Developing a Tasting Room Loyalty Program Part 2

By Dr Kathy Kelley--Professor of Horticultural Marketing and Business Management and Dana Ollendyke-- Extension Associate

In our previous post, we discussed what a loyalty program should do for your business--which, simply put, it should help increase your tasting room’s profits! In this post, we will discuss developing an outline for your loyalty program.

A loyalty program rewards program (photo credit: iQoncept/Dollar Photo Club).

The great thing about offering a loyalty program is that customers understand their basic function, as they most likely belong to other programs. Regardless of the type of program you offer, consider these key questions:

• Your overall goal – what do you hope to achieve?
• Will charge customers to join the program, limit the number of members, or will enrollment be free?
• How will customer purchases will be recorded?
• What questions will you ask members that will help enhance the program and their experience?
• What purchases will “count” towards loyalty program benefits, what can members redeem points on, and would a program co-developed with a complementary business be perceived as being even more attractive?
• How you will determine that loyalty has really been established?
• How and when might need to end the program (and steps for doing so)?

The next post in this series will focus on your overall loyalty program goal.

What Is Your Business's Customer Service Philosophy?

 by Juliette Enfield, Penn State Extension Educator, Warren County

Although we give and receive customer service almost every day, we rarely take time to stop and think about what customer service means. Customer service does not come easily or naturally for most people. Providing good customer service is a skill that involves product knowledge, concern or empathy for the customer, readiness to help the customer, and knowing where to go to find answers. John Berry, Extension Educator in Lehigh County reinforces these ideas with a four step process for providing excellent customer service:

Be sure your employees know about the product they are selling.

–      Know the Product

–      Reach Out

 

–      Be Alert

–     Get Help

Customer service affects a business’s bottom line when there are many competitors. The fewer competitors, the less customer service matters, such as in the telephone and internet service provider industry. The more competitors, the more customer service matters, which is the case in the food industry. 

Another benefit to providing good customer service is the cost savings associated with customer retention. Losing one customer can have a domino effect on a business. The business from this customer is lost, but so is the business they could have brought to you, as well as the opportunity to change something that was not working well in your business. Remember these two rules of thumb: attracting new customers costs 5 times more than keeping existing customers, and 80% of your sales come from 20% of your customers.



Taylor's Farm Market (which I recently visited on our Are You Crazy Retail Farm Market Bus Tour) in Inwood, West Virginia shares their customer service philosophy.

You may have protocols in place for handling returns, or complaints, but it’s the customer service philosophy that is portrayed in these actions. Consider what script(s) you want your employees to follow when providing good customer service. For example, Sue Miller of Birchrun Hills Farm in Chester County, PA told me that for her, marketing is about having good relationships and providing good customer service.  She says she enjoys trying to guess what the customer wants. She believes that people don’t want to take advantage of you. She believes in treating people the way she would want to be treated. Sue says that if a customer is ever dissatisfied with her products, she is happy to exchange the product for a new one.

Below are some questions that can help start the customer service conversation at your business. I filled in some of my own reflections to get you started.

1. What is your business’s customer service philosophy?
We want people to feel that we care about them and their health by shopping with us.

2. What makes implementing this philosophy challenging?

Lack of sleep, not being able to relate to the customer-who may not have much awareness about agriculture, who may be from another culture, may make more money than I do, etc....

3. What works?

Not taking criticisms personally, offering services such as carrying heavy items, being honest...

4. What doesn’t work?

Apologizing when I don’t mean it...

5. What kind of customer service do you enjoy when shopping?

I like when the sales person is knowledgeable about the product, I also like when the sales person is not overly aggressive about making sales...

6. Does your business have a customer service training plan in place? Circle one.

Yes                                           No

Useful Books & Videos:
Carlaw, P. and Deming, V. The Big Book of Customer Service Training Games. McGraw-Hill. New York, NY. 1999. (This book is cheap to buy and has fun and educational training games that you could play with your employees)

Wicks, Judy. Good Morning, Beautiful Business. Chelsea Green Publishing. White River Junction, VT. 2013. (This book was featured at the Pennsylvania Women in Ag Network's Annual Symposium in 2013. Judy Wicks spoke about her inspiring business and customer service philosophy.)

Telephone Doctor® CUSTOMER SERVICE TRAINING, 30 Hollenberg Ct. St. Louis, MO 63044,(314) 291-1012, Fax: (314) 291-3710, E-mail: nancy@telephonedoctor.com, www.telephonedoctor.com (Purchasing these tools is not cheap but there are some sample materials on YouTube which are entertaining and educational)

The Learning Service, Ltd., 2800 Market Avenue North Canton, Ohio 44714, Phone: (330) 456-2422, Fax:(330) 456-8944, E-mail: learningservice@aol.com, www.thelearningservice.com (This company has published several books on customer service which are listed on their website)

Sources for this blog:

Berry, John. I Seem to Have Lost a Customer Some Place! April 8, 2014. Agricultural Entrepreneurship Blog. <http://farmbusiness.blogspot.com/2014/04/i-seem-to-have-lost-customer-someplace.html> Accessed Sept 9, 2015.

Lawrence, Alex. Five Customer Retention Tips for Entrepreneurs. Nov 1, 2012.
< http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexlawrence/2012/11/01/five-customer-retention-tips-for-entrepreneurs/> Accessed Sept 8, 2015.

Makovsky, Ken. Where Customer Service Doesn’t Matter. Jan 23, 2014. <http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenmakovsky/2014/01/23/where-customer-service-doesnt-matter/>Accessed Sept 8, 2015.

Is Customer Service on Social Media for You?

by Sarah Cornelisse, Sr. Extension Associate, Dept. of Agricultural Economics, Sociology, and Education

I'm sure you've all seen them - the stories, comments, or other posts on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, or another social platform from people dissatisfied with some aspect of a product or a service from a business. More so than ever, consumers are turning to social media to share their annoyances and horror stories.  However, they also turn to social media to connect with brands and businesses - to seek information,  ask questions, and resolve problems or concerns.

A 2012 Nielsen report provides some insight to consumer views regarding customer service via social media, or "social care."  Their findings include:

• Almost half (47%) of social media users engage in customer service activities through these networks. And of that 47%,
• Seventy percent (70%), do so on a monthly basis.
• Thirty percent (30%) prefer social care over contacting a company by phone.
• Facebook, through both the company's page and the user's personal page (29% and 28% respectively), are where users are most likely to comment or ask a question.

If your business has an existing presence on social media and is looking for a competitive edge, or just to improve your relationship with your followers, taking on social care may be something to consider.  However, it does require commitment.  Here are some tips I've come across for using social media as a customer service channel.

• Be proactive. Listen and participate in conversations. You can learn so much from simply listening to what your customers, or the public, are saying on social media.  If a conversation is happening and you can add to it, do so.  Through active listening, you'll be ahead of the curve in knowing what's important or of concern to them.

• Focus on social interaction as a competitive differentiator. One reason the buy local movement is popular is because consumers like to know the person(s) from whom they're buying.  You can bring the same focus on relationships to your online interactions with consumers.  When you're separated from individuals by a computer screen it's easy to put off replying until a more convenient time or to send short, clipped responses. However, by being personal and personable, you can build trusting relationships with your customers and followers that they will appreciate and value. 
  

  "When executing social media customer care, canned responses are unacceptable. Responses must be personal, and it’s essential to strike the right tone." (Source)

  Additionally, if consumers see inconsistency in your social care, they'll know that you're not committed to them.  A study by Conversocial, found that 88% of respondents said that they would be less likely to do business with someone who didn't answer questions on their social media pages.  This leads us to the next tip...
  
  
• Define a process and framework for dealing with customers. How, and when, will you respond to requests?  What's your strategy for dealing with complaints? Creating a response map (see example below) may be useful, as you'll want to have a consistent response strategy for everything that comes your way, even praise.   With some aspects of your response strategy, such as response time, it may make sense to make this known upfront to your customers with short notices on your social media page, or through an automatic reply.
  

  

  Source: http://www.conversocial.com

  When complaints are involved, be sure these points are addressed in your response framework:

• Understand what's behind the complaint before responding.  Sometimes, the complaint made is just the tip of the iceberg, and the real issue lies deeper.  Ask the complainant clarifying questions as appropriate if you suspect this is the case.
• Follow through on all channels.  If a conversation moves from one channel to another, say from Facebook to email, make sure you indicate that this has taken place.  This will allow others who have seen the start of a conversation know that you are in contact with the original poster.  You may also want to post the final resolution, or answer, on the original channel for others to see and for the complainant to verify that they have been assisted.
• Follow up after problems have been solved.  Once you have provided a solution or rectified the situation, follow up after a reasonable length of time to ensure your customer's satisfaction.

It is possible to provide excellent customer service using social tools, just check out this customer's experience with Netflix. 

"If you’re not engaging customers during the entire product life cycle through social media, you’re missing out. Because someone else will."

                   - Dennis Stoutenburgh, co-founder of Stratus Contact Solutions

Note: Where businesses or trade-names are mentioned, no endorsement is intended.