Transaction or Interaction

Too Transaction Focused – Businesses that only focus and train on speed and quality end up having employees who make their Customers feel like a transaction rather than an interaction. Before reading any more, listen to this phone order conversation of a Customer ordering a pizza. Did you catch it? Did you hear it? That phone conversation was like a person being so excited and runs up to high five someone else and the other person doesn’t react by raising his hand. This employee was so focused on speed of order, get the order and getting the Customer off the phone that he did several things wrong;

• Totally blew off and diminished the Customer incredible enthusiasm, this Customer was a raving fan and was trying to share how happy he was with his last order, i.e. “it was the best pizza I have ever had in my life” and “it was like a $100 pizza”.
• The team member doesn’t hear the Customer share how he couldn’t figure out how to make a positive comment online, it was either not working or confusing.
• The employee almost blows the order when he tells the raving Customer that they have a big order going out and it will be about 35 minutes. The Customer starts deciding if they wait that long, the employee person lets the Customer figure out how to get the pizza sooner, instead of the employee suggesting alternatives, i.e. you can pick it up in 10 minutes and reminding the Customer that it is the best pizza he has ever had.
• The Customer thanks the employee, but the employee never thanks the Customer.

Fast AND Friendly – This is not the employee’s fault. This is clearly an example of the company only focusing on speed of time and zero training on hospitality and Customer engagement. A properly trained employee can totally do all the right things, engage the Customer, share in their enthusiasm, upsell, etc. without it taking any more time on the phone.