The Customer Service Myth

This is a picture of my house, which is currently undergoing something of a refurbishment.

As you can see, it's a bit of a mess at the moment and is completely uninhabitable.

In fact, it's been empty for just over a year, when the old man who originally owned it, died. We took it over in November.

Imagine my surprise then, when my gas bill for £749 arrived today, just a week after I had phoned the exact same meter reading that I had given them in November!

The problem these days, is call centres.

Without wanting to sound old and cranky, in the "old days" before the advent of call centres, you could actually reach a local person, in a local office, who could sort something out for you, right there and then on the telephone.

Now, you get 20 minutes waiting time, spent listening to mindless music and then have to go through a multitude of options that send you into a frenzy, only to be put through to an imbecile who doesn't give a stuff about helping solve the problem.

Why do I bring this up on a business oriented blog?

Simply because we are all in danger of going the same route. Even the smallest of businesses.

Automate everything is the order of the day and personally, I think it's wrong. It is especially wrong for the smaller business person. And yes, that's really coming from me, someone with so much automation in my life that I could easily pass as a robot.

So, in the context of the blog, here are some of my personal theories with regard to what's good and bad with automation:

• Email automation of common tasks is good. In fact, it's very good and can be personalised to whatever degree you feel comfortable with. I like mailing lists, when used properly.
• Web forms - generally I place these in the good category too, but only if you have a fantastic follow-up system, ideally by telephone!
• Contact telephone numbers - good as long as the caller doesn't reach an answering message. Real human contact is all important, as is, answering the telephone within three rings!
• Call centres - bad. I hate them, you hate them, everybody hates them. So, unless you run a public utility, a mobile phone company or a national firm of electrical retail outlets, steer clear from outsourcing your customer service to a call centre.

Do you need customer service if you are a domainer?

In short, you need good customer service no matter what business you're in!

One day, even as a domainer, you are going to have to deal with other people. They might be buying your traffic, or advertising on your web site, or even be buying a name from you.

In my experience, if you make dealing with people a pleasure and are honest in your dealings, then you'll soon have customers beating a path to your door.

For a domainer or small business person, dealing with customers isn't always easy. Here are a few of things I use to run some of domain names as mini-businesses, or at least give people the impression that there is a business on the other side of the web site:

• AllDayPA - this is a simple service that is available in the UK. If you're not in the UK, there are other providers offering the same thing. With this service, I receive a free free local rate telephone number to use in my advertising or on my web site. By using an online control panel, I can specify how the phone is answered, for example, one is answered as "Asbestos Surveys .com". Callers ask for me or a colleague by name and are told that we are currently unavailable but that we'll return the call shortly. AlldayPA then send me a text message and an email with the enquirer's details. We then have a sales lead, which is called within minutes, without fail.

• AWeber lead collection and lead generation system all in one, for such a low price, that I cannot understand why anyone wouldn't use it! I use this system extensively across many of my web sites and it generates far more in revenue than it costs. I even use it on one-page sites where I am simply trying to get the email addresses of my visitors so that I can let them know when the full site is going to be luanched. This is the one tool that I absolutely would not be without.

Offering good service from a web site is far more important that doing so from a bricks and mortar business, simply because on the Internet, you are already at a disadvantage. People are naturaly wary of doing business online, so you have to prove to them that you are just half a degree better than anyone else they could have called for the same service or product.

The response of people when I call them back after leaving a number or sending an email is generally one of surprise. I am nearly always the first to return the call, yet am rarely the only person they call. That alone wins me more business than most.

An example. When the people involved in the liquidation of the domain name "sms.co.uk" wanted soneone to brojer the sale of the name on their behalf, they contacted two large, well known domain auctioneers that shall remain nameless, as I don't wish to embarrass them.

They also called me, on one of my AllDayPa numbers. I returned the call and was instructed to sell the name the next day, after the others they had invited to help hadn't returned their calls. In fairness, one did, but not until after my press release had hit the fan. You can view it at The Register. Shame we didn't hit the £100,000, but that's life :)

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank British Gas Plc for providing the inspiration for today's blog. I am sure that on another day, the accolade could just as easily go to any of the following, from all of whom I have received similar levels of frustration (in no particular order):

Sky TV Powergen 02 Dell BT Comet