|
You cannot judge your customers by their covers
By Bill Perry
Charleston Regional Business
Journal 7/14/2003
You can’t judge your customers by
their covers
At a recent customer
seminar, a successful professional woman told a story of visiting an automobile
dealership to look for, and hopefully buy, a new car. She went after work and
made arrangements for her husband to meet her at the dealership later to help
her decide.
The salesman was very friendly and
helpful, the woman related. He showed her a number of new cars and went over
the various options available in each one. Finally, after considerable looking
around and test-driving, the woman selected the car she wanted. She was excited
and ready to close the deal, but decided to wait for her husband so he could
take a look at it.
Several minutes later her husband
arrived. It turned out he worked on the waterfront as a longshoreman and came
right to the dealership from offloading a ship. He was dressed the way
longshoremen dress and, it being the end of a long day, was hot, tired and a
bit scruffy looking.
What happened next is hard to believe,
but sadly true. The salesman, after looking over the husband, said to his wife,
“I don’t think you can afford a new car. Our used car department is right next door.” Naturally, they went to
another dealership, were served pleasantly and bought that new car.
Unbelievable? I wish it were. I have
heard many similar stories about customer profiling and I think it happens a
lot more than we all realize. Women constantly tell me that if they visit a
department store “dressed down” in jeans or the like, they are afforded less
stellar customer service than if they dress professionally.
Actually, customer profiling is a very
legitimate marketing strategy when it is used as part of a customer
relationship management program. The idea of knowing your customer base and
targeting potential consumers based on age, race, gender, income level and
location is good business practice. Sophisticated software has made CRM a
rapidly growing tool in the marketing tool bag of corporate America, especially
in service industries.
But I’m talking about a much less
formal and more negative type of profiling, one based not on science or data
but more on attitudes, appearances and prejudices. At its worst, you can call
it customer discrimination, which goes back in time farther than we all can
remember. If you want to read some stories of out and out customer
discrimination, go to web sites like www.planetfeedback.com
or www.customercomplaints.com.
In our book, we tell the story of
another car dealership (sorry auto industry), this one in Atlanta. One very
cold and dreary morning, as the salesmen sipped coffee and tried to stay warm,
an old, muddy beat-up pickup truck rambled onto the lot and out stepped a guy
in jeans. He walked around the lot looking a bit. “Probably just a
‘tire-kicker,’” one salesman commented. After a few minutes it was obvious the
man wasn’t going away and someone had to put on a parka and go see what he
wanted. “I’ll pass,” said the senior salesman. “Me too,” said another. Finally,
Bobby decided he’d go out, being new and hungry.
Turns out the guy had his car stolen
from a convenience store parking lot a couple weeks before. The insurance
settlement just arrived and he drove his old hunting truck to buy a new car.
Laid down $60,000 cash for a new luxury model. Do you think Bobby was grinning when
he returned to the showroom?
We profile customers all the time,
often without thinking. How do they look? How old are they? Are they male or
female? What profession are they in? What’s their financial status? I had a man
tell me recently that while applying for credit to purchase an expensive item,
he was told by the finance person, “Your credit isn’t good enough to buy a Hot
Wheels.” Now, that’s just plain rude.
Next time you’re tempted to pass
judgment on a customer based on a first impression, think twice before you act.
You can never tell who that big sale will be.
Bill Perry, president of the Charleston Center
for High Performance Organizations, co-authored the book “Exceptional Customer
Service” with Lisa Ford and David McNair and gives seminars and speeches on
customer service. He can be reached by e-mail at billperry829@aol.com.
|
E-Mail This Article
Printer-Friendly Version