Everyone talks about customer service but in my experience, it is almost impossible to quantify until you have a really bad experience. It is at that moment you know whether your "partner" (a.k.a. vendor) has the processes in place to remedy this terrible event or not.
Some providers may argue that they have stats to show that they consistently deliver positive customer service but the truth is that if you are the one enduring a bad, or a series of bad experiences, those numbers don't hold water for you.
In my experience when we replace another provider it is not because the incumbent vendor had one failing it is because the last one was the one that broke the camels back. You may recall in earlier posts that I have talked about how hard change is, whether it is in our personal or professional life. The perceived pain of changing partners is so great that many clients will on average endure 17 negative experiences before saying enough is enough. When this happens, my phone rings.
I would be remiss if I did not say that we are not perfect, just like all of God's creatures. What I know makes us different from 99% of the other IT Service companies in the Lehigh Valley is the fact that we never-
Hide from our clients
Are afraid to admit our mistakes, often before the client even knows about them
Fail to outline how we will prevent a specific failure in the future
Blame someone else when it is our fault
As the owner of the company, I am available to our clients 24x7 even though we have a great team in place to support every client effectively and efficiently as well as on time. I make myself available in this way because in my many years of business experience I know that it is always about relationships, integrity, and doing the right thing, consistently.
We as a company and I as an induvial understand that you have many options in this very crowded and frankly convoluted IT Provider space and our job is to always differentiate ourselves by reliably delivering phenomenal customer service each time that we interact with our clients. I also well understand our business is like a Broadway Show. No one cares how good the show was yesterday, once the curtain goes up today, it is a whole new experience and we are being judged accordingly.
In closing, we also appreciate that we must also deliver value-packed and useful services, which we do. We also get that our technicians and network engineers must be top-notch, are regularly updating their skills and certifications, and constantly look for ways to improve your technology from both a performance and a human point of view. So, what is your current IT vendor's position on customer service, and more importantly, what has your experience been with them?
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