Talking customer experience, here’s my most recent stories:
I first ordered a batch of Lenovo IBM Tablet back in Oct 07, two weeks later when we contacted them they said the order was lost and that we had to start over again. So we bought some stock from a reseller. Four weeks, later a notice came through my mail box and said my order was on its way. I called them up and said all I needed to do was to decline delivery and they would take care of things. Three months later today, AMEX still has not refund my money to date for merchandise that was cancelled and never received.
During the week of Christmas, I ordered another batch of Lenovo IBM Tablet online and they promised delivery in 2 weeks. So I thought perfect as out new staff won’t start until mid Jan. Two week later I called and they said my order was cancelled due to configuration problem. So if I needed anything I needed to re-order and they could rush my order which would take 2-3 weeks. I said forget it and I bought some from a reseller. Last week, a notice cam through my email telling me they were preparing to deliver the laptops. I called them up and they said they had no idea of what’s going on and I talked to about half-a-dozen of customer service people and at the end no one knows what’s going on. So they delivered the laptops today that I don’t need. Anyway I decided to take them instead sending them back for refund which I know how painful it will be.
And worse, we have so many problems with the quality and now we’re waiting for parts for replacement plus the battery recall. Lenovo is hopeless and so many things are broken in their system. They deserve to go out-of-business. It is a matter of time when I will issue a company policy of not buying from them. We have spent collectively about 50 hours on the phone with them and the experience was awful. How can Lenovo turn this IBM division into such a bad company? The IBM Thinkpad was really nicely designed and the ThinkPad logo still gives me a lot of goodwill. I think I need to tell my story on the Wall Street Journal. Will put in on my to-do list.
On the contrary, Apple gives me the best experience I can get. I order a batch of MacBook Air a few weeks back. They called me while I was driving to work to confirm my order; I made some changes to it and add a few more MacBook Air to the order. Went back to the office, checked my order on the site and they did exactly what I’ve asked them to do. Two days ago I got this email in my inbox telling me that they were being shipped directly from their assembly plant in Shanghai. I clicked on it and it gave me an instant tracking, so I know it is now in Anchorage. This morning, this stack of MacBook Air showed up on my door front. When I opened the box, it was like such an experience. With the black box packaging so much thinking has been put into this thing. I opened the box and it was such a delight.The battery is pre-charged and setting up takes less than 3 minutes. A small little icon was jumping up and down to tell me there’s a software update needed. Click on it, done.
Just this weekend, I was at the Apple Store picking up a few accessories and some software while my wife was shopping at the Louis Vuitton store next door. The guy was so helpful and despite the shop was full of people; there were people available to help. So 10 minutes later, I got what I needed and about to head off to the cashier. He pulled out a hand-held and scanned my credit card and seconds later the invoice was in my Blackberry inbox. That’s a great experience. Apple deserves to rule the world. What a difference between the two experiences? Is it that hard to do what Apple does (outside of the product)? I am so upset with Lenovo that everytime I look at my machine I was wondering how fast are they losing market share?
Companies today invested heavily with in systems and networks of frontline sales staff to retaining their current customers. It is an indisputable fact that the costs of doing so tend to be much lower than those of acquiring new ones. Why companies such as Lenovo are foolish enough to piss customer like which heavily influence corporate buying decisions?
What I was getting from Apple were multiple sparks between me, the product and frontline staff —the sparks that help transform wary or skeptical customer into strong and committed brand advocates. These sparks are the core of the emotionally driven behavior that drives great customer experience companies earn trust and loyalty during "moments of truth": those few interactions when customers invest a high amount of emotional energy in the outcome and being remembered as the customer or brand “experiences”. Proper and effective handling of these moments requires an instinctive frontline response that puts the customer's emotional needs ahead of the company's agenda and systems/processes.
When we work with some of the greatest brands of the world, we have identified a number of simple ways for them to solve these challenges. In any industry that offers a service (or sells a product with an "embedded" service component), there are moments when the long-term relationship between a business and its customers can change significantly—for better or for worse. By developing a rigor customer experience strategy can ensure delivery of these positive "moments of truth". This is not a spread sheet exercise; it requires a sound practice of “customer empathy” and “customer service economics”. It is not one or the other; you need both. Need to call Lenovo again.
