glass of wine, even though she didn't want a full glass. 

The point of her story was about empowering employees to assess the situation and provide extras when warranted. It's a good point.

But, the author also did what many customers do. She undermined her own service experience by demanding something extra and then getting upset when she didn't receive it.

She hurt her credibility by writing about it as if her server was clearly in the wrong.

What Should Customers Reasonably Expect?

A customer's perception of service quality is a function of how the experience matched the customer's expectations. On a basic level:

• Good service is when the customer's expectations are met.

• Outstanding service is when the customer's expectations are exceeded.

• Poor service is when the experience falls short of the customer's expectations.

This makes expectations crucial to customer service. A customer with unreasonable expectations is much more likely to receive what she perceives as poor service.

So, what's reasonable?

On a broad level, customers can reasonably expect to receive the products and services that a company promises to provide. 

It gets trickier when a customer wants something that's not explicitly promised.

Let's use the author's restaurant example. The restaurant sold wine by the glass. If a guest orders a glass of wine, it's reasonable that she would expect to receive a glass of that wine at the price listed on the menu.

It would also be reasonable to say that if there was something wrong with the wine, the customer could immediately send it back for a replacement without being charged.

But, what about asking for more than a glass of wine but less than two glasses?

The author made it clear she would be willing to pay for a second glass of wine if she had wanted that much. But, she wanted less than that so she expected it to be free. She requested what essentially amounted to a free sample or a bonus portion.

Some restaurants actually address this directly. A typical glass of wine contains five to six ounces while a taste of wine (like you'd get when visiting a winery) is usually about two ounces. So, a few restaurants have glass and taste prices for wines on their menu. (This restaurant apparently didn't have this option on the menu.)

I don't fault her for asking. But, I think the author was wrong to be upset when she wanted something that the restaurant never promised her.

Where Do Expectations Come From?

Just as the author was being unreasonable to demand free wine, it would be unreasonable to expect all customers to be reasonable!

So, it's helpful to understand how customers develop their expectations so we can help them avoid these types of situations.

Customers generally develop their expectations from four primary sources:

1. Our communication to the customer

2. The customer's past experience with us

3. Word-of-mouth from others (includes online reviews)

4. Experience doing business with other companies

Let's go back to the wine example. Can you think of ways that any of these expectation sources might have influenced the customer to expect a free taste of wine?

Two jump out to me:

The first is number two, the customer's past experience. Many restaurants are perfectly willing to give you a free taste of wine before you order a glass. It's a way to allow customers to try a wine before they buy it. 

If the restaurant had done this with the author, it would make more sense for her to expect a free taste. 

The second expectation source that may have influenced the author is number four. Perhaps she had gotten free tastes before buying a glass of wine at other restaurants. Or, she may have recently dined at a restaurant that had pricing on the menu for two ounce pours. 

Again, her expectations would be more understandable if she had had one of those experiences.

Resources

Dealing with unreasonable customers is a big challenge for customer service professionals. Here are a couple of resources to help you navigate through these situations.

One is Adam Toporek's book, Be Your Customer's Hero. It was written to provide practical advice directly to frontline employees. Chapter 59 focuses on this issue direction, "Focus on what you can do, not what you can't."

There are also two training videos on Lynda.com. 

The first is How to Manage Customer Expectations for Frontline Employees. It focuses on effective communication techniques for situations like the one where the author demanded free wine.

The second is The Manager's Guide to Managing Customer Expectations. This video addresses the issue from a manager's perspective by providing tips for preventing situations where customer expectations go unmet.

You'll need a Lynda.com account to view the full videos, but you can get access with a 10-day trial.

How Clear Language Can Help You Avoid Service Failures

"If you say that to a customer, you're lying."

I'll never forget that advice. It came from the manager at the clothing store where I worked as a teenager. She was explaining how to set appropriate expectations.

We'd frequently get calls from customers asking if we had a particular item or size in stock. Customers wanted to save themselves an unnecessary trip if we didn't have what they were looking for. (This was back before the days when you could go online and look it up.)

The process involved walking the sales floor to physically locate the item. If we had it, we could hold it for the customer so it was waiting for them when they came in.

It usually took us several minutes to find what the customer wanted.

Our store manager was coaching the team on how to put a customer on hold. Many of us had a habit of saying, "I'm going to put you on hold for just a minute while I see if we have that item in stock."

Of course, "just a minute" really meant a few minutes. Customers could reasonably believe we literally meant one minute and be slightly annoyed when it took longer than that. 

The lesson the store manager shared was that we can help customers avoid unpleasant surprises by being careful about the language we use.

Problem 1: Customers Are Too Optimistic

Two problems can occur if we don't use clear language to manage customer expectations. Both can easily result in a service failure.

The first problem is customers have selective hearing. They tend to be overly optimistic about the service we promise them.

Here are two examples:

If you say, "Your order will arrive in two to four days," a customer will hear, "Your order will arrive in two days."

Or, if you say, "I'm going to put you on hold for just a minute," a customer will hear, "The maximum time you will be on hold is one minute."

Problem 2: We're Too Eager to Please

The other problem occurs when we're too eager to please our customers. We inadvertently set the scene for a future service failure by trying to make our customer feel better right now.

You've probably heard the phrase, "Under promise and over deliver." This is just the opposite.

A two to four day delivery time sounds too long, so we emphasize that it often takes just two days. This makes the customer feel good in the moment, because two days is acceptable.

It also sets the stage for an unpleasant surprise if it takes longer than that.

How Clear Language Can Help

You can avoid these problems by using clear language to get your customer to agree to the worst case scenario. Most of the time, customers are perfectly fine with this.

Here's an example:

Instead of saying, "Your order will take two to four days to arrive," say, "Your order will take up to four days to arrive."

This way, your customer won't be upset if the order takes four days. And, they'll be pleasantly surprised if it takes just two or three days to get there.

Of course, if four days is too long, you can always discuss options such as express shipping to get the order there faster.

Another example:

Don't say, "I'll get back to you right away." Instead, give your customer a specific time that has a little built-in wiggle room in case it takes you longer than anticipated. You might say, "I'll need to do some research on that issue. Will it be okay if I get back to you by 4pm today?"

Learn More

You can learn more from the short video below. It’s part of my LinkedIn Learning course, Managing Customer Expectations.

Use clear language to avoid surprises from Customer Service: Managing Customer Expectations by Jeff Toister

Customer Experience Success Story at AT&T

Customers view service relative to their expectations. 

• Good service meets expectations.

• Poor service falls short of expectations.

• Outstanding service exceeds expectations.

Here’s an email I received from my friend Larry. He expected to receive poor service from AT&T, but was pleasantly surprised in several ways.

Hey Jeff,

I wanted to share a GREAT customer service experience with you.

While I was out of town this weekend there was a power outage and I thought I lost my internet modem. I have not always had the best of luck when dealing with AT&T and am quick to say it. But I want to also be quick to point out my good experience.

First, I went to the local store. I got there about 15 min before they opened at noon. The parking lot was packed and there was a line at the door. 

When the door opened at noon, it was an amazing sight…there were a ton of employees inside and everyone who came in the door was immediately greeted and helped. No waiting at all. This caught my attention in a positive way.

I was met by a young lady who took me to a table and I explained my problem. We trouble shot the modem and immediately determined that it wasn’t the modem, but the power cord. We got the cord from another new piece of equipment and everything worked just fine. 

A power supply costs $10. A new modem costs $100. I asked for the $10 option. 

Initially she suggested we order one and I could have it come to my house or to the store and pick it up. She was unable to find the part # for the cord, and went to ask for help finding it. 

After a few minutes, she came back and I asked if there was a cord in the store I could borrow or rent for a few days until it arrived. She didn’t object and tried to order the cord for me. After another couple minutes, she just took my broken power cord and replaced it with the working one from the new modem box without charging me and said they will fix it on their side because she could not order a new one.

This is a great example of a front line employee taking the initiative and going above and beyond to FIX a customer issue. Instead of being without internet for several days or having to unnecessarily purchase a new piece of equipment. I was out of service for a couple hours and left a very satisfied customer who wanted to share that experience.

I am also sharing this on FB.

~ Larry

Notice how expectations played a role in Larry’s experience.

Larry’s initially low expectations made it easier for him to be pleasantly surprised by good service.

He was worried about wait times when he saw the large crowd. Excellent staffing levels allowed Larry to receive service much faster than he expected. 

Larry expected to pay for the repair. The associate took the initiative to find a solution she was empowered to deliver and gave Larry a replacement power cord at no charge.

These pleasant surprises prompted Larry to share his experience with AT&T on Facebook and with me. It all came down to one customer, at one store, served by one associate.

AT&T promises smart, friendly, and fast service at their AT&T stores. It sounds like they delivered.

Outstanding customer service you'll never notice

Our regular UPS driver came to the door yesterday afternoon. I had to sign for the package because he was delivering a shipment of wine. As I was signing, he remarked that the package had the wrong address on it. "I'm glad you knew where to bring it!" I said.

He replied that it was easy for him to track down the correct address because of my unusual last name and the shipment contained wine. (Yes, I am a huge wine enthusiast: www.sharethebottle.com.) 

I paused for a moment to think about what had just happened as I brought the wine in the house. The wine shipment had arrived just as expected. That by itself wasn't amazing, but the fact that it arrived on time was due to the actions of a very alert UPS driver who knew the regular customers on his route. He took extra initiative to ensure my expectations were met.

Could it be that some of the very best customer service happens behind the scenes? 

Customers tend to notice service service that is either exceptionally good or exceptionally poor. We are unlikely to notice when things go exactly the way we expect them to. 

What would have happened if the UPS driver had not taken the initiative to deliver my wine to the correct address? The shipment could have been delayed a day or two while a customer service representative tried to track me down. I might have been inconvenienced if I had to go to the UPS station to pick up the package instead of it being delivered to me. The wine might not have been delivered on time for an upcoming party if it took too long to resolve the problem.

All of those situations would have landed squarely below my expectations. I would have likely been upset at the winery, UPS, or even both. 

Instead, I'm happy.

How many times do unsung customer service heroes spot a problem before it occurs and just fix it? When it does happen, the experience will likely register as "average" on the customer's radar, but we should all agree that the effort was outstanding.