I was a little shocked to be honest.
I had sent an email question off to a professional services firm and received an instant email notification. It thanked me for contacting them and explained that because they were so busy I could expect a response in 4-5 days. I thought I had misread the message so read it again, but no, I could expect a response in 4-5 days. Are you kidding me?
Do you think this is an acceptable level of service or a positive client service experience?
I know we all have different levels of expectation around service and given client service standards seem to have declined quite significantly across all industry this may be acceptable to some. However, it’s not acceptable to me! Roles reversed, I would not and could not treat my clients in this way. I wouldn’t have any clients or a business left.
Given what has transpired with the economy over the past 6 months, I’m not sure we can risk a turnaround time of 4-5 days to respond to an email query for our clients. As Doug Warner said “In the world of Internet Customer Service, it’s important to remember your competitor is only one mouse click away.” Which is exactly what I did. I put a call out to my network and did a Google search and moved on. Business lost at the click of a mouse!
We have got to shift our thinking and our operating rhythm at a time of huge disruption. We can’t continue to operate as we did 6 months ago. Times have changed, people have changed, and expectations have changed. You must adapt.
Ultimately, this is about your reputation, something you have no doubt spent a long time building. Why would you risk it for something so silly and in my opinion super lazy and risk losing clients? It’s perplexing to me but perhaps I’m old fashioned, though living in this economy of instant gratification I highly doubt I am alone.