Great Expectations, Failed Promises

The new economy was supposed to bring a bright, new day for customers. The customer would be king. The customer would be delighted. Customer-service excellence would be the standard by which a company measured its success.

How could such good intentions go so wrong?

Fast Company's panel of customer-service experts met at RealTime Philadelphia earlier this week to explore the promise that went off the rails. Jeanne Jackson, CEO of Walmart.com and former CEO and president of Banana Republic; Martha Rogers, partner at Peppers and Rogers Group and coauthor of The One to One Future: Building Relationships One Customer at a Time (Doubleday/Currency, 1997); and Hal Logan, president and CEO of Manheim Interactive, the leading wholesaler of used cars on the Net, joined Fast Company senior editor Polly LaBarre for a fast-paced round of shared stories and good advice from the front lines of the customer-service revolution.

We listened in as they debated what works and what doesn't when it comes to getting and keeping customers.

What's the biggest misconception about the Web and customer service?

Logan: The greatest misconception is that technology makes customer service easy. In many cases, technology makes the provision of service more difficult, because it introduces entirely new ways of recording information that are not compatible with yesterday's techniques.

Jackson: Several years ago, I remember hearing someone say, "The current channels for getting goods to customers are grossly inefficient; the Net is going to make life easier." In reality, a lot of the current avenues for delivering goods don't necessarily provide customers a broad view or in-depth information about products. The Net alone is not better. But the Net coupled with new thinking is phenomenal.

Rogers: We expected technology to save us all on its own. We thought that we could keep chugging along and that technology would help us move faster. Many of the recent e-commerce failures occurred because companies didn't fully utilize the technology. They failed to fundamentally change the way they did business, and they bombed.

But keep this in mind: At the beginning of the 20th century, there were 300 car companies, 297 of which ultimately failed. Regardless of the failure rate, cars have changed our entire culture and way of life. We can't assume that it's all over now because times are tough. Technology will fundamentally change the way we view customer service. No question.

What do customers really want?

Logan: Customers today want the same thing they wanted 20 years ago: people who will listen to them, take them seriously, and solve their problems.

Jackson: And the Internet can help us solve problems faster and more efficiently some of the time, but not all of the time. The means don't matter. The solution does.

Rogers: The fact is, customers want what they want. That sounds obvious, but it hasn't always been. We spent most of the 20th century creating things that people somewhere might like. Then we broadcast messages to find those people and get their money. Today, instead of giving people a lot of choices and taking orders, we are beginning to serve customers better by getting to know them. A company that knows what I want has a great advantage over a company that offers me a slew of choices and makes me sift through them.

What are the challenges associated with serving customers through various channels?

Logan: At Manheim Interactive, our customers are used-car dealers, people who are not typically found at the bleeding edge of technology. They treat the Web like any other tool that, if used correctly, will make or save them money. If it doesn't address their needs today, they have no interest in it whatsoever. Our challenge is to integrate Manheim's face-to-face automobile auctions with the technology to make the process of buying and selling cars run more smoothly.

Specific information becomes increasingly more important the older a car gets. After three years on the road, no two cars are exactly the same. And if we mess up, the used-car dealer who bought a car from a Manheim auction is not going to call our 800-number, he's going to complain to the auction manager, who probably can't solve his problem. That question of accountability and responsibility is one we grapple with constantly.