Enhancing Customer Experience: Strategies for Starting and Ending Well in Business

It's always a good time to improve the customer experience.

With good customer experience, you never go out of style - because every season is customer experience season.

Thanks for tuning in to another episode of Collab with Kiva.

See you next time!

Are you ready to take massive action in your business and make data-driven decisions? Let’s chat 👇🏽

Podcast Transcript:

Kiva Slade: [00:00:01]

Hello, and welcome to Collab With Kiva. I'm your host, Kiva Slade. From the marbled halls of the US Congress to my racing-themed office chair, I've learned that there is no perfect path to the life of your dreams. My journey over the past 20 years has included being a legislative director for a member of Congress, policy director for a nonprofit, stay-at-home mom, homeschooling mom, jewelry business owner, and now the owner of a service-based business. Whether your journey has been a straight line or full of zigs and zags, join me and my guest as we share insights, hope, and lessons learned from our female entrepreneurship journeys. May the collaborative sharing of our stories be the tide that lifts your boat. Let's dive in.

[00:00:55]

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of Collab With Kiva. I am your host Kiva Slade. And today we're going to talk about customer experience. Customer experience is ... I don't even know. Can we fully define how important it truly is, and that importance? It covers so many different industries. And obviously, most of us are service-based professionals. So, understanding that, customer experience is huge for us. It can make or break in many instances, relationships. It can make or break the quality of the service or the perception of the quality of service that someone has. And as I shared a few weeks ago in the episode on Recession Proofing Your Business, things like positive customer experiences and focusing on that, it's not something that's recession specific, it really should be a part of your everyday best practices. The key, though, is continuing to do those, even in the difficult times. And so, let me just tell you a story. Recently, my daughter and I had a mother-daughter trip. We were excited because we were taking a journey to Charleston. And many of you know, I'm gluten-free, so I live or die by gluten-free menus and my find me gluten-free app. And there was this restaurant that we were excited to go visit. She liked the menu that wasn't gluten-free, and we were pumped. So, everyone said reservations are highly recommended. So, I went to their site, I made our reservation. I was impressed with the reservation software. It was an open table. It was a service called Resy.

[00:03:03]

And not only did they ask, how many people and the date and time, they also asked about allergens, and they literally had gluten-free, pescatarian, dairy free. They had choices for you. And they even said, if you're booking a reservation for two, you can even include the allergen information for your guest and you could send the reservation to your guest. So, I was pumped because I'm like, this is going to be amazing. So, we arrive at the restaurant, we're seated and the waitress starts telling us about the specials. So, for those who don't know, in addition to being gluten-free, I don't eat meat. And so, I had chosen gluten-free and pescatarian. And the waitress starts with, "And we have this beef carpaccio that's really delicious." Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. And then I was like, okay, I'm just going to keep letting her go. And the second dish she mentions was another meat dish. And I knew that they had gluten-free biscuits. So, another server comes with this wonderfully smelling cornbread that my daughter just dives into. And I was like, so I don't mean to cut you off, but I'm gluten-free, and do you have biscuits available? And did they transfer any of the information from the reservation to you? And I said, because I don't eat meat either. And so she was like, "Oh, they normally give me a slip of paper, but I didn't get one. I need to go put in an order for your gluten-free biscuits. And well, pretty much anything can be made gluten-free."

[00:05:09]

And I was like, okay, all right. Because it's not one of those menus that actually designate it, and that's fine. So, two shrimp and grits later, literally my biscuits came. Maybe 5 minutes if I'm being generous before my meal came. My daughter at this point has gone through all the cornbread. And if I'm honest with you, cornbread is actually an easy thing to make gluten-free. Honestly, it is one of the easiest things. You do not need to have flour. At any rate, I get the biscuits finally, my food comes so I'm not able to really enjoy them. My food comes and my daughter and I both ordered shrimp and grits. I had them take out the meat, but hers is adorned with green onions. Mine looked boring compared to hers. And to the food runner, I said can I get some green onions? Because I'm sitting there thinking, did green onions all of a sudden start to contain gluten and I missed the memo? And so, he brings them out, so at least now my food has some garnish. And I'll be honest with you, though, the excitement I felt when I completed the reservation waned as every single experience I was having in the restaurant occurred. The waitress felt terrible. She was like, "I'm so sorry." Honestly, she was trying to rush the biscuits and get them to come out sooner. And she was like, "I just was not informed." And I even included in my review, operationally, if you're going to take all that time to ask the questions on the front end, that information needs to transfer down the line, so it should be present with the host when they are going to seat, and it should be translate to the waitress or waiter so that you continue the experience that you had created through that reservation portal.

[00:07:16]

So, on the flip side of that, when my daughter and I were back in Myrtle Beach, she's always talking about this place called Insomnia Cookies. "Oh, they're so good. Oh, they're so good." And she and her friends drive just to go get a cookie. And I'm like, what the heck? Like, honestly, the cookie is that great? And there's one now in Myrtle Beach, and so I found out that they actually do have gluten-free chocolate chip cookies. Let's just say ever since I found that out, I'm kind of there on a regular. Seriously, it's that. So, after our experience in Charleston, I was like, look, I need some good dessert, and so I wanted a cookie. So, we go to Insomnia, and they're out of gluten-free cookies. Then we're like, "We'll have to bake some." I was like, okay, I'll go sit outside and wait. They're like, 13, 16 minutes, whatever. And so the manager is like, "I'm so sorry." I was like, “It's no big deal. I'll just take my six cookies when you guys bake them.” So, imagine my surprise when he comes outside and he's like, "Hey, your cookies are ready." And I go inside. He has decided since they weren't ready, to give me a dozen cookies for the price of six. Any disappointment that I had when they didn't have my cookies available was totally gone when here are a dozen cookies because we didn't have them available and we should have.

[00:09:00]

Two totally different experiences. And if I'm honest, two different price points as well in terms of the restaurant, which was way more high-end than a cookie spot, but the restaurant started out strong and did not finish strong, whereas the cookie place, one would say, maybe didn't start strong, but finished super strong. And I share that because, again, when you're thinking about customer experience, it's important how we start. It's also important how we end. Both of those are important because, again, focusing on positive customer experiences, those are things that keep your business going even in those tougher times. Ending well is important. All of your client relationships, they're not going to last forever. Some of them might be project-based and they're due to end. And some of them, your focus area has changed, and the client maybe has changed something that they're doing and the relationship is going to end. I want you to off-board them with the same upbeat energy that you onboarded them with. Handoff, overcommunicate. Keep all of that same focused energy on delivering a positive customer experience, even if that person is literally getting on your last nerve, maybe they haven't paid, maybe there's something else that's just driving you batty. It doesn't matter. You want to end well because you are focusing on having great customer experiences.

[00:11:03]

Even allow time for follow-up with you. In most cases, clients aren't going to know how good they had it until you're gone. It's like drinking from a fire hose, reading your goodbye packet of all the things that... "Here's your Google Drive folder with a gazillion things," depending on how long you've worked with them. "And here's this, and here's that. And don't forget to remove me from this service, this app, this thing, this whatever." There's a lot. And honestly, sometimes they're in the process of still running their business, so they're not able to just stop everything to focus on your off-boarding them. Give them a few days, 15 days, 30 days to be able to follow up with you, even if it's only via boxer and email. Or limit it to one or the other. Whatever your preference is, allow them that time to follow up and allow them that time to digest the information. That level of ending well is so super important. And it shows you as that ultimate consummate professional in how you conduct things. And again, it is a positive customer experience. And those are important because even though the relationship is ending, there's not to say that there may not be a time in the future where your paths will cross again, that they might need your services again. Someone in their circle might need your services. Are you more likely to refer someone who you had a positive customer experience with or someone that you had a less than stellar customer experience with? Yelp is famous for this. We have one thing wrong. The one time we've gone there, we just lambaste the place.

[00:13:07]

It's so important to focus on those positive customer experiences. So, I want you to start well and I want you to end well. Because they are both important. So, even if you felt like your start was more like Insomnia Cookies and it was a little shaky, you still have time to redeem that start at the end. Or maybe you start with more like the other restaurant where it was gangbusters and you were like, "Oh, got this," but things started to unravel. It's not too late for you to change that, for you to turn the tide so that you can finish well and you can end well with a positive customer experience. Because let's be honest, we're going to tell our friends or we're going to say, "Hmm, I wouldn't eat there. Nope, because this is what happened to me." Or we're going to say, "Oh my gosh, you so need to go there, because that was the most delicious experience I've ever had." So, make sure you're focusing on positive customer experiences, not just now. Because remember, it's not recession-specific behavior. It is an everyday best practice in your business. Take some time to evaluate what can you do to up-level your customer experience. Do you have retainer clients? Could you send them a gift? Do you send a gift now, but you could send something a bit more meaningful? Maybe you have reached a stage where you send them a custom box that has your logo, and it's such an experience for the opening of it and the unboxing of it. What can you do to make things better?

[00:15:05]

So, focus on those customer experiences, and evaluate your process. Like your current onboarding and onboarding, evaluate it. What does it look like? Where does it need to improve? Set its time quarterly to just look. How can I uplevel this even more? Trust me, it does do wonders because I am still raving over my 12 gluten-free chocolate chip cookies. So, I will wish each of you positive customer experiences and I'll talk to you next time. Bye.

[00:15:42]

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Collab With Kiva. Each of us has a different path and I hope that this episode gave you some takeaway that has left you inspired and motivated to keep pressing forward on your unique path. Make sure you subscribe so you don't miss out on any future episodes. And of course, your reviews on Apple are greatly appreciated. If you're a small business owner ready to start making data-driven decisions in your business and you know that without the data, you're really just guessing, make sure to visit my website, the 516collaborative.com, and let schedule a time to talk to make sure that you can harness the power of data in your business. I'll see you next time. Bye.

Meet Kiva Slade - the Founder and CEO of The 516 Collaborative. With a unique background in high-power politics on Capitol Hill and sixteen years as a homeschooling mama, Kiva found her calling in the online business world as a trusted guide for entrepreneurs looking to build the business of their dreams.

Kiva's work began behind the scenes, orchestrating the back end of businesses and managing teams. But her inner data diva couldn't help but notice that small businesses needed help harnessing the power of data for growth. So she and her team set out to uncover and tidy up the data required to enable clients to grow their businesses confidently and easily.