How Much is Too Much Customer Experience?

Businesses often encourage their employees to be extremely friendly, be informative and make sure to follow up. These are certainly good principles, but where is the line between winning a customer over and pushing them away?

A recent Harvard Business Review article titled, “The Downside of Attentive Service” (March-April 2019) discusses the perception of “too much” service. One of three factors can put customers off: excessive service frequency, overly intensive warmth, and providing unsolicited care and information. In the end, high service levels do not always necessarily result in customer satisfaction. Additionally, the article goes on to describe how these factors weigh differently in various cultures.

Companies need to be mindful of the customer’s service equilibrium as they define service expectations and communicate with customers. Much like a great restaurant server, company representatives need to read customers in the moment to know when to leave them alone and also when to step in and offer assistance. The best default is generally asking the customer “how can I help you” or to ask their preferences instead of assuming what they need. Similarly, having a well-trained team that is guided by principles instead of scripts helps teams react to the appropriate level of mood. Often times, hospitals train their staff to be friendly and outgoing, but the appropriate approach in that setting is often empathy. Finally, companies need to let their customers own the process of how often the company connects with them. Imagine someone in your personal life that you are not that close sending you a message every few days like automated business sales emails. You would think they are crazy. Communication needs to be appropriate to the relationship and evolve over time.

There are two major areas to start with to ensure that your customer experience is appropriate for the customer. One is to ensure that you are always investing in the appropriate customer insights. The saying “treat others as you would want to be treated” is not applicable to customer experience strategies. As stated above, different people and different cultures resonate with products and people in varying ways. It is essential to do the proper ongoing research on how a wide range of customers react to your company and your offerings. This involves reviewing surveys, holding focus groups and monitoring the customer journey. Second, as companies utilize CRM systems with increasing connectedness and frequency, a business needs to be mindful to collect and use data that benefits the customer, not just what benefits or interests the company. How that information is used or communicated can certainly create loyalty, but can also be a turn off to customers and backfire.