Customer Service collage
We courted this customer, we wooed this customer, we pitched this customer, and each time we got a rejection.
That customer – a company we’ll call ToughNut Inc. – didn’t even want to give us a shot. They were loyal and perfectly happy with their specialty chemical suppliers.
Until a couple of weeks ago.
That’s when one of our account managers, who had not given up, got a frantic call from a ToughNut exec.
“We are going to literally shut down our plant tomorrow,” he said. “We can’t get our raw materials.”
He asked if we had a particular specialty chemical in stock, an offset material that would keep its plant up and running. We did, and our team immediately moved into action.
Within 24 hours of that initial conversation, our material was inside ToughNut’s plant, which never had to stop its production line. By that time, we’d also received orders from a second ToughNut facility.
The emails came too, with messages like: “Oh my God, I wish my other suppliers were half as good as you guys” and “This is amazing.”
These kinds of stories happen all the time at Maroon Group.
We cracked ToughNut, not with slick presentations, fancy dinners or deep discounts. We did it with a sales team that persevered and service so extraordinary that it went beyond customer “service” to customer “success” – as in “Creating Customer Success®!”
Yes, we trademarked it.
Those three words are part of the “secret sauce” of Maroon’s competitive advantage, of our success and our strong reputation. Yet we decided to not keep it a secret at all. In fact, we love to share it.
I urge you to replicate Creating Customer Success®, copy it. You’ll get the same remarkable results we did.
So, how did we do it?
1. We created the right culture and environment.
Since the late 1970s, when Maroon was born, we’ve woven customer service into every part of our business. It is literally everywhere, the relationships that our sales team maintains with customers, on the walls, on documents, in meetings, on every performance review. It’s in our mission and in our core values. It’s always on our minds.
2. We found out what customers wanted.
A couple years ago, we hired a firm to research our market, both the companies we did business with and those – like ToughNut – that we didn’t work with. This was blind research, and we remained anonymous.
The firm interviewed plant workers, senior executives, tech and lab workers – anyone who might have a say in the decision about a supplier. We wanted to know exactly what they wanted and needed.
The results were clear: Customers wanted consistent products, consistent delivery and consistent supply.
3. We made those customer needs our “products.”
We are not a manufacturer. But that doesn’t mean we can’t have a product.
We decided to take those customer desires – product consistency; on-time, in-full delivery; reliable inventory – and turn them into our widgets.
4. Using data, we set out to perfect them.
The old adage “what’s measured is managed” cannot be overstated.
We began to gather all the quantifiable data we could on any of our operations and processes that might affect those three products – from order entry to shipping performance to customer complaints. We began measuring them all.
Using the data we gleaned, we launched a formalized program to spot and fix the problems and to find and expand what works well.
5. We share the results.
Accountability is a great motivator. Visit our website right now and you’ll find, on the homepage, current statistics on our three “products.”
You’ll see that things are working:
Returns or complaints on less than 0.1 percent of orders.
On-time, in-full delivery on 96 percent of orders.
An average of more than two months of inventory on hand.
This stuff works.
6. Add a human touch.
While data is powerful, business is done by people, like sales and support teams that have great relationships with customers.
Call Maroon and a human being will answer the phone. Chances are, it’ll be LePreece Thomas, who cherishes her role as “Director of First Impressions.”
We’ve empowered our sales team, our customer-service team – all employees – when it comes to helping customers. If someone calls with a problem, our team can forgo approvals and permissions, use their judgment and do something revolutionary: Solve the problem.
Their answers are never, “We can’t do that” or “Let me check with my boss on that.”
Instead, they say things like, “Let’s make this happen!”
7. Never stop. Creating Customer Success® is a long game.
There is no finish line. The clock never hits double zero. Your company, like Maroon, must make this a part of life. You can always find more goals, more service improvements, more customers to help.
And more ToughNuts to crack.
Mike McKenna is COO of the Maroon Group LLC.