A lot of business executives fail to understand why a product that they thought would change the world actually turned out to be a total failure. Then they come up with excuses like "It was ahead of its time," or even worse, they blame the customer and joke that the "Customers don't get it." Nothing could be worse than that. If your product doesn't sell, the problem is not with the customer; the problem is with you, your product, and your company. Or in other words, I am still frustrated that despite the iProceed mantra that "You don't exist without your customer," companies still continue to ignore what really matters in business: customers.
So it was no surprise that Jurgen Schrempp, the chairman of DaimlerChrysler, is "befuddled by the complaints about such seemingly inconsequential matters and cup-holder size and air-conditioner velocity". The point to learn here is that no matter what your smartest engineers think, it is the customer who gets to decide what is good and bad. If you are an executive with such an anti-customer attitude, get out of your office, and spend a couple of weeks talking to your customers. You will do a lot of good for your company.
Let me share another story that highlights how companies simply ignore their customers and then wonder what went wrong. I recently needed to open a business checking account and chose Citizens Bank of Massachusetts simply because of proximity. I signed a couple of papers with a colleague and deposited a check to start off. The manager said that we should order the first set of checks with them since they were free though she winked at me said not to reorder since they were expensive than getting them printed elsewhere. Within a matter of days, what I thought was a welcome letter, I received a letter informing that they have charged us $26 since our bank account had no money when they decided to bill us about $80 for the checks. Not a great way to start a business relationship. After several frustrating phone calls, we got the credit for the overdraft fee (I would expect any bank to figure this out without much trouble - even if you are going to bill someone for the checks then you need to ask them to deposit cash and not a check) but no one could figure out how to take care of the promised free checks (by the way, we have moved completely to electronic banking and hardly ever use checks). When we contacted the manger who opened our account, she promised that she would take care of it. Several weeks went by and Citizens Bank apparently did nothing. So we get another statement and it still did not have the credit. By this time, the bank manager did not want to deal with us ("Oh, you will need to call customer service at the back of your card") and the customer service folks had never heard of a promotion of free checks. Eventually, a trip to the bank had to be made and the manager hated us for asking her to keep her promise. So our recommendation to everyone who is reading this: Do not open a business checking account with Citizens Bank.
And that is exactly what happens when a company mistreats customers and provide poor service. What Schrempp is forgetting (and so is Citizens Bank) that customers care about small things and they are the ones that get passed around. I don't care how big Citizens Bank or how much assets they have, all I know is that they have poor IT systems and horrible customer service. And when someone asks me for a recommendation for a bank, I tell them to stay away from Citizens Bank.
Related article: How to improve customer service?
So it was no surprise that Jurgen Schrempp, the chairman of DaimlerChrysler, is "befuddled by the complaints about such seemingly inconsequential matters and cup-holder size and air-conditioner velocity". The point to learn here is that no matter what your smartest engineers think, it is the customer who gets to decide what is good and bad. If you are an executive with such an anti-customer attitude, get out of your office, and spend a couple of weeks talking to your customers. You will do a lot of good for your company.
Let me share another story that highlights how companies simply ignore their customers and then wonder what went wrong. I recently needed to open a business checking account and chose Citizens Bank of Massachusetts simply because of proximity. I signed a couple of papers with a colleague and deposited a check to start off. The manager said that we should order the first set of checks with them since they were free though she winked at me said not to reorder since they were expensive than getting them printed elsewhere. Within a matter of days, what I thought was a welcome letter, I received a letter informing that they have charged us $26 since our bank account had no money when they decided to bill us about $80 for the checks. Not a great way to start a business relationship. After several frustrating phone calls, we got the credit for the overdraft fee (I would expect any bank to figure this out without much trouble - even if you are going to bill someone for the checks then you need to ask them to deposit cash and not a check) but no one could figure out how to take care of the promised free checks (by the way, we have moved completely to electronic banking and hardly ever use checks). When we contacted the manger who opened our account, she promised that she would take care of it. Several weeks went by and Citizens Bank apparently did nothing. So we get another statement and it still did not have the credit. By this time, the bank manager did not want to deal with us ("Oh, you will need to call customer service at the back of your card") and the customer service folks had never heard of a promotion of free checks. Eventually, a trip to the bank had to be made and the manager hated us for asking her to keep her promise. So our recommendation to everyone who is reading this: Do not open a business checking account with Citizens Bank.
And that is exactly what happens when a company mistreats customers and provide poor service. What Schrempp is forgetting (and so is Citizens Bank) that customers care about small things and they are the ones that get passed around. I don't care how big Citizens Bank or how much assets they have, all I know is that they have poor IT systems and horrible customer service. And when someone asks me for a recommendation for a bank, I tell them to stay away from Citizens Bank.
Related article: How to improve customer service?