Everyone, and I mean everyone, in business today has climbed aboard the great customer experience train. B2C and even B2B businesses have made providing a great customer experience a key aspect of their culture and business plan. I believe that this is not a bad thing or temporary fad. Instead, like so many shiny new initiatives, it would behoove us to unpack two sayings that have entered the lexicon of our behavior as human beings in the business world. These two quotes provide a foundation for the face of a great customer experience
“You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.
“You cannot be everything to everybody, but you can be everything to somebody”
What’s the one common thread in these two statements? It’s YOU! You the person, you the human being. A great customer experience begins with human interaction. All other methods, processes or technologies no matter how advanced, by themselves will ultimately fall short.
Yes, large companies like Amazon and Walmart, to name but two, have successfully removed human interaction from the commodity buying experience. But, for most B2C and B2B companies, the distance between where you are and where they are is massive. Ironically, that gap is your competitive advantage. You have counter sales expertise that provides the “know how” your customers want and need. You have real live customer service representatives that can help your customer navigate through a complex order. You do have an advantage!
While it’s been said a million times it does bear repeating: People, Process and Technology are indispensable for your customers to have a great experience. The smartest and most helpful counter salesperson in the world is handicapped if the information they need takes a computer science degree to find. The most upbeat and smartest CSR in your company is hamstrung if they need to navigate through bureaucracy and multiple screens just to get approval for a discount that the customer is entitled to.
If you as a wholesale distributor, hardlines retailer or manufacturer run SAP you know exactly what I am talking about. Yes, all the power, scalability and flexibility are at your fingertips but for most it’s the technology that’s managing your people. SAP along with Partners like DataXstream are determined to flip that equation around with one elegant, powerful and easy to use solution, OMS+! Company’s like Lumber Liquidators, Milliken, Pacific Coast Supply, Crafco and Ann Sacks have found that their people incorporating refined processes and using DataXstream’s OMS+ can be the face of a great customer experience.
SAP and DataXstream’s OMS+ enable you and your associates to lay the foundation for a great customer experience!
