The Era of Short Memory and Loud Voice

By Danica Cullins

In this industry, we toss around the term “customer loyalty." How does a service provider – or any business for that matter – measure loyalty? If it's by the length of time a customer has been utilizing one company’s product or service over a competitor’s, it means nothing if said customer is gone tomorrow. As it relates to today’s marketplace, it’s best to consider loyalty dead. There is only repeated evaluation of satisfaction and dissatisfaction leading to a constant and very conscious decision about whether to stay or go.

Today’s consumer lives a life saturated with peer review and competitive choice. These factors lead to constant evaluation. Even with enterprise customers, a single negative experience in service or billing can be enough to lose business. It’s critical to remind yourself that today’s customer has a short memory and a loud voice. The vocal reaction is swift – but remember that this condition can also be a benefit as you strategize.

I recently saw on Twitter a great quote attributed to Alice Harris, director of billing at CenturyLink: “The invoice is your monthly appointment with your customer." While this is true, there is daily interaction. In fact, whether or not you rock the monthly appointment depends on it, in large part. The “monthly appointment" is where OSS and billing come together. If you’re going to charge for it, you better back that up every time in service execution. Emerging roles such as CCO (chief customer officer) or CXO (chief experience officer) play a pivotal role here, overseeing the integration so the customer doesn’t. A seamless, and flawless, presentation of service and billing doesn’t equal gained loyalty, but it does gain another appointment for next month.

In fact, the rise of the customer into the C-suite is indicative of the customer’s ability to impact business quickly and virally. Imagine the end-user in your executive boardroom, feet up on the conference table, device in hand “talking" about your every move to all his contacts, and in turn their contacts, and so on. Much bigger than a fly on the wall, he is really there.

Among CCOs, CXOs and the like, there is much to be evaluated, observed, tested – and celebrated. B/OSS is heading into 2012 with a significant focus on the challenges, complexities, developments and celebrations around customer experience and customer-centricity. Plan to engage live around these matters at the B/OSS Customer Experience 360 live event in April (more details very soon!) and follow along at www.billingworld.com. In the meantime, download the September digital issue focused on the CEM/CRM.

If you have a challenge or want to voice a celebration, let us know!