Highlights of Jeff Bezos buying The Washington Post

(Photo courtesy CNNMoney)

The news world is abuzz with news & conversations about the Jeff Bezos buying The Washington Post. Here are a few points in the announcements that caught my attention:

• Bezos’ first communication to The Post'’s employees elaborated clearly where the priority lies – the customer.
• “The paper’s duty will remain to its readers and not to the private interests of its owners.”
• “We will need to invent, which means we will need to experiment. Our touchstone will be readers, understanding what they care about – government, local leaders, restaurant openings, scout troops, businesses, charities, governors, sports – and working backwards from there.”
• How often do we get to hear about an individual’s decency as a deciding factor in world of mergers & acquisitions? In the case of Jeff Bezos, it seems quite often.
• From Donald Graham’s statement: "Jeff Bezos’ proven technology and business genius, his long-term approach and his personal decency make him a uniquely good new owner for The Post."
• As seen in earlier cases earlier (like when Zappos was acquired by Amazon), values finds multiple mentions in Bezos’ communication.
• “When a single family owns a company for many decades, and when that family acts for all those decades in good faith, in a principled manner, in good times and in rough times, as stewards of important values – when that family has done such a good job – it is only natural to worry about change.”
• “The values of The Post do not need changing.”

It will indeed be interesting to see how Bezos will try & innovate The Post out of its financial misery. What kind of innovations will we get to see in the world of news publishing? After the medium, is it now the turn of the content to play a role in Bezos’ & Amazon’s vision?

Reinforce The Positives

 
(Photo courtesy Express Photorail)

India is gaining in reputation for being the services & hospitality capital of the world. But, instances of bad experiences introduces doubt if the country & its professionals have what it takes to deliver on this promise. I came across a Vir Sanghvi article today that deals with the issue of service attitude (or the lack of it) amongst professionals in this industry. Causes vary between employee's lack of long term commitment to a job, multitude of employment options, corporations taking customers for granted, etc. - all matters beyond any one individual's control. Overwhelming for anyone wanting to better the situation!

Can such systemic issues have simple individual remedies?

Read the full article here.  

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Related Posts:
     ~ Changing Scales in India
     ~ Enterprise IT – Just A Utility?
     ~ When Customer Rule!

Pay For Customer Service

Airtel - a leading Indian cellular service provider has (supposedly) announced that it will start charging customers for service calls to its call centers. Though a nominal amount, the first reaction to the news has been indignation. Here below is my take on Airtel's move.

(Image referenced from Livin’ On Tulsa Time)

From being one of the most expensive countries to make cellular calls in (and from), India has fast progressed to being one of the most economical. Its not only the fastest growing cellular market, but also very competitive. Multinational service providers from all over are swarming into the 'market of tomorrow' by the dozens. Whereas the mature markets are all about maximizing margins per customer, India has been about maximizing a customer base with very low margin per customer (profiting from the bottom of the pyramid). With increasing competitive & stock market pressure, managing costs is understandably a high priority for cellular businesses in the country.  From this perspective, the move to charge for customer service does sound like a logical step. 

Calling a service desk is a rare scenario in which a customer initiates direct contact with a business. Do you see this as an opportunity to charge customers? Or, as an opportunity to develop better customer relations?  Proponents of customer centricity will argue that this is the best opportunity to better understand customer's needs & to delight her.  But what is Airtel doing? Instead of wooing customers into this channel of interaction, they are going to shoo them away? Isn’t the cost worth the opportunity to stay in touch with customers? Are they trying to convert an operational cost into a profit?

Anything given free looses it value. Suppose Airtel is coming with the line of thought that its customers are not optimally utilizing the service framework it provides. With the nominal charge, Airtel (maybe) just wants to nudge customers into better using this facility (a more efficient cost line in its P&L). Can charging for the service make customers value the service any more? Maybe. But then, if you charge for something, it better provide its money's worth. Else, you stand the risk of turning an already disgruntled customer into a churn statistic.

Players in other industries have used a similar strategy earlier. Computers & peripherals is a segment that comes to mind easily. Such a strategy has resulted in the evolution of an ecosystem of maintenance service providers - an alternative for customers to get their issues addressed.  In many cases, these service providers are better positioned to address customer needs & wants than the parent business itself. Also, it has resulted in increased customer value & satisfaction. I don't believe in this being a strategy for Airtel.

In many ways, Airtel has been a pioneer in the industry & has successfully managed its leadership position. The Indian market too has been known to evolve in surprisingly different ways across industries. Innovative practices & products have come out of the market at a sprinting pace. Dismissing the current move of Airtel's as thoughtless is to be done at the risk of being short sighted. Being an Airtel customer (a life long one at that) & a share holder, I sign off this post with the hope that this is just another ace up its sleeve.

Customer Experience - what lies ahead?

In his article The Future of CE: Post Purchase Experience Creation, Mark Binns brings out an important point -

The future of CE should be in experience creation. As an industry, we will continue to manage customer service and existing experiences, but never get them perfect. I expect the law of diminishing returns will eventually set in on managing existing experiences. So, creation of new experiences will be the true CE differentiator of the future. When something positive and unexpected happens to a customer, it creates instant word of mouth value. People talk about new experiences – they rarely talk about expected experiences unless they were bad ones.

He also goes on explain his theory on opportunities for experience management & creation through the life cycle of the customer interaction. 

On similar lines is this posting by Eric Fraterman. 

True loyalty happens when there is an emotional engagement with the organization or product. This engagement comes from experiencing the brand or organization in a unique way that creates true value for the customer.

How does this apply to an IT product company (esp an enterprise applications vendor) & its customer life cycle?

PreSale

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Sale

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Implementation

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Usage

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Support

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Upgrade

Customer perspective during the downturn

The Think Customers 1to1 Blog is carrying a nice post by Brent Leary - So YOU Want to Improve MY Customer Experience?

During the downturn in economy (and always ..but especially so now), all businesses ought to be thinking about what works for their customers. 

• How have the macroeconomic factors affected our customers business & life?
• Should we be offering a different value proposition to customers now?
• What is it that we can do for our customers that no one else will possibly do? 
• Everyone's expenditure has come down ...so has our customers'. How can we ensure that whatever little they spend is spent on our products / services?
• Is there a way we can make our customers feel special ..w/o spending too much?

All valid questions even during normal times. But businesses do have extra time now ..so might as well think about customers!

The Ultimate Question - NPS

A few months ago I started off on a NPS adoption journey. All though I have gone through some of the continual negative press on the topic, I have not heard or read anything compelling enough to drag me away from the simplicity & basic idea of NP. 

We have started really small & getting together the mechanism to capture responses to the NPS query. 

Some questions that I am searching answers for are :

• What does one do with the NPS score?
• How can NPS help develop & sustain a customer centric culture?
• What have been the past experiences (anything specific?) of NPS implementations in B2B situations?
• What have been the main grouses against NPS?

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From the Blogosphere

Today, hundreds of companies around the world have subscribed to the Net Promoter philosophy. But many of them still don't understand the true meaning of NPS and what Reichheld meant the question to become: an organizational discipline that transforms your business around the customers.

....

Reicheld admitted that companies cannot be driven by scores; it's what they do with the scores that matter most and getting the people in the organization to treat customers the way they'd want to be treated.

....

Until companies can move beyond getting their organizations to reach high Net Promoter scores, and help their CFOs to understand how to quantify and increase the number of promoters, then they won't find success with NPS.

Read the complete article at Think Customers: 1to1 Blog. 

Product centricity to customer centricity

(Photo Courtesy: Purdue University)

In her blog today, Patty Seybold shares a commentary about where organizations go wrong in the journey from product centricity to customer centricity. In Graham Hill's own words -

"The stages start with pure product-centricity. This typically evolves through the development of internal networks of colleagues who need to work together to deliver the value proposition; to cross-functional teams that formalise the collaboration of the internal networks; to a customer segment coordinator who takes on formal responsibility for collaboration across different teams; to a matrix organisation with nascent segment teams reporting to both product and customer management; and finally to bona fide segment managers responsible for all aspects of segment experience delivery. The vertical silos of product-centricity have given way to the more connected, more collaborative customer-centric organisation."

The key phrases (for me) from the above are :

• work together to deliver the value proposition (ought not to loose sight of this)
• formal responsibility for collaboration across teams (in the absence of a culture that fosters team work)
• responsible for all aspects of segment experience delivery (key enabler - accountability)

As important as the end result is, the journey & the milestones involved are as or more important in ensuring effectiveness & sustainability of the end state. 

Quality - The Customer Centric Type

Intangible Quality: Engage in the Third Quality Revolution

(Courtesy: www.istockphoto.com)

Found this interesting article on Intangible Quality on RocketPosts - nice read. 

Some of my take aways -

• Want to create products that meet the subconscious wants and needs of our customers. We want the customer, upon experiencing our products, to say, “This is exactly what I always wanted. This is what I have always needed. I cannot imagine what life was like before I had it.” 
• Seeking quality that pleases the customer in ways he never before even imagined.
• It is a concept of quality that falls into an almost spiritual realm. It means creating a product, or providing a service, that profoundly affects the customer. It is not only defect-free, but it is exactly what the customer has always desired.
• Intangible quality requires a new model of customer awareness— one that includes continuous, meaningful contact, and a spiritual connection with a customer’s needs. In effect, you must become a virtual employee in your customer’s organization—seeing what he sees, understanding what she understands. Then, you must use this knowledge to develop possibilities of which the customer has never before dreamed. In a world where Six Sigma is commonplace, the goal of profoundly affecting your customer is the next quality battleground.

Some of the examples quoted in the article allude to concepts O'Reilly uses for the Web 2.0 definition (usage of data to improve customer experience - eg. Amazon, usage of CRM, etc. 

There might be no end ..but there is always a beginning

Evangelizing customer centricity within my organization, I had a conversation wherein my colleague was highlighting to the various initiatives & plans of action organizations undertake to build customer centricity. He seemed to be aware of a lot many things that people were doing out there - but not done in his own organization. In fact he knew so many, that he didn't know where to begin himself.

I wonder if this is typical of many out there - we can so easily reel out a list of things that people ought to be doing. But when it comes to our own self, we might be non-starters (baked in the squat - as Zig puts it).

There is no end to the things one can do wrt customer centricity. But there is always a beginning. Have you found yours?

What is a customer centric organization?

A post by a fellow blogger triggered this thought process in me - What is a customer centric organization?

I would believe that the following are some key identifiers of a customer centric organization -

• customer centricity is a strategic imperative rather than a group or department or annual or marketing initiative
• the decision making process in the organization places the impact of the decision on the customer as its focal point
• customer success is a key consideration across the rank & breadth of the organization
• a strong belief that customer success & customer service is what will eventually lead to organizational profits
• customer focus is a key element of the organization's culture
• customer loyalty is constantly & actively sought

Corporations are people

It was that time in the elections where the US presidential candidates took off on corporations. Responding to this phenomenon, Jack Welch in his BW column rightly argues that corporations are nothing but people.

As pointed in another blog post today on the 1to1 blog, this has relevance to B2B marketers too. When corporations make decisions, it has to be understood that it is people behind the scenes who are making these calls. Instead of targeting corporations - think about & target the people who make up the coporations.

Even when focusing on customer satisfaction of these corporations, pick u individual after individual & chase their satisfaction.

Over the last couple of weeks, a business trip too me across 4 time zones / 10 flights / 9 cities in a period of 2 weeks. I have to mention to you an air hostess experience on one of these flights -

A passenger seated next to me was asleep when the air hostess made the "beginning decent - buckle up" announcement. In a few minutes, an air hostess walks up, wakes up my neighbour & tells to buckle up as already announced. Just as he was buckling up, he is curtly told that the announcement also asked passengers to straighten the seats.

A couple of days later, I was on the same airline & came across another similar incident.

This time an air hostess walks up, apologetically wakes up the passenger. Requests him to buckle up & straighten the seat. When the passenger forgot to straighten the seat, the same air hostess returns to courteously requests him to straighten the seat again. She quickly adds that some of the seats have a problem of tilting on their own at times.

Which customer experience do you think will result in the customer having a positive feeling about the airline?

Factually, the air hostess in the first case might be correct. But does anyone want to be reminded about it? How many of us are purely rational?

Why the topic customer centricity?

Over the last 10 years, my profession has taken me across the continents pretty regularly. Though most business travels are forgettable experinces, one part of the journey always resulted in a pleasant experince. Time after time, flight after flight, person after person - it was a consistent delivery of good service. I am referring to my travel with Jet Airways.

Jet Airways, I believe, revolutionized air travel in India. Not only did they end the hegemony of the state carriers (Air India & Indian Airlines), they also introduced quality service (usually associated with 5-star hotels) into air travel. Their service always stood above the rest - a distinct differentiator & contributed significantly to its stickiness to its customers.

(Photo credit to http://www.sxc.hu/index.phtml)

A differentiator not only for the airline, but also for the Indian service economy. With the increasing size of this economy, it is very important for the industry to inculcate principles of experince based differentiation to build itself a strong foundation based on customer relationships & establish itself as a world beater.

I would be very happy if this blog contributes even a bit in this endeavour!

Is being customer centric altruistic?

Often qualities of altruism, sacrifice and benevolance are associated with customer centricity. The common perception is that being customer centric is tantamount to accepting a win-loose (the customer centric organization loosing to the customer) strategy. Best left to the realms of business idealism?

Being customer centric means that the supplier organization is sensitized to the world of its customers. What are their business challenges? What does it take to succeed in that world? What is my customer's strategy? What adds value to my customer or their customers? Basically - the abiliy to get into our customers shoes.

Isn't this something we see in a ot of successful people around us.

Apologies from a CEO

(Photo from stockxpert)

Thanks to global sentiments & a mega local IPO, the Indian stock markets witnessed choppy times over the last few days (it still continues in the same vein for now). The market swung crazily between new highs & lows. Accordingly, investors had a hectic time on the floor.

Here is an example of the cheif executive of an online trading portal apologizing to its customers about loss & lack of its service during various points the last couple of weeks.

+es

• Who doesn't falter!! But how many accept they falter!! This is the difference that an act like this highlights. Publicly accepting the short fall is the first step in one's efforts to avoiding the same being repeated.
• With this note, the CEO is setting a good example to his team - its oki to say sorry as long as there are genuine attempts to avoid repeats. This is also a public affirmation that the business values its customers.

-es (could've done better)

• Going by my experince, many have had monetary losses of varying magnitude due to Sharekhan's loss of service. Maybe Sharekhan should have explored material ways of compensating - even if it were to be a token act. Maybe a brokerage free day / hour / transaction, or a gift hamper, or a charge free service from the Sharekhan portfolio.
• I would be delighted to see a Tarun Shah follow up mail a few weeks from now enquiring on levels of service. And Sharekhan should try & ensure there is a marked improvement in service during this period.

Have to say though that I am glad I am a Sharekhan customer. And glad to see a services organization raising the bar wrt customer focus in this space.

A lot more Indian services companies need to cover a lot of ground in this area - not because their service is bad, but more so because this segment intends to be world beaters.

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Dear Customer,

The last few days took all of us off guard. To make things worse, a lot of you faced issues with our service levels. Some of the issues faced by customers were trading system downtime, customer service cell not responding, fund transfer not happening etc. We don’t want to offer any excuses on why this happened as there can be no justification for the hardship you have undergone.

We apologize for the inconvenience caused to all of you. We will strive to make amendments in all the areas concerned to improve the service delivery to you. We exist because of you- our customers. It’s the confidence that you have placed in us that has resulted in us doing more than 4 lacs transactions per day and adding 45,000 new customers this month. We accept that we were found wanting on service delivery due to the sudden spurt in transactions/queries caused by this fall. We commit to improve upon the same in the days to come.

Warm Regards,

Tarun Shah

CEO

Sharekhan

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Dilemma of Indian IT companies

Many an Indian IT company face a dilemma today.

With a strengthening Rupee & a weakening Dollar, margins of most companies are getting squeezed between Dollar earnings (mostly export oriented) & Rupee costs (salary costs are the biggest chunk in the costs).

The obvious choice is to control (read minimize) costs via employee salaries. How many of these companies can do a Southwest (that abstained from layoff in tough times) & continue to pamper their employees with 10-15% annual hikes? Or is there a better way of managing employee morale?

Can you be customer centric without being employee friendly?

In his book Customer Mania, Ken Blanchard emphasizes that a customer strategy needs to be about "customer AND employees". So do most other thought leaders on this topic.

I do believe that an organization incapable of taking care of its employee's satisfaction is equally lost in addressing its customer's satisfaction. This is especially true of services organizations where a multitude of interactions between employees & customers constitute the customer engagement. In such firms, being employee focused is a great way of setting an example about how customers need to be taken care of.

The question is - is the above thesis inapplicable for product companies? Can an organization with a fantabulous product afford to depend on its products & compromise on the product's creators? And still expect long term success?