Satisfaction: How Every Great Company Listens to the Voice of the Customer

by Chris Denove, James Power

Overview

For nearly four decades, J. D. Power and Associates has been measuring consumer satisfaction and helping businesses improve profits by paying attention to what customers really want. Their annual awards are widely publicized and valued worldwide for what they say about a company’s commitment to its customers. Now, at last, the company has created the definitive book on how to boost profits by increasing customer satisfaction.

Although most businesses pay lip service to putting customers first, few actually listen to the voice of the customer and use it as a tangible asset. In this book, J. D. Power and Associates provides an insider’s perspective on some of the most successful companies on the planet. Corporate giants such as Toyota and Staples and local legends like Mike Diamond Plumbing all use customer satisfaction as their key to market dominance.

Satisfaction opens the vault on years of J. D. Power data, quantifying the elusive links between satisfaction and customer loyalty, market share, and profits. The book provides extensive coverage of the varying touchpoints of consumer satisfaction—covering every type of business from service providers to product manufacturers—and shows companies in detail how to make a commitment to consumers at the highest levels and translate this commitment into strategies and practices.

For any business that wants to reap the rewards that come when they truly put the customer first, this is the ultimate guide.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781101216323
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	06/26/2007
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	288
File size:	826 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Chris Denove is a vice president at J. D. Power and Associates.
James D. Power IV is an executive vice president at J. D. Power and Associates. J. D. Power and Associates, founded in 1968, is a global marketing information firm that conducts independent and unbiased surveys of customer satisfaction, product quality and buyer behavior for many different industries.

What People are Saying About This

Lee Iacocca

If you can find a better book on customer satisfaction, buy it.

From the Publisher

If you can find a better book on customer satisfaction, buy it. (Lee Iacocca)

It always seemed that J. D. Power and Associates wrote the book on customer satisfaction. Now they have, and the business community should be thankful for it. (Horst H. Schulze, founding president and COO, Ritz-Carlton Hotels)

In Satisfaction, the customer's experience is broken down into bite-sized, logical components that managers can use to develop practical business strategies. A truly valuable book. (Ken Blanchard, coauthor, The One Minute Manager and Customer Mania!)

The folks at J.D. Power and Associates wrote the book on [customer satisfaction] and now they've written the Æbible.Æ Satisfaction is an important book, and a good read, too. (Paul Ingrassia, president, Dow Jones Newswires)

Editorial Reviews

Despite the rhetoric, most organizations have not made a significant and sustained commitment to customer satisfaction. This lack of attention to customer satisfaction can be costly. There is an intractable connection between high levels of customer satisfaction and increased shareholder value. Anecdotal evidence abounds to support the theory that high customer satisfaction is important, but most chief executives need more than a good story to prod them into action.

The Relationship Between Satisfaction and Shareholder Value
One J. D. Powers and Associates study showed that the relationship between satisfaction and shareholder value wasn't just visible; it was paramount! Companies were divided into one of three groups: companies whose customer satisfaction rank within their industry remained constant, those whose rank improved and those whose satisfaction ranking dropped relative to their industry competitors. The companies that improved customer satisfaction more than doubled their shareholder value! And those whose rank declined lost 22 percent of their value within the previous five years.

Loyalty: The Common Denominator for Improving Customer Satisfaction
Studies show that customer satisfaction does in fact impact the likelihood your customers will return, but customer satisfaction is only one of many factors that determine actual loyalty.

Different Companies, Different Touchpoints
It might be difficult to compare the fortunes of a plumber, a major Japanese automaker and a U.S. office supplies retailer, but Mike Diamond Plumbing, Toyota Motor Co. and Staples have one very important point in common: Each has demonstrated an in-depth knowledge of the various ways its business touches customers and has used that knowledge to maximize both its sales and customer satisfaction. Each company offers up dramatic examples of how the three major categories of businesses - service providers, product manufacturers and retailers - touch its customers in a unique way.

Take Enterprise, for example. Rather than standardize every movement an employee makes, the car rental company lets the unique talent and personality of each employee shine through, thereby providing the branch with the opportunity for greatness in its own unique way. By measuring the relationship between a branch's customer satisfaction and its financial performance, Enterprise was going where few companies had gone before. The results were clear: Narrow the performance gap between branches and overall customer satisfaction will improve.

Consider hotel chains. In the eyes of the customer, best is always better than good. Providing the best, however, just isn't always economically feasible. Not every company can be The Ritz-Carlton; someone has to be the Holiday Inn, and someone even needs to be Motel 6. You just need to balance the financial benefits of any action against the cost.

Just because you're Motel 6 doesn't mean that you shouldn't spend money to improve customer satisfaction. You may find that providing coffee and donuts in the morning is cheap compared to the resulting increase in satisfaction, but that installing down comforters in every room is not.

Full Disclosure
Among other touchpoints, full and honest disclosure during the sales process (both in spirit and in fact) is one of the fundamental features that characterize companies with high customer satisfaction scores. High-scoring companies refuse to mortgage their future and their reputations for a short-term bump in sales. These companies are very clear that short-term profits are meaningless if they come at the expense of a hard-earned spotless reputation.

Perhaps the most common broken promise of all is one made with the intention - or at least the hope - that it will be fulfilled. These “best-case scenario promises” are promises likely to be broken and should never have been made in the first place.

Listen to Complaints
Too many companies that empower their employees to do good watch those employees take the easy way out by trying to buy their way out of a bad situation. Don't just automatically offer a $25 gift certificate to every customer who walks up with a legitimate beef. Take the time to really listen to your customers when they complain. Sure, for many customers the correct, and perhaps only, course of action is to incur the cost to make the problem go away. But, for others, by listening and trying to find the root cause of their discomfort, you will not only be able to do a better job of building advocacy, you may be able to save money in the process. Copyright © 2006 Soundview Executive Book Summaries

—Soundveiw Review

Soundview Executive Book Summaries