Sometimes these blogs write themselves. I have a deadline every other week for you, dear reader. Some weeks I have much to say. Other weeks, I neglect the page and often find myself scurrying around to find something worthwhile to share. This is not one of those weeks.
As I sat down to write this edition of “Frosty In The Field,” my phone pinged with a text (transcript screenshot included below). My hotel wanted to know if there was anything I needed ahead of check-in later today. “Well, isn’t that nice,” I thought. The weekend trip was for my daughter so I wrote back and asked if they could focus their attention on making it special for her. A few minutes went by and I received a reply back letting me know I could email their guest relations department to make that request. This felt paradoxical. Before I’d received the initial text, I’d been perfectly happy. Now, because of a voluntary act of solicitude, I felt frustrated (not really frustrated, but moved enough to write about it). What had gone wrong here?
Hotels like the Ritz-Carlton (not where I was staying — the names have been redacted to protect the poorly trained), focus on catering to what they call the guest’s “unexpressed wishes and needs.” Further, they describe this focus as “The Art of Anticipation.” As hotels of their ilk know all too well, nailing these unexpressed wishes can mean the difference between raving fan-level loyalty and never seeing the customer again. Ritz-Carlton famously talked about an inquisitive events coordinator who wanted to document everything about a prospective customer before they visited for a sales lunch. This included what kind of soda they liked (Diet Coke in this case). When the prospect arrived for lunch, no Diet Coke could be found. The prospect took their business elsewhere…
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I found myself obsessing over the hotel’s attempt to impress which had resulted in an unforced error. I could only surmise that the person on the other end of the text hadn’t been properly trained or didn’t understand contextually what solicited my reply to begin with. In either case, there didn’t seem to be much of a feedback loop to let them know where there may be coaching opportunities.
Also by Henry Clifford: Ladies and Gentlemen Serving Ladies and Gentlemen
As I turned over the missteps of my little text interaction, naturally my mind turned toward my own CI business. How often are we guilty of these “broken boomerang” interactions where we’re sending out confirmations with no ability to reply or telling people in a buying mood that we’ll “have someone call them back.” Here are a few common broken boomerangs:
- Search engine ads referencing a product that links to a home page vs. a proper landing page with specific information about that product or service
- “Contact Us” or “Schedule Appointment” links that open up an email editor vs. drive to a proper web form
- Email or text confirmations with a “do not reply” admonition
- Telling a client, “We’ll have someone call you back” vs. scheduling an appointment right then and there
- Voicemail
- Email or text autoresponders telling clients they need to do something else besides what they’ve just done
- Interactions with automated systems pretending to be human and aren’t
- Hiring companies to pose as you and the client feels deceived
There are many more broken boomerangs in our businesses. How many did you count in yours? Which one will you fix this week?
Stay frosty, and see you in the field.
