{"id":847,"date":"2017-07-19T10:00:38","date_gmt":"2017-07-19T10:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/?p=847"},"modified":"2025-07-01T17:20:23","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T17:20:23","slug":"really-view-telephone-call-opportunity-build-zappos-brand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/really-view-telephone-call-opportunity-build-zappos-brand\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWe really view each (telephone call) as an opportunity to build the Zappos brand.\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whatever happened to customer service?\u00a0 Everybody pays lip service to it, but very few actually deliver it.\u00a0 More and more often, when you go to a company\u2019s website looking for a phone number, you will be disappointed to find there isn\u2019t one.\u00a0 Apparently, they don\u2019t want to talk to their customers.\u00a0 Instead, they provide a little email form that you can complete with the promise that they will respond promptly.\u00a0 Of course, they don\u2019t respond promptly.\u00a0 In fact, they often don\u2019t respond at all.\u00a0 Contrast that with the experience you get when you call Zappos (*), the online retailer.\u00a0 When it comes to customer service, Zappos is generally ranked right up there at the top with companies like Nordstrom and Ritz Carlton Hotels.\u00a0 Unlike some other online retailers, Zappos does<\/u><\/em> want to talk to its customers . . . as often as possible.\u00a0 So to achieve the level of customer contact it wants, Zappos maintains a full service, 24\/7, inbound call center, but it\u2019s very unique in the way it operates.\u00a0 Even if you don\u2019t run a call center but would like the telephone traffic you do have to be more effective and customer-friendly, you can take a few tips from Zappos.\u00a0 To learn what makes the Zappos call center different from others, and to learn how Zappos uses it to cement a commitment to customer service, please continue reading below.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe really view each (telephone call) as an opportunity to build the Zappos brand.\u201d \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 <\/strong>~Tony Hsieh, Zappos CEO<\/em>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>There are a number of things that separate the Zappos call center from other call center operations:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Call center employees don\u2019t work from scripts and they don\u2019t upsell.<\/strong> The company recognizes that each caller is unique and deserves a genuine, person-to-person conversation, not a canned, one-size-fits-all script.\u00a0 \u201cWe trust our employees to use their best judgment when dealing with each and every customer,\u201d says CEO Tony Hsieh.\u00a0 \u201cWe want our reps to let their true personalities shine during each phone call so that they can develop a personal emotional connection with the customer.\u201d<\/li>\n
  2. Calls are not timed.<\/strong> At many call centers, employees are evaluated according to how many calls they can \u201cclear\u201d within a specified period of time.\u00a0 Not at Zappos.\u00a0 Employees there are instructed to take as much time as they need to give the caller a positive, WOW experience.\u00a0 They work with one simple imperative: no matter how long it takes, whatever question a caller has, make sure it\u2019s fully and completely answered, and whatever problem the caller has, make sure it\u2019s solved.\u00a0 Zappos doesn\u2019t even care if the question answered or the problem solved results in a sale.\u00a0 It\u2019s all about delivering a great customer experience.<\/li>\n
  3. Call centers are not an expense to be minimized. <\/strong>Look at each call as an investment in your customer service brand.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 At Zappos, the strategy is to build the brand through word-of-mouth and through the repeat business from a loyal customer base.\u00a0 To achieve that, rather than pouring a lot of money into traditional advertising mediums, they pour that same amount of money into their various customer service initiatives (such as their call center).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    You may not have or need a call center like Zappos, but maybe you do have a help desk or technical support function or dispatch activities that depend on telephone communication.\u00a0 Or maybe you have \u201cinternal customers\u201d who are in the field, such as sales people or technicians, who need to call in periodically for whatever support they need.\u00a0 Or maybe you\u2019re a virtual company with no \u201cland lines\u201d at all and with cell phone-toting employees scattered around the country.\u00a0 In all of those cases, telephone traffic, both inbound and outbound, is connecting your company to its employees, customers, and suppliers.<\/p>\n

    In the Zappos world, each of those calls represents an opportunity to build or strengthen a relationship.\u00a0 Following a call from an employee, does that employee feel a stronger bond with the company?\u00a0 Following a call from a customer, does that customer feel so well-served that he or she wouldn\u2019t even think about going to a competitor?\u00a0 Following a call from a vendor, would that vendor do whatever it takes to help us when we need it?<\/p>\n

    Telephones have been with us for over 100 years, and even though the telephones of today are mobile computing devices, they still connect people in a personal way that texting and email and voicemail cannot match.\u00a0 According to Tony Hsieh, \u201cAs unsexy and low-tech as it may sound, our belief is that the telephone is one of the best branding devices out there.\u201d\u00a0 We should do whatever we can to leverage the personal touch those branding devices allow us to deliver.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0What would it look like if everyone in your company was treating every telephone conversation as an opportunity to strengthen your brand as a good place to work and a good place to do business?<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    (*) Zappos achieved $1 billion in annual gross merchandise sales in under 10 years, was named one of the \u201cBest Companies to Work For\u201d by Fortune magazine in 2009 (and would continue to make regular appearances on that list), and in that same year, was purchased by Amazon in a deal valued at $1.2 billion.\u00a0 However, it continues to. be run under its own brand, with its own culture, and its own unique way of doing business.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Whatever happened to customer service?\u00a0 Everybody pays lip service to it, but very few actually deliver it.\u00a0 More and more often, when you go to a company\u2019s website looking for a phone number, you will be disappointed to find there isn\u2019t one.\u00a0 Apparently, they don\u2019t want to talk to their customers.\u00a0 Instead, they provide a<\/p>\n

    Read More\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[39,36,33,31,22],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=847"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":848,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847\/revisions\/848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rocksolidbizdevelopment.com\/ourblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}