March 14, 2007

In the news today it was reported that Jennifer Hudson had been given free Burger King for the rest of her life.

“The company made the announcement after a recent spat between Jennifer and Simon Cowell. Jennifer responded to Simon’s criticism of her not thanking the show enough for launching her career.

She said: “If I’d been any better at my job when I was at Burger King in my middle teens I wouldn’t be here either, so should I thank them too?” ”

Burger King responded by giving her a free pass for life and this has been more widely reported than the initial story! A bit of PR genius from Burger King there. Opportunism is where it’s at.

Back to the Nando’s restaurant (Making customers feel valuable).

I was there having dinner with my brother and got chatting to the manager about their EFTPOS terminals somehow. (The machines where you pay for things using your bank card.) He told me about a regular customer who must have stuffed up her PIN because the transaction got declined. However, the customer service guy didn’t notice this, served her the food and she left. They discovered their error balancing the tills that night.

His solution?

(This guy is NUTS.)

“She’s a regular customer.. so when she comes back in we’ll settle the bill then.”

In other words, he’s willing to risk the possibility of sacrificing a regular - and lucrative, the bill was about four meals worth - customer for the sake of his staff members mistake!

As I turned away from the conversation I looked at my brother and his opinion was already written large on his face. “That guy is crazy.”

More on customer service :
Every customer is a potential competitor

My friend didn’t know it, but the other day I was overhearing him talk about someone - me.

Fortunately he didn’t have anything negative to say (maybe he was waiting for me to get out of ear-shot to use his best content.)

He said this:

 ”I love texting Mat.. every time you’re guaranteed a reply within a minute! He’s a machine! He replies every time and so quickly…”

Yeh it was a nice ego boost but stop and think for a second : can people say the same thing about you? If you’re in business how valuable would that kind of reputation be? “Whenever I contact Tom he gets back to me straight away. Every time.”

 I know that I want my customers to be saying that about me.