Today’s New Rule for Customer Service is…be opinionated. In any relationship nothing breeds trust like “being real,” and this is never truer than when people aren’t expecting it, such as in the cruel world of commerce. This means that sometimes the best way to build a lasting customer relationship is to talk smack about your own product–when it’s deserved. By drawing attention to the bad as well as the good you demonstrate that you and your customers are in this together. In the past week we’ve seen this work well for Jetblue (admitting to terrible follow-through), New Balance (dissing its apparel business) and 37Signals (critiquing flaws in Campfire’s design).
This works even better with everyday customer interactions. When I eat out at restaurants I like to ask the wait staff about their favorite dish on the menu. I can often predict the quality of a meal based on the strength of the waiter’s opinions. A good restaurant will give its staff lots of opportunities to sample its food. It wants its servers to know not just the culinary factoids about tonight’s unpronouncably gourmet dish, but also how it tastes, its mouth feel, what else it’s like. Not just which wine should be paired with the dish, but why.
And I’m far more likely to trust a waiter, and the restaurant by extension, if he also talks about what he doesn’t like. Though it is counter-intuitive, it gives me real comfort when I order to know that some dishes aren’t as good as others. Similarly, I spend more money at clothing stores where the salesclerk tells me when something’s not looking so hot on me. I trust them when they give me the thumbs up on something else.
Now think about the customer service interactions that fail–insurance companies, phone companies, PC-makers. These are organizations that have no place for opinions, nor the passionate involvement of their staffs. They actually provide scripts designed to protect against such things.
As people we share opinions when we genuinely care–care about the subject we’re discussing and those we’re sharing with. So it’s natural that the wait staff at great restaurants tend to be foodies themselves. Successful boutique workers are fashionistas. We can see that being opinionated is ultimately tied to who we are. We can’t fake it, at least very well. That’s what makes being opinionated so special, and why it’s today’s New Rule.
