In this article, Tom said, “If you can’t get people to pay for what they love, we’re all out of business.” WOW – this was a great statement not just for Newsweek magazine but for the world of business.  Think about it.  If you don’t create a customer experience where your customer doesn’t “love dealing with you” how long, in this competitive climate called a recession are you going to last?  This is something i have espoused for years and years that is you don’t have a customer experience that customers love and they don’t absolutely love dealing with you, Trust and Loyalty are always going to an elusive goal. 

If you take anything away from Tom’s message it is this.  Get someone to honestly evaluate your current cusotmer experience from an objective perspective.  NO, ididn’t say do another lame survey.  I said understanding the CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE and the PROMISES that go along with being able to deliver on this experience.  Get help in understanding the Promises your customers want from you and figure out how far off you are in being able to deliver on these promises and FIX IT or you run the risk of going the direction of the print media – extinction.

Understand what it takes for your customers to LOVE dealing with you and what PROMISES they want you to keep every day and you will have LOYAL customers that TRUST you and wouldn’t go anywhere else.  And in these difficult times, isn’t that what everyone wants?  Hope this helps…

Blaine

Blaine Millet

Customer Experiences Inc.

By way of background, we had this issue several years ago in the Customer Loyalty and Customer Satisfaction discussions.  What I would do is get a room of people together (not more than 25) and I would ask them all to write down the definitions of “Loyalty” and “satisfaction” and a few other terms.  You guessed it – what came back were a whole host of definitions that were all over the map.  So then, what “is” the right definition?  The only answer was, it depends.

Fast forward to today and ask the same question about the word “Authenticity” and I’ll bet you a venti Starbucks latte that I would get the same results as I did with the words Loyalty and Satisfaction.  Big problem.  If you have one definition and your audience has another one, you will NEVER see eye-to-eye and thus won’t be able to deliver the “experience” they are desiring from you.  It is absolutely critical that you are on the same page with your definitions so you can deliver on these.

OK, so what’s the answer you ask?  Find a word or words that aren’t as ambiguous and that you don’t have to spend a lot of time and resources to make sure you are on the same page.  We came up with the word “PROMISES” to do just that.  No, we didn’t invent the word, we just decided to use it in the context of customers to make life simpler and more straight forward.  When I asked the same question of the group above and used “Promises” they virtually all got it right.  Why?  Because it is a simple and powerful word that everyone understands.  Is it dangerous?  Absolutely.  Anything powerful has the potential of being dangerous.  I will talk more about this in another post.

I just read Seth Godin’s latest blog titled, “Authenticity.”  Interesting discussion on this exact topic.  Why?  Because Seth uses the two words, “Authenticity” and “Promises” interchangeably!  He believes the definition of Authenticity is keeping your promises and “acting” a certain way rather than “being” a certain way.  Very interesting argument.  But if I asked all of you if you would have equated these two terms, I doubt I would have gotten much agreement – thus my initial point – definitions that are ambiguous NEVER, NEVER, NEVER result in easy to deliver experiences. 

When you use a word, make sure you feel it has the strength to be consistent among your audiences, especially customers and employees.  Otherwise, you run the risk of misunderstanding and delivering the “wrong” experience to your audience.  That is the reason we settle on the word “PROMISES” and live by the belief that if you understand what these are and can keep them with our audience (personal or professional) you will build TRUST which ultimately builds LOYALTY - it’s that simple.  Comments welcome…

Blaine

Blaine Millet

Customer Experiences Inc.

John states in the article that when times are tough and the economy is either weakening, is already weak or is headed downward, don’t try and cover it up with “things are going well” type comments to employees – be straight with them and be TRANSPARENT.  Everyone knows this is happening, so why are we making excuses that it isn’t or it isn’t as bad over here or over there – just be straight.  There is too much information easily obtainable today that would warrant this type of behavior.  Yet, many if not most organizations today continue to play this pathetic game of cat and mouse with employees.

OK, let’s turn the tables a bit on this same subject.  What about your CUSTOMERS?  Don’t you think they deserve the same treatment?  Absolutely YES!!  Why would an organization try to paint a different picture for their customers when they, in most likelihood, realize things are tough and as such you should be straight with them as well.  It is really pathetic when a company tells their customers “hey, things are going well for us” and then they lay off 20% of their employees – duh?  Customers aren’t stupid and when you treat them like they are, guess what happens – they DEFECT and buy from your competitors. 

The goal of any organization should be to be as transparent as possible to their customers and form greater partnering opportunities and situations where they share more information with their customers.  Customers realize you need to make a profit so why hide it – be up front with it.  Customers know you have to operate in certain ways to make their life as easy as possible, don’t hide that either.  And most certainly customers figure out when you are in trouble as a company or not – don’t hide that either.  Instead, adopt a philosophy of TRANSARENCY with both your customers and employees and you will benefit greatly.

Remember, Loyalty, whether it be employee loyalty or customer loyalty, is an end state.  It is built on a foundation of trust.  Trust is built on a foundation of making and keeping your promises and being transparent with your customers and employees.  Don’t think you can get to loyalty and skip trust – hasn’t ever worked and never will.  Spend the time, invest in your people and your customers and above all, be transperant and straight with both of them.  The rewards will far outweigh any additional costs or hardships you might endure. 

Blaine

Blaine Millet

Customer Experiences Inc.

But really folks, think about your own lives and those of your businesses.  Isn’t it refreshing when something you are working on or involved in or managing is so simple everyone gets it right away?  Isn’t every one’s life easier (other than possibly the consultant that is trying to make it too complex) when something is simple?  I am reminded of this every day in the work we do and in my own personal life.  Think of Apple and the Ipod – can’t get any simpler than that – one button and a wheel does it all.  Every time, and I mean every time I either make something more complex than it should be or communicate my thoughts in a way that is too complex to understand, everyone loses – especially me. 

I built Customer Experiences Inc. using the mantra, “Simple Solutions – Powerful Results” and I try to live by that every day for the sake of my clients.  We do a lot of things, one of which is helping companies better understand the promises their customers want them to keep.  As part of that work we are constantly reminded by our clients customers how complex they have made the relationship.  They don’t fully understand what they are being promised and they aren’t really sure if they are delivering on these promises that they don’t fully understand – whew – that is is complex and confusing. 

Another example is when we look inside our clients own “house” to see what is happening internally.  Invariably, we see new solutions and programs being implemented (or I should say trying to be implemented) that have no chance in you know what of succeeding.  Why?  Because they are so complex that the majority of employees don’t even understand the program or their role in helping to make it happen.  It doesn’t work if only top management and the creator of the program gets it – it has to reach the “lowest common denominator” in the company.  If they don’t get it, it won’t work.  But when companies introduce programs that are so simple the lowest level employee “gets it” and understands their role in it – it is generally wildly successful. 

A great example of this, and I keep going back to this company, is Southwest Airlines.  Their missions statement is so simple everyone gets it and knows their role in it.  It is simply, “The Golden Rule – do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”  Simple – everyone gets it and can do their best to make sure they are living by this rule.  We could all learn a bit more and be a bit more effective at everything we do if we constantly keep the word SIMPLE in front of us every step of the way – and when things start to spiral out of control, remember the Golden Rule and get back to something that is simply simple.

Blaine

Blaine Millet

Customer Experiences Inc.

What do I mean when I say she “got it right?”  Simple, she focused on the CUSTOMER.  I have attended hundreds of speeches by leaders from all over the world, in business, sports, politics, not-for profit – you name it and I have probably attended a speech on it.  My goal is to always take away at least one thing that I personally believe to be accurate and to use that to better myself, my relationships or my business endeavors.

Carly was more than generous last Thursday morning, she shared many things that I could take away and share with others.  But there were several things she talked about that I felt compelled to share with our readers that I thought were “spot on” with what I believe.  You can disagree if you like and if you do, please comment on the blog.

First, she talked about the fact that the “individual is now becoming ‘in charge’ during this century.”  Couldn’t agree more – we see this every day in our interactions with companies and their customers.  Second, she said “Individuals demand a level of transparency and if you don’t embrace this you will lose.”  Again, right on target Carly.  Customers in particular (and employees as well) are tired of surprises and as such want transparency in the people and organizations they deal with.  The Internet has changed the game and where information is available at your fingertips, why try to hide something – it just makes people skeptical and not trust you or your organization.  So “get transparent” and you will open the doors to many happy relationships and create Loyalty among those.

Third, she said, “The Customer is ALWAYS in charge.”  We have been focused on the customer in great detail for the past 15 years and believe me, that couldn’t be truer.  If you aren’t focusing on the one constituent that writes you checks then who are you focusing on.  Fourth, she talked a great deal about change and how hard it is for people and organizations to change – believe me, we see it every day as well. But she did make a great comment about change and the level of the individual in the organization.  She said, “Only leaders can drive positive change.  Managers accept the world as is and manage in that world whereas leaders change the world around them and show people how to adopt a different direction. A leaders job is to unlock people’s potential.”  Great insights and again, spot on Carly. 

Whether you like Carly or disagree with everything about her, she has great insights and wisdom from being in the board room at at the helm of one of the biggest organizations in the world.  She certainly inspired me and showed me some simpler ways of thinking about issues and people – which I look for every day.  I just wanted to thank her for “staying in the game” and sharing her insights and for Seattle Pacific University for taking the chance on a certainly controversial speaker – both should be commended. 

Blaine Millet

Customer Experiences Inc.

I just recently released an article, “Marry Your Customer – Creating Trusted, Loyal Relationships,” on our website, www.customerexperiencesinc.com, to share some thinking I have had for quite a while.  It also supports what I have been seeing in various client situations and since it is so “simple yet powerful,” I wanted to share my thinking and some additional insights in this area.

What I absolutely find amazing and appalling in organizations is how leadership tells their people to act one way toward their customer that goes against all the principles of building trusted relationships – all for the almighty dollar.  This is just plain wrong!  The organizations we see that have the greatest success, create linkage between what the leadership stands for and the employees and this is then demonstrated to their customers through their actions.

Let me give you an example.  When employees go to work, they bring with them their own set of “ethics” or what I call “Employee Character.”  Included in this Employee Character is an underlying component of wanting to build trusted relationships with co-workers, leadership, customers, suppliers, partners, etc.  And they know how to do it.  They understand how important it is to a successful personal relationship to make and keep your Promises - they do it every day when building their own relationships outside of work.  So now, they enter the workplace and one of the first things that happens is they are asked (directly or indirectly) to make Promises that they know they can’t keep – at least not consistently. 

For most employees, this doesn’t work.  They are at odds with this and whether they recognize it outwardly or not, they are violating their own character to act this way.  This conflict between the employer and the organization is one of the greatest frustrations in employees and one of the key reasons for employee defection – or leaving the organization.  But when there is great alignment between “Leadership Character” and “Employee Character” and the Promises they are asked to keep are actually supported by leadership – great things happen.  The organization has become both “customer-focused” and “employee-focused” instead of “operationally focused.”  This is a huge distinction and one that separates the best organizations from all the others.

So I won’t steal the thunder of the article and allow you to read how all this comes together but let me leave you with one parting thought.  Promises Made = Promises Kept is one of the most basic concepts an organization can embrace and one that has some of the most profound impacts on short and long-term profitability, Loyalty and ongoing sustainability.  It is just interesting so few understand it or have implemented it today.

Take a minute and let me know what you think?  Are you seeing the same thing in your organization?  Does this make sense to you or not?  Do you think this is off base and isn’t the way it works and you have other ideas?  Do you agree and would like to see your organization operate like this?  Any and all comments are welcome – as we continue to explore this area and write about it, we would love to incorporate others experiences and thoughts.  Thanks.

Blaine Millet

Customer Experiences Inc.

After searching their website, it was clear they had a model that was both strategic and executable – something that is hard to find these days.  Rather than just talking about something they actually had numerous cases of doing it and how they helped entrepreneurs and small businesses (probably some larger ones as well).  One section, of course, that caught my eye was about Customer Experiences and what they focused on in this area.  Usually we find a lot of marketing hype about how to better serve your customers – lots of great comments and quotes but nothing tangible.  I found just the opposite here.  They hit on something we talked about in our first book, “Creating and Delivering Totally Awesome Customer Experiences,” the issue of psychographics and the role it plays in helping to determine the best way to approach your customers.  I won’t go into the details of this right now but wanted to offer some additional thinking on the subject.

When we wrote our book, psychographics was a key component to our Customer Experience Mapping effort and still is a key component today – and it works!  However, over the past year or so we literally stumbled onto something that takes psychographics and other tools to a much higher and more powerful level – PROMISES.  We have extended our original thinking to included a very simple, yet powerful concept: Promises Made = Promises Kept.  This basically says if you really want to take your company to a higher level and excel above your competitors, you have to first UNDERSTAND the PROMISES your customers want you to make them and then build the operational and delivery portions of your business to KEEP these PROMISES.  If you can be successful at this, then, and only then will you build true loyalty with your customers and significant differentiation from your competitors.

When E-Myth gives an example of a customer situation, they do so around the psychographics model – take a look at some of the articles on their website.  Now, envision this same example, only adding the strength and emotional bond to it if they also understood and could deliver on the core set of Promises that this customer really wanted them to make, each and every day – WOW, that is real power to a business.  I feel the typical business could really take E-Myth to a higher level than it already is – incorporate a Promise Architecture into the model and leverage all the benefits of an E-Myth program.  The combination would seem to provide a set of complementary tools to create clear and concise market differentiation, while simultaneously streamlining the development of operating processes that are required to support any business that intends to build scale.

Blaine Millet

Customer Experiences Inc.

Comprehensive Sales and Marketing Plan

Member is looking for an updated/more comprehensive version of a sales and marketing plan. Any suggestions would be helpful. This member would like to achieve a better planning tool ffor their directors to create and use more effectively.

Is it just me, or does anyone else see the oxymoron in the phrase “Comprehensive Sales and Marketing Plan?” 

There are plenty of ways to develop a “Comprehensive Sales and Marketing Plan”, but the problem with most that we’ve seen is that they aren’t comprehensive at all.  Almost by definition, a “Sales and Marketing Plan” ISN’T comprehensive, because the focus is on only two elements within a business: Sale and Marketing. 

Far too often, Sales and Marketing exercises tend to become  internally-focused idea generation projects that are used to determine budgets, with action plans for how to spend the budget added in for good measure.  There are two significant stakeholders that are missing from the exercise:  the Customer and Operations, and this represents a “slight problem.”

Many planning methodologies fail to collect meaningful insights from existing Customers.  Our research has shown, for instance, that for Customers that have defected to a competitor, over 60% indicated they were Satisfied in a their most recent “Customer Satisfaction Survey.”  Customer Satisfaction means “shopping for the next best deal” and has nothing at all to do with Customer LOYALTY. 

While it’s one thing to fall short of understanding the Customer, it’s quite another thing to develop a Sales and Marketing plan without adequate operational involvement.  Yet, this is done as a matter of routine within most organizations that have the best and brightest minds working in Sales and Marketing.  The notion is that Operations will somehow rise to Deliver whatever the Marketing Plan dictates, and that Sales will sell.

Far too often, the result of a “Comprehensive Sales and Marrketing Plan” is a plan that costs real money communicating capabilities that don’t quite exist to potential new Customers, all the while forgetting about the needs of existing Customers and how to build Loyalty based on Trust. 

Comprehensive Sales and Marketing Planning cannot possibly be effective unless Customers and Operations are integrally involved in the Process.  It starts with knowing what Promises can be Made and Kept that are important to the Customer.  These are “Strategic Promises” or “Brand Promises” that have been studied sufficiently to ensure that they will build Customer Loyalty, enhance Market Differentiation, and Improve Profitability.  When Organizations have clearly articulated Brand Promises, building a Sales and Marketing Plan is easy.

The hard part?  Figuring out which Promises can feasibly be Made and Kept that will yield Customer Loyalty, Differentiation, and Profitability.  And actually, that’s not too hard either, if the CEO makes the decision to become Promise-Driven.  Without executive leadership towards a simple method to manage Customer expectations and internal spending initiatives, functional managers will do what they always do:  propose solutions for the business that happen to fit their view of the world. 

A business built on optimizing each functional area fails because there will never be agreement on how the overall Operation should function to meet a Customer’s need.  Localized optimums simply don’t work, and only the CEO can dictate a different path.

That’s why I’ve recently coined the term “Chief Promise Officer” to explain what the CEO’s role is in the organization in terms of creating a foundation that all functional areas must work to build upon.  In an upcoming post, I’ll explain the Chief Promise Officer role in greater detail.

Greg Lins
Customer Experiences Inc.

Related Posts are listed here.

“What is the difference between a “Commitment” and a “Promise” in your mind?”

Being the good consultant, I turned the question back on them, with a subtle difference: ”Well, what comes into your mind when you hear both the words Commitment and Promises?”  I thought their answer was spot on and something that really made me sit back and think.  One of the group said,

“I view a commitment as something I said I would do but if I had to break it, I would feel bad but not terrible and I would figure out a way to make it up to them. However, if I made someone a Promise to someone and broke that Promise, I feel my “character” would be tarnished a bit.”

This is very telling and compelling to me.  First of all, I completely agree.  A Promise has both more “emotion” associated with it and it speaks to someone’s “character” all in the same sentence.  So I did a bit of unofficial research on this and asked some more people what they thought.  You guessed it, they all agreed: breaking a Promise is a character issue and breaking a commitment is a business or social issue – one of which is far more acceptable and understandable than the other.

This leads me to some interesting articles by a very well known and successful educator and author, Donald Sull.  He has written numerous articles on commitment and the organization.  Promise-Based Management: The Essence of Execution is one of his more recent articles.  I whole-heartedly support what he is saying about how commitment is necessary in the organization and how without it you basically get people doing what they want as individuals and not for the good of the company, the customer, their fellow employees or themselves – I couldn’t agree more.  However…

Let me challenge this thinking a bit – I don’t think Mr. Sull quite went far enough.  I believe that making and keeping Promises strikes at the very core of human nature.  Promises – we are programmed to understand them, and (usually) raised to believe in and do the right thing.  Numerous studies have been done psychologically that say the majority of people want to do “the right thing” and “do what is right.”  It is the exception that looks to take advantage of others and situations.  This says to me that people have “character” and this is first and foremost what they want to demonstrate. 

So, if this is the case, why would we not want to capitalize and leverage what people (employees, management, executives, etc.) truly “want to do” that speaks to their higher character – to make and keep their PROMISES.  How many articles have you read recently where it was clear that management and/or employees didn’t keep their Promises and did something “wrong” that hurt the company and its employees?  They abound.  This is because people are being asked, or told, to go against their human nature and act in ways inconsistent with what they truly believe in.  This friction creates confusion, dissention, and even rebellion.  Employees, like customers, want to have a consistent, positive experience that supports their character – that is just human nature.

So, why should anyone put up with an organization that asks employees to go against our character and beliefs by forcing them to make Promises they can’t keep, and somehow look the other way?  Why do we tolerate Organizations that don’t live up to their Promises?  Like Donald Sull discusses in many of his articles, commitment is something that is really needed in organizations today to make them function well. 

Why not take it to an even higher level?  Since people generally have good character and want to work with companies that do, what if we could move beyond simple commitments to Promises?  What if we could build “Character Organizations” instead?  We believe this is easier than people think and the rewards are significant.  We, at Customer Experiences Inc. exist to help organizations be Promise-Driven because we believe character should count and should be used to its fullest strength at work as well as at home.

Blaine Millet, President

Customer Experiences Inc.

Actions speak louder than words.  As a leader, you won’t get far without people following, because a leader’s boundary is a function of how many people he can engage in the pursuit of his vision, or Mission.  Therefore, it is vitally important that you build an Organization that is capable and ready to support the Mission.  In order to do so, at least two things must be accomplished:

You should start with a GOOD Mission. It must inspire, attract, and motivate people to join your organization and work together to achieve it. There are different things that inspire people. For example, my personal preference is for a Mission that focuses on serving others. However, other leaders may have different motivations such as profit, fame, or other distinction. There is plenty of room in the world for differences, which leads us to the next item.

Your Mission better be DIFFERENTIATED from others. So here’s what you do. Just go to MissionStatements.com, and pick one. Hey, it’s cheap and easy… Can you imagine? How far astray have we gone, where a nice, standard Mission Statement can be copied and pasted online, or a more thought out one purchased for a small fee? What happened to Vision and Leadership? What do we STAND FOR?

This is where Promises enter the picture.  CEO’s, get it.  Your Mission Statement doesn’t differentiate you anymore.  Everyone has one, and most of them aren’t worth the paper they’re written on.  If you want my Trust and my Loyalty, say what you mean and mean what you say.  Make your Brand Promise, and deliver it every time.

If you want me to engage with your Mission, give me a Mission I can engage with.  As a Customer, I want to know what you are going to do for me, and I might care about what you intend to do on a grander scale.  So if you’re going to write a Mission Statement, tell me about things that matter.  If you  want to change the world, as long as it’s for the better, I’m behind you 100%.  If you want a Mission your Customers can engage with, do you think maybe it would be a good idea to ask them what they want?

We have a Mission at CEI, and that is to help our clients thrive by building Promise-Driven Organizations.  Most people, I believe, have some personal Mission that goes well beyond what we can ever hope to accomplish within the context of our business lives.  For those of us gifted with business skills and knowledge, it is truly a blessing when we find our Personal and Business Missions in solid alignment.  And so it is.

The journey to becoming Promise-Driven is not for everyone. If one goes down this path, it will cause you to think about your values, and look for inspiration. Be wise about where you look for inspiration and guidance, so both you and those around you benefit from your growth. 

In my next installment, I will share a little more about the specific issues that CEO’s must face when taking the plunge to become genuinely Promise-Driven.  It is as much a personal journey as it is a journey for the benefit of your Organization.  To those that lead organizations, you will find that the pursuit of becoming a Promise-Driven Organization may change you at least as much as it changes your business…

Related Posts:

About Promise-Driven Organizations

Promises – Why has the exception become the norm?

Greg Lins
Customer Experiences Inc.