I’m on vacation with The Mrs and The Boy on Ocracoke Island, NC, one of my favorite places on Earth. We had lunch today at Howard’s Pub, an Ocracoke institution known for staying open 365 days a year no matter what the weather.
Somehow we only brought two sippy cups with us to the beach, so when we got back in the car after lunch and realized we’d left one on the table, it was a big deal. I walked back in to try to find it. Keep in mind it had only been a few minutes since we had left.
I told someone who I thought was a manager that we’d left a sippy cup on the table. He seemed kind of annoyed and said, “They probably threw it away. Do you want another one?” I realized he thought I meant the kids cup they had provided and told him it was a cup we had brought ourselves.
“Oh, then it would be at the hostess station,” he replied, and walked away. When I asked the hostess, she gave me a blank look, looked under the counter for a moment and went back to selling t-shirts.
The frustrating thing was I knew the sippy cup was somewhere on the other side of the kitchen door, either in a bus tray or at the top of a trash can or maybe on a shelf if someone had noticed it. I suppose I could have walked into the dish room myself and looked around, but of course, we just don’t do that. All I needed was someone willing to listen to what I was actually saying I needed, and take a moment to look for it.
I spotted our very helpful waiter and asked him. He walked through the door, asked the dish room guys if they’d seen it, and handed it back to me. I thanked him, and was happy we’d tipped him well for his earlier friendly and helpful service.
The old model of customer service requires the customer to conform to the procedures and structures of the company. In the social media model of customer service, it’s incumbent on the company to be where its customers are asking questions and answer them in the way the customer needs, regardless of how things have always been done or whether or not it conforms to their organizational silos and responsibilities.
Even more, it requires people who are willing and able to listen, think for a moment, and do what it takes to resolve a situation to the customer’s satisfaction. That’s always been the customer service model at exemplary organizations. Social media is making it the norm, and highlighting the exceptions.