About a month back, Straits Times published a report suggesting that Singapore’s service standard is heading south. What is worse is that it’s sliding for the third year running. With millions of dollars put in to training and running campaigns to get the service sector to go the extra mile, the results isn’t very satisfactory. The survey suggest that the retail industry was among the poorest when providing service, followed by the education and tourism industry, Info-communications and finally F&B. Only transportation and logistics logged the same service score as they did last year (Not good either).

With so much money being poured in it and so little to show, what was really going on?

Well, I believe it all boils down to experience. I believe most customers who said they receive poor customer service really are saying they had a bad experience when doing business with you. The only way to improve customer service therefore is no longer just putting a smile and saying ‘Hello!’ or ‘See You’, because this is expected. The best way to improve customer service is to create a personal experience for each customer.

Customer Service in the Digital Age

During the pre-2005 times, providing poor customer service carries a little risk. The only thing the customer can do was to talk about her experience to her friends and relatives. In order to damage a particular brand, it requires significant, long lasting service failures. But everything change with the arrival of social media. One poor experience can carry a very big consequences. Worse still, it will be talk about instantly, real time.

Take for example HP’s customer service boo boo a year ago. As broadcast on CrunchGear, one of the most influential sites among tech-savvy consumers, a HP customer sent his computer that was still under warranty to HP for service. He was notified indicating that when a tech opened his computer, fluid spilled out and onto a motherboard, so HP claims the consumer owes them $1,099 to repair or replace their motherboard.

During the pre-2005 period, such a matter will only be known to a couple of dozen people at most. But in the digital age, CrunchGear’s 34,000 daily visitors now know about HP’s rather ridiculous and embarrassing customer service gaffe.

As HP’s case study have shown, social media have change the way businesses look at customer service. The cost of one poor experience can have a huge ripple effect for the company and the brand.

Improving customer service in 2010 require action that are both traditional and innovative. It is still vital to hire, train and monitor customer service employees. They must also know what the brand is all about and why their interactions with the customers are important. However, to provide customer service that create high-quality experience goes beyond being at the brick and mortar store.

You must ask yourself this: “Are people already talking about our brand with others online?” “Should we participate in the conversations and engage these people (in forums, Facebook or Twitter)?”

Another way your company can use social media is to listen to conversations about your company. Take note of the problem and clarify it before they become a PR disaster.

Brands can no longer wait until something bad hit the news before reacting to it, nor can they rely on few positive comments written by the traditional media to help protect their brand. Social media is changing how we perceive customer service and if things don’t change, I believe the slide will continue.

What do you think brands can do to improve the customer service in Singapore?

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