Is this familiar? My post on customer engagement earlier today highlighted gathering customer data (email address and telephone number) as tip number one to engaging your customer in line with building an emotional connection. What do you think is the reason why and what do you do when your customer refuses to share their contact details?  Thoughts?

Customer Engagement is a business communication connection between a customer and a business i.e. product/service provider (source- Wikipedia). It is also a means by which businesses can build an emotional relationship with customers which leads to customer loyalty and advocacy. I stumbled on this email banner (swipe left to see original image) and felt immediately that  Meadow Hall School  has demonstrated their interest in the performance of pupils/students attending the school both in and out of the school premises and that is GREAT! With a caption like ‘5 Tips To Get Your Children Organized & Focused In School”, Meadow Hall School has demonstrated true customer understanding and it resonates with me as a parent + I form a perception about the school. So down to the how, how do you build this kind of engagement with your customers? Here are a few tips to help and there are generic steps  1)      Get your custome...

In my opinion, this is one of the ways to NOT advertise your product or service.  Yes it’s an innovative solution  @gokadang but it’s communicated more like a business pitch than value to customer from a customer’s perspective and I will explain why. Off the top of my head, if market Research was done prior to the design of this product, I will expect the below value highlighted (using myself as a customer because yes, I still ride on motorcycles in my neighbor only) 😉 1) You will definitely beat traffic and faster movement means you can  #fuelyourhustle but how does message communicate your guarantee of safety knowing how reckless some of these riders can be? 2) Is this service insured so that if I ride with  @gokadang  and there’s an accident I am somewhat taken care of? 3) How trained are the drivers? What’s the selection process like?  4) Does riding on this motorcycles comply with government regulations on motorcycle usage in Lagos? Are the motorcyc...

Love it when brands tell their stories from a customer's/value proposition perspective. Understanding what is important to your customer and drafting your marketing communication in line not only attracts customers to you, it also forces you to look inwards at your operations so that when new customers come to you, their expectations match the actual experience. Zenith Bank Plc I hope your business processes align **wink**

Nigerian airlines have a steep hill to climb in order to gain customer’s confidence after several crashes, continuous delays, planes falling apart, dirty seats and sub-par customer service standards. Most of all, Arik Air had the toughest job after last year’s fiasco, with serial delays, cancellations and eventually AMCON taking over management. One would have thought that Arik would have learned from its mistakes and its efforts would’ve been directed where it mattered: Its customers. Unfortunately, my experience there was not the case and all the details can be found here: https://talktodebbie.blogspot.com/2018/09/poor-is-understatement.html My perspective: Cards on the table; I am a customer service manager and I tend to see certain angles that “regular” customers don’t. Hence I can be more critical than others, but I can also understand the customer service team in certain cases. Arik is always my last choice when booking a flight, due to almost confirmed delays and...

Today was one of those days that nothing seemed to work i.e. couldn’t get cash from the ATM (tried 3 different machines) and had to physically go pay my electricity bill (please don’t get me started on the internet drama). As is the norm on prepaid meters, you have to punch in the token using a little white box (or what ever it is called) and this got me thinking about the amount of effort I put into a task as simple as topping up on electricity. No doubt there has been some improvements in this space i.e. 1) You consume electricity 2) You get an outrageous monthly bill that you have to negotiate downwards! 3) Prepaid meters introduced (thank God – putting you in control of your consumption) 4) You get a token 5) You punch in token 6) You get power With the help of technology, this process can be further simplified into topping up/making payment and it reads on your meter immediately, kind of like DSTV (on a good day)! What do you think? If for any reason you don’t get a token, can y...

What’s your typical way of gathering customer feedback in your business? I bet satisfaction surveys right? You are not alone! Did you know that by observing how your customer buys and uses your product could also give you real and undiluted insight into their experience? Absolutely and I will share a very practical example. In my role as Director of Customer Experience at a global education management organization, part of my responsibility was making sure both parents and pupils had a great experience across all touch points and a key touch point was at the schools. My first time experiencing the first day of school was more of an ethnographic research where I got to observe staff, pupils and parents go through the registration process. In summary, the customer flow was; ask questions (CONSIDERATION), indicate interest and register child (PURCHASE), a parent goes shopping for stationaries before sending child into the classroom (**USE**). Conducting an e...