Great Products Can't Mask Lousy Service Design

One of the many consequences of how businesses are coping with the economic downturn is the way they deliver service through retail storefronts. The pressure on bricks and mortar retailers to compete with ecommerce sites on price is obvious from the minute you walk in the door - from the product quality on the shelves to the fewer people around to assist you on the sales floor, the physical world is threatened by the low margin world of the Internet.  Though bricks and mortars stores need to operate more efficiently to keep competitive, they still need to remember the service experience can be a valuable differentiator worth paying for.  Over on Apple-Investor.com, a post entitled Why Don't Retailers Copy the Apple Retail Model suggests the Apple experience in retail is nirvana. "There’s no lines, no frustration, just pure satisfaction'

I have lamented the way product quality has suffered from manufacturing and supply chain cost-cutting measures to grow margin, and cutting out the "middle class" of products. Apple has engineered quality from the manufacturing line into the front lines. Every detail matters. But quality may not be the only victim when a company shifts focus onto increased profitability without providing increased customer value.  With today’s tough business choices, many brands are losing their core equities simply from the lack of innovation on the service experience.  When policy and process become the defining attributes of the service experience, customers generally don’t win.

Would You Like Vinyl Siding With Those Earrings?

A great case in point was a recent experience I had with my husband at our local Sears. Through good times and bad times, Sears has stood for quality tools and appliances. My husband buys Craftsman as much because of the kind of service Sears provides for out-of-warranty repairs as he does because the products are durable and dependable. If anything does happen, he knows the company will stand behind their products. When our pressure washer recently went on the fritz, they fixed it in half the estimated time. We went into the repair center to pick it up, but were amazed at the journey we went on once we walked into the reception area. The lack of design thinking applied to our interactions as customers was readily transparent. This was an experience designed from the inside out. 

Find out how Sears could design a better service experience by reading the full article here.