When customer experience matches the brand proposition, sales happen. Customer service is meeting customer expectations. Customer expectations are established from the first moment contact is made with a brand, product or business.
We fail our customers when we tell them what to expect through literature, messaging, advertising and the website yet when they get up close and personal with the brand or product at the point of sale, it doesn’t reflect what’s been promised. However, when the experience is delivered seamlessly from marketing through to the sale, magic happens…
From the moment we submitted the enquiry request on the Mini website, a purchase seemed inevitable. Within minutes, Kevin from Rushcutters’s Bay Mini Garage made contact and organised a test drive. Everything was made easy, and no pressure was asserted.
When we arrived at the showroom, Kevin greeted us warmly, dressed casually in an über cool ‘I Love Mini’ t-shirt, jeans and sunglasses. He personified the brand and reflected the marketing collateral that showed Mini as a fun-loving, stylish, driving machine. He tossed the keys and said: “Go and have fun”. No time pressure was imposed, nor was there a salesperson sitting in the back seat supervising the ‘fun’.
When we enquired about ‘best price’, Kevin responded with: “When you’re ready to buy, we can certainly look at sharpening our pencil.” Thus, the decision was not ‘would we buy this car at a particular price’, but shifted to ‘do we want to buy this car?’
The marketing and brand promise had established a desire to own this car, the test drive whet our appetites and the laid back sales approach created a buying environment rather than a high pressure sales environment. Considering Mini sell ‘fun and style’, it made the process feel authentic.
While my husband was the driving force behind being in the Mini showroom, the process shifted my own attitude from ‘why do we need a new car?’ to ‘we’re going to be Mini owners’. We were no longer simply buying a car but buying fun and freedom for our weekends and gaining access to a community of like-minded people.
To ensure we belonged, Kevin also kitted us out with the appropriate Mini accessories and apparel; we couldn’t get enough of the stuff.
At no point did we entertain going to another dealership, Kevin had taken us on the Mini journey: he was our guide, the sale would be his.
Were my customer service expectations met? Abso-Mini-lutely!
—Nicole Billett is the general manager in Sales & Marketing for Servcorp
