Harvey Kanter is the CEO of Blue Nile, the largest online retailer of certified diamonds and fine jewelry. He addressed the Economic Club of Phoenix on January 28, 2016. The W. P. Carey School’s Economic Club of Phoenix connects business leaders with top executives and thought leaders at its monthly luncheons.
Building a brand for a services business is more complicated than ever. Customers might perceive one hotel chain or insurance company as pretty much the same as its competitors. Customers also are saturated with thousands of messages a day, and they’re relying less on traditional marketing and more on social media and word of mouth to discover and form relationships with a brand. How can services businesses simplify their customers’ experience in such a complex world and still stand out from the crowd?
The 2016 College Football Playoff national championship game was played January 11 in Glendale, Ariz. Marketing Professor Michael Mokwa and other marketers and economists have been studying the economic impact of these sports events since the mid-1990s.
Do you know when your customer’s service experience actually starts? That is, when it begins in your customer’s mind? Could you be missing something important?
Who hasn’t experienced the feelings of frustration, disappointment, bewilderment, anger and even rage in reaction to a problem with a product or service? I know I have.
Putting on my customer hat, I’m going to share with you an experience I recently had at a restaurant. After reviewing this experience, I’ll tie the story back to an often-ignored but critical business skill: recovering when we fail a customer.
