Solving a Customer Frustration

Dennis Snow
November 17, 2009 | COMMENTS

One of the best ways to distance your organization from the competition is to solve a problem that frustrates your industry's customers. I read an Orlando Sentinel article that provides a great example of this approach: Disney by Cell Phone.

The number-one guest complaint at Walt Disney World is about long wait times for the rides. And over the years Disney World has implemented several tools to help minimize the problem. Tools include:

• Wait time signs
• Entertainment while waiting in line
• Making the line part of an attraction's theme or “show”
• Tip boards around the park with posted wait times for popular attractions
• FastPass® (a mechanism for making a “reservation” for particular attractions)

Disney World (and Disneyland) has just introduced a new way to help reduce wait time frustrations for Disney guests—“Mobile Magic.” It's a smartphone application that allows guests to get real-time information about attraction wait times, character greetings, and other park events. The application allows guests to get the most out of their Disney visit by helping them make informed decisions about what to do next.

The full application of Mobile Magic is only available to Verizon subscribers right now, but a scaled-down version is available to subscribers of other mobile services. My guess is that the full application will soon be available to anyone with a cell phone.

The reason I'm sharing this story isn't to brag about Disney; it's to point out an example of a relentless quest to solve an ongoing customer frustration. I can't think of an industry that doesn't have its inherent customer frustrations, and most companies just accept them as givens. But customers don't accept them as givens; we see them as reasons to look for alternatives.

You don't have to do an expensive survey to find out what frustrates your customers. My guess is that you know exactly what frustrates them. Those recurring complaints and those negative customer interactions that burn out your employees tell you what the problems are. What's needed is action.

So, I challenge you to pick one customer frustration that you'll commit to solving. Start small if necessary, but commit to one. Bring in some employees from your operation and go to work coming up with and implementing a solution. Or you can use this link to a Service Improvement Meeting agenda which guides you through a team meeting for identifying and developing solutions for customer frustrations. Once you've solved a problem, go on to another one.

Imagine if you just identify and solve one customer frustration per quarter. Four improvements a year is huge! It will put you in the “world-class” category, and customers will wonder, “Why can't other organizations do it like they do?”

Dennis Snow is the founder of Snow & Associates. Read his blog at www.dennissnowblog.com.