Impact of Branding Your Customer Service

Four significant benefits can be accrued from branding your service experiences.

1. Branding customer service returns control of the definition of good service to the organization. When companies offer generic service that is not designed to reinforce their brands, customers judge the received service based on their personally held standards of good and bad service. This makes it difficult for organizations to define good and bad service in their own terms. Under these circumstances, staff will not know exactly when they have delivered good or bad service until the customer tells them. If you go into a Costco store, you will find it difficult to locate employees who can tell you where items are. It's expected and partially enables the store's discount pricing, so the absence of an adequate number of employees walking the floor is not considered bad service. However, if you went into a retail shop that was promoted as a personalized shopping experience, you would experience the unavailability of sales clerks as bad service.

   Just as manufacturing companies set their own standards for quality, so, too, should service companies set their own service standards. Let the public know what to expect, and then get your staff to meet this defined service standard in the same way a line supervisor checks for product quality to a certain standard.

   Southwest Airlines has been known to send customers who complain about its practice of not assigning seats a letter that, in effect, reads, "Thank you for having been a customer of ours. We will miss you." Southwest is not about to move away from its brand promise (low fares and reliability) by changing systems that make possible a turnaround of aircraft in twenty minutes.

   Consumers know that a commercial interest is present in every transaction, and they can become quite cynical when employees present themselves as working exclusively for the consumers' benefit. No doubt, most people would just as soon staff be up-front about this. When they know how the brand has been defined and that there are no apologies for that, the customer-supplier relationship becomes more authentic. We were told once by Southwest, "We don't offer interline transfers of luggage so we can remain profitable. Our competitors aren't." While not meeting our wishes, such a statement is nonetheless honest and refreshing to hear.

2. Branded service lets the organization set standards for the five dimensions of service in relationship to its brand. The five classic dimensions of customer service (ServQual, as they are called) are based on extensive consumer research. They were identified at Texas A&M in the 1960s and include reliability, assuredness, tangibility, empathy, and responsiveness. (A further explanation and application follow in chapter 4.) When service is branded, an organization can write specific brand standards for each of these five classic dimensions of service.

3. Branded customer service is a strong equalizer for brands. By consistently delivering its brand promise, an organization can develop a strong brand without a huge advertising budget. U.S.-based Krispy Kreme Doughnuts exemplifies how brands can develop significant market share without spending a penny on media advertising. Krispy Kreme has become known in the marketplace by occupying a clearly defined brand space and making sure that customer experiences match the brand. Because of its remarkable rarity, there are a lot of public relations possibilities when an organization delivers its brand promise.

4. Successful branding can create quasi monopolies. It may be extremely difficult to topple Coca-Cola from its number one position on Interbrand's annual list of the top one hundred brands worldwide—or even to get on the list. But branded customer service can make it possible for small brands with limited marketing budgets to be tops in their local markets.

   A product or service whose delivery reinforces brand promises can become a magnet within the target population the brand wishes to attract. Starbucks, for example, is not the number one coffeehouse brand in every market. And sometimes an obscure brand can capture public attention by standing out from big-name brands, such as is the case with a previously little-known restaurant in New York City. The Grocery was recently named by Zagat Survey as the seventh-best restaurant in Manhattan. It's an inexpensive place to eat, no liquor is served, and no one will be there to take your coat. What the Grocery has created is a reputation as a solid neighborhood restaurant, delivering the excellent food and service it promises at an appropriate rate. According to the owner, who was made a little nervous by the acclaim, "I don't want people to be disappointed, but we're not going to change the way we do things." ^[9]

^[9]Florence Fabricant, "New York Diners Toast a Modest Find," International Herald Tribune, October 22, 2003.