Video - Micah Solomon on Customer Service Excellence
In this episode, Robert talks with Micah Solomon. Micah is one of the world's leading authorities on customer service, consumer trends, hospitality, and company culture. He is a consultant, keynote speaker, trainer, and training designer in these subjects, and the author of many books including, Ignore Your Customers (And They’ll Go Away) The Simple Playbook for Delivering the Ultimate Customer Service Experience. Companies in every industry call on him to mystery shop and transform their company’s customer service, and bottom-line results—and he is known as “the customer service turnaround expert.”
Robert and Micah discuss:
How Micah helps companies strive for excellence
Companies that do customer service really, really well
Why customer service such a pain point for businesses
Things that companies do wrong and where they can improve
Secrets to exceptional customer service
Why a customer-first approach is so important to a company’s success
Transcription:
Robert Craven 00:07
Hello, welcome to the guide talks today absolutely fantasticю. Today I'm delighted to have my guest Micah Solomon. Hi there Micah.
Micah Solomon 00:17
Hello mr. Craven.
Robert Craven 00:19
Hi that's so let's just give the intro the proper intro that Mr. Solomon deserves because it's worthwhile and I've been really excited to have you on board. So Micah is one of the world's leading authorities and hands on consultants specialising includes inclusively customer service, company, culture, customer experience, particularly relevant for me because way back in 2009, I wrote a book called “Customers King” based a lot on what I'd heard and read from from this man here. So he's been named Financial Post the new guru of customer service, excellent, specialising in creating five star customer service with an eye towards bottom line results. Author consultant, keynote speaker, contributor to Forbes Inc. has reviews from all the top names. Hello, and big welcome to you, sir.
Micah Solomon 01:10
Wow, thank you. I'm blushing.
Robert Craven 01:13
Well, you don't need to blush. So tell us how, um, how would you describe yourself rather than the formal words? How would you describe yourself? What's your sort of pitch about yourself?
Micah Solomon 01:25
And I'm about five foot. At ten I wear glasses. I have headphones on right now. But you can see that right? Yep. Yeah. All right. Well, the rest of it is, I am a customer service turnaround expert, which means I'll come to your company and help you either literally everyone not literally, but figuratively turn everything around. Or if all that's needed is a refresh, I'll refresh it as well. And this means I might start by mystery shopping. Your company simulated a client as best as I can, talking with you about what the pain points are talking about some of your customers. And then we'll strive to improve everything from communications to processes that were IOC. That was for my Canadian names, Canadian friends for this year, I will translate those processes. And, and it can be very impressive results. I will tell you though, that the people who hire me tend to already be doing pretty well. They already know the value of an exceptional customer experience. And they just want to make it more exceptional. It's amazing all the infamous companies that have terrible customer service that don't call me and I'm on it. I think that's kind of telling. It's very interesting.
Robert Craven 02:37
So it must be one of those things that never leaves you alone because you can't walk into the, it's very hard. The language is used for supermarkets and gas stations. You can't go to Amazon. Without feeling or out measuring. Whatever it is, you do. My first business was running a cafe in a restaurant, I spent years even after I'd run it. So picking out cups and looking where they're made and looking good for years. So presumably, that's your light that you're never you're never off duty, because you're always aware wherever you go about how you're being treated by other people.
Micah Solomon 03:18
Well, I tried to get better about it. My new mantra is that I won't complain unless they're paying me to. But this is how I was born. I actually I've always been extremely particular, at least in some things. I I found this note that was written to my parents at summer camp. At the end of the summer there is very good customer service. The counselors understand their customers are really the parents. So they'd written this note to my parents like they did to all the kids, but you had to read well, not really even between the lines, but it said, we have enjoyed the rigorous pleasure of Micah's company. But it will be something of a relief in the offseason to not get all these great suggestions about how the whistle is attitude on the water for it. And the orange is that orange juice doesn't quite pair with the sloppy Joe's and so forth. So we are somewhat relieved to return him to your capable hands, Mr. Solomon.
Robert Craven 04:17
Because the thing is, once you start I mean it's what actually goes on you go into a hotel room, you're quite happy. They said to you turn left turn right, go to the to the key and you open the door, and then and then it's kind of when you see the first pubic hair on the toilet seat or whatever it is, you suddenly go. Oh, and another thing look at the dust. And another thing the showers are not clean. And another thing. It's kind of like everything's okay until suddenly you see somewhat for me until he's wrong.
Micah Solomon 04:46
And you turn off at the first one. You don't have to wait for the third.
Robert Craven 04:50
So that Quinton, my father was quoted by Quinton Chris, who said if you go into a restaurant and you order a dry martini, and it comes sweet That's the time to leave. I kind of get what he's saying, because they're never going to stand up again to rescue it if they've made a really fundamental mess up. And yeah. Let's say vaguely to a script. How did you get to doing it?
Micah Solomon 05:16
I think we're way off already. Robert, I like that.
Robert Craven 05:19
But how did you get to 2020? How did you get to doing this? I mean, all of all the things you could have been doing, you end up doing customer service. And, and there's another thing is, surely everyone knows about this stuff. Surely there should be no need for you to be running around. Thanks.
Micah Solomon 05:38
Thanks a whole lot. Well, there's two stories, there's two completely true stories to how I got to doing what I'm doing. And the one I just told you, I was born in particular. And I finally found a way to monetize that. But the other story is that I built my own manufacturing company, and it was a big, well, in our small market, it was a big success. When I sold it, I started thinking about what had made us beyond being a commodity. And the answer was always the customer experience that we provide. So I started to write a book about that. And I thought, well, you know, I have all these examples from business to business and such, but you know, everybody wants everyone wants to be the Ritz Carlton of widgets. Nobody wants to be the Bank of America of hospitality, right? So I have I, he's now a colleague, but at that time, he was a friend who had created many of the wonderful systems at the Ritz Carlton. So I called him and I said, Hey, let's write a book together. And he said, Now I'm planning to write my own book. So sorry. So I called him again six months later, and I said, Hey, how's your book coming? And he said, Oh, you know, I haven't done anything. But I still think this is how deluded he was. He said, I still think I'm going to find a week in the Bahamas and write it. So I was like, okay, good luck with that. 30 minutes later, he called me back sort of shaped, you could hear how sheepish he was on the phone. And he said, My wife overheard that last phone call. And she said, you have to write this book with Micah, because you're clearly never gonna get around to it on your own. So we wrote this book called “Exceptional service, exceptional profit”. And it's still a bestseller, still a perennial, and people started asking me to consult and transform their companies. How it started.
Robert Craven 07:28
And the Ritz Carlton story is a remarkable story. And it gets quoted back at you back at me endlessly. I quoted at people because I work with Ritz Carlton in Jamaica, I also worked with sandals in Jamaica, probably about 10 years ago. And, they are stunning organisations. I mean, they are, they're stunning as a guest. And they're stunning, when you get sort of under the skin of how they operate. They're just amazing.
Micah Solomon 08:07
It's a pretty good analogy to your listeners, because they're selling something that they almost have to describe to their customers. And a great hotel is similar, their rooms not going to be any more rectangular, you know, their toilets, not gonna flush any, with a more melodious sound than the guy down the street. But they infuse that with things that make customers not only enjoy it, but spread the story for them.
Robert Craven 08:35
Yeah, and I think that and I certainly know when you get really good service. And it doesn't matter whether good service comes when someone appears to have engaged you as an individual, when someone seems to have gone the extra mile, when someone seems to have, have just just spent some time with you. So you're not a number, that makes a remarkable difference. And that happens. It happens more in small businesses and big businesses, but but just because it's difficult to do doesn't mean that larger businesses shouldn't be able to do
Micah Solomon 09:13
No, and a lot of times, not always. But a lot of times, that's when things start to fall apart. And people call me is they had a great, or at least a very good relationship with their clients when they were small. And then it feels like it's fallen off. So I will at the beginning of my book, ignore your customers and they'll go away. I described that I say that I slide down the guru pole, which is like the bat pole, but it's for consultants. And I rush when I hear that call, and very often this is exactly what I find, Robert, is that at the beginning, they were signing their thank you notes. They were not hiding in the back. They were answering calls more quickly. And then they grew and they started to think and this is such a mistake we all make that there was an infinite supply of customers. Will there isn't the reality is I hesitate to even use the word customers in the plural, I think you should only be thinking about the customer in front of you right now. And if you lose that customer, they are gone. Barring some miracle, they're gone forever, right? They're gone forever. And if you're okay with doing that, I mean, one of the great things about being small is you can fire a customer once in a while. But by and large, you don't want to let that be happening willy nilly as you grow.
Robert Craven 10:31
Okay, so still going to ask the question, why customer service?
Micah Solomon 10:38
Am I dancing around a question you want to know?
Robert Craven 10:41
I'm loving it? I'm not I'd much rather have a conversation like this and then be rigid. But I'm still curious. So we were writing books 1015 years ago about customer service. They haven't got it somehow or, or they don't believe they need it. I mean, I can understand an airport hotel where it's always full. And then they treat you like rubbish. And they charge you to sleep for four hours and you get on your plane, you know, kind of, I don't I don't accept it. I can kind of get how they can treat customers badly. But I'm constantly amazed that customer service is not the number one item on the agenda of every board. It's not the number one thing that banks and finance isn't investors look up.
Micah Solomon 11:36
Well, you're I mean, you're exactly right. Anyone who thinks that great customer service is not important, or even and I hear that is that it's too expensive. I mean, they have to be what's British for crappy, crappy. Okay? You have to be crappy at math. I hate math, because the best number that I've seen is that 97% of customers make buying decisions based on word of mouth. 97%. So at first, I thought, Wow, that's a big number. I'm sorry. That's right. 93% 93%. So at first, I thought, Wow, that's a big number. And then I thought, well, who are these stubborn 7%? Who doesn't listen to word of mouth? Who are they? And I thought, well, you know what, I know who it is. It's my uncle. It's my uncle. He's a stubborn, fantastic guy. But he makes decisions on his own, maybe he'll read Consumer Reports, but he decides on his own, but everyone else the 93% are going to be are going to decide based on their customer experience, based on the customer experience of the people they listen to online. Based on the customer experience they read about in the customer is king, or that's Robert's book, or you ignore your customers, and they'll go away, that's mine, or your and this is true of all generations, this is true of all generations. We think of Gen Y and Gen Z as being the only people who do this social stuff. But it's totally not true. There's actually a group on Facebook called My life's officially over my parents who joined Facebook. So it's all of us now, right?
Robert Craven 13:15
So you must have seen some great customer service disasters, you must have seen organisations getting their clients wrong, we're not good. Can you give us some examples of some really great mistakes you've seen?
Micah Solomon 13:34
So in the book, in my book, I don't mention any by name. I mentioned the good stories by name. But I'm going to confess to a disaster that happened at one of my companies. Is that okay? Yeah, go for it. I can name my own name. So this was early on. And technology is very important in providing great customer service these days and getting the technology right, we can talk a little bit about that in a moment if you want. But sometimes technology could kill you as well. This is an example of that. So one of my companies had a very particular customer. I'll call him Michael, because that's his name. And it because it gave me permission to tell the story. So Michael was very, very particular. And I always said that was fine. But one of our younger employees rubbed her the wrong way. And we were using it as it was Dynamics CRM and we had typed into it, but it was pre CRM at that point. So she had typed into this for Michael's record. He typed in a seven letter word, seven letter word, seven letters. To describe him. Well, that was okay. No, I mean, not best practice, but that was okay, as long as everything was offline. Then one night our brilliant IT department finally came up with their new pet project and they put it online which is a My Account prod product where you could check your account 24/7 So that happened, Michael saw this seven letter adjective that describes him or maybe now and he's an seven letter word. He called me, thank God. He's a nice guy called me and he said, Micah, I think you owe me a really nice dinner. And thank goodness, he had a sense of humor. He said, I know I strike people, some people that way. And in fact, I said he was in Maine. And I said, What's the best? What's the absolute meaning? What's the absolute best restaurant in your area? And there is an incredible five star related Chateau restaurant there, the white barn and so our little hard little learning, quick learning curve cost me like three or $400 was totally worth it for the story. Yeah, and we're still friends.
Robert Craven 15:47
That's tough. That's even better. So. So if you just flip that round? What are the what are the what do you think the secrets are? What do you think, you know, if we're going to talk about exceptional? Is it because it's quiet? Don't
Micah Solomon 15:59
Don't do that.
Robert Craven 16:01
Yeah, I mean, that's, that's a real.
Micah Solomon 16:04
When you do that, one of the secrets is to have a way that's one of the secrets is to have an approach ready for customer service recovery, because this stuff's gonna happen. I mean, that one was avoidable. But these, this is gonna happen sometimes it happens from employees being empowered. I mean, we say they're going to be empowered. But it's not like they're empowered till they mess up and you fire them, they're empowered, until they do something great. And they're also gonna make mistakes. I mean, they're gonna make mistakes. So you need to be ready to deal with it. And one of the secrets of dealing with it is apologising. And a lot of us, especially those of us who've built our own businesses, we bristle rather than apologise. I mean, if you're working for the man, you don't mind apologising on behalf of them, perhaps. But if you're working on top of yourself, the first thing you're going to think is you don't really understand the situation. Yeah, rather than Oh, I'm so you know, I'm so sorry. By the way, if you're gonna give an apology, give a real one. Here's a good fake apology you should never use. I'm sorry, if you feel that way.
Robert Craven 17:08
Just very much say it's your problem that you feel like you've got a problem is that you find when you when you when you're complaining, and I do a fair amount of complaining.
Micah Solomon 17:20
So I would never have guessed all you've got
Robert Craven 17:23
all you got to do. All you gotta do is say you're sorry, all you got to do is Say, say I'm really really sorry, what can I do to put it right? And you say, Well, I want my money back? And then they say, and what else can we do? For you? You go? I'd like a letter from the managing director. And what else can we do for you? Nothing is okay, I'll go now. But they so rarely do that it's normally like, well, well, we don't understand why it happened. It's not down in our system that you had a ticket for the front row as well. You know, when I gave you $100 For the front row seat, you told me the front row seat, and it's like, well, that's not not in the system. So it's my fault. And I think that there's a couple of things that were lined in with that is that in this world, where everyone emails, so we we got as a we, we got fired as a client by an agent now is the work for us before we even got in, it's really interesting. And actually, they didn't have one, they didn't have to fire us. And secondly, we were really hacked off. But if they'd picked up the phone and said, Actually, we've been thinking about what you want and what you need. And we think that you need a smaller, cheaper agency that can give you what you want, because we're not we're not new, we're a little bit to five stars. And I think a three star will get you what you want. And his recommendation for you to go to, then I would still sing their praises. But they actually sent us an email saying, for the following reasons we feel, we feel that you're not appropriate. You don't understand this, you don't do it. It's like, it's like, Hey, I'm the customer. And I was willing to give you my cash. And clearly, clearly you're you don't think that's right, you're superior. So for me, it's a lot about how we do stuff. And in this world where we think we can email people. It's kind of not good enough. Pick up the bloody phone, you know, in a world where we think that the words are enough you like almost like the features. It's not what you say, it's how you say it. And it's, um, where you have really good examples where you feel really good that there's a whole process, you know, so you arrive at the hotels. They don't have to take your credit card details. They've already got them. They don't have to take your passport details. They've already got them. They don't. But for some reason hotels did insist on making you queue up, you know and then when you get to the front of the queue then is it One minute and then they look for your room, they don't have to do that they can take you to the room straightaway. And so, tomorrow morning, when you're relaxed, we'll come and just make sure we've got the right passport number blah, blah, blah,
Micah Solomon 20:11
Excellent. That's a good approach.
Robert Craven 20:13
And, and it's if their system is working properly in favor of customer service, putting the customer first thinking things through the customer journey, that's fine. I think too many businesses think about what's convenient for them. As opposed to what's convenient for me, and whether that's what digital agencies call user experience, which is, when you go to a website, you're looking for some basic stuff. Or whether you go when you go into into a hotel, and and that usual thing, when they say your room, you're in room 463 On the second floor, and you go to the second floor, and there's no numbers on the wall, or it says 461 460s 462 and enforce it. Where's my room? Why am I feeling so stupid? Why are they doing this to me, but it's just not necessary? Give me some great examples of an excellent customer experience. Give me some examples. Well,
Micah Solomon 21:08
Let's back up for a second. So it's not really a flip side of this. But something to be aware of with today's customers, is that it's not always the time for the personal touch. It's not always the time for the WoW customers machine, you also need to be reading when your customers are feeling like they're all business feeling like they're in a hurry. And sometimes they do just want they do just so I think we're saying the same thing. But when you do have that moment where you have that touch point, make it extraordinary. So I'm going to give you an example of some good customer service. So Zappos is an E-commerce company. So it seems like the last place you would find one of these examples. But their theory is that fewer than 5% of their sales are made on the phone. And that's got to be fewer than 5%. It's got to be a very, very, very tiny number. But they also theorise that every customer is going to call them once in the course of their relationship. And usually it's going to be when something's gone wrong, or they really need something. So they want to make that call exceptional. And then once you've had that exceptional call, you'll feel bonded. And you'll probably go back to ordering online, but you'll be singing their praises and you'll feel like you have a friend from Zappos and it's the same. It's the same principle. That is the reason we still have bank branches. If you're wondering why I still have bank branches, it's because time is probably four. It's a habit, but it's also studies that show that in retail banking and financial services, if you just have that one reassuring in person interaction, then every time you are working with him electronically, you feel like you're talking to rob Burt rather than to a faceless algorithm or whatever it is. So what does Zappos do? Well, Zappos is famous, and this is where I diverge from the typical Zappos sources. Zappos is famous for these completely over the top Wow stories, and some of them are a little unrealistic. So let me tell you a story of realistic Wow, at Zappos that any of us can emulate. This is what I call every day Wow. And it doesn't cost much more, I won't say it doesn't cost any more. You have to be hiring good people. You need to be training them right. Or if it's yourself, you need to be on your best and, and you probably need to allocate a little more time on the phone, then maybe some efficiency expert told you. But if you do all that, then you're golden. So I'm at Zappos. They call it the customer loyalty team. It's what the rest of us would call a contact center. And this older woman calls in and Madison, who was in her 20s or 30s answers the phone, and they suddenly have this cross generational bonding experience. Well, what happens is this older woman is really frustrated because she used the website and managed to purchase some dressy shoes for this upcoming wedding for one of her younger relatives or I forget if it's her niece or granddaughter . It's by the way, in the book if you want to fact check it. And so she bought them and she did get them but they were really uncomfortable. She has narrow feet, there's a limited selection. So Madison says, Oh Mrs. Or whatever her name is. Or she might have used her first name but with older people. I think she used her last name Mrs. Whatever it is. narrows are the worst. I have an aunt with narrow feet. And I swear every second or third phone call I have to her it's about the miseries of being born with narrow feet. Oh, it's the worst and so they become best friends immediately. I And the woman calms down and they do some co surfing together some co surfing to find shoes that both look classy enough for the wedding and also promise at least to make the day be not a torture fest that's the end of the story, but that's what I call everyday. Wow.
Robert Craven 25:19
Yeah. Well, I think that the thing that disappoints me is that we are so regularly so regularly underwhelmed, you know, you know, you get the taxi driver to the train station. When you buy the train ticket when you get on the train. When you get off the train. You just don't you know, it's like, people don't want to be alive. You know, it's like it's like, and, and they don't need to be like that they could they could equally be Hi there. How are you? How's the day? What's going on? Have you ever been going up to London? Oh, that's nice. What are you doing in London? That's fun, you know, not like nobody wants a New York cab driver. But you know what I mean, there's a kind of a, there's a kind of a, a way of doing stuff where people could be interested where they could lean in rather than lean out. And, I'm constantly amazed at how often people lean out because it does. So is it just common sense? Or is there a secret or is it systems and processes what is it that is the secret sauce of customer service.
Micah Solomon 26:35
The secret sauce is systems and smiles
Robert Craven 26:45
And smiles.
Micah Solomon 26:48
So with that one or the other it's not enough if everything's always falling apart and you don't deliver on time and your work is shoddy that's never gonna fly.
Robert Craven 27:20
And let me just uh, exercise a bit of my brain five star service like Ritz Carlton is incredibly expensive to run one star service, like formula 21 With your core group, or, but those love those small rooms where you're gonna go out, don't even get breakfast. Where's the profit? Is the profit in five star services a profit in one star service is the profit in quality service. I mean, is there a correlation in your mind between profitability and customer service? Where are you sitting on that?
Micah Solomon 28:10
Well, I think the situation is different for your clients, for your listeners it is a little different. Because you're already providing something that we just discussed that it's a hard thing to prove one way or the other. And in that situation, adding the service will always increase the profitability. The only time it might not be if you are might not be necessary, let's say is if you have an absolutely unassailable advantage, if you are the only gas station and your end before you enter Death Valley or something like that, right. You know, so and there are situations like that where you have an incredible efficiency advantage or an incredible convenience advantage. But if you don't if you are, in spite of your parents telling you you're the best, best kid ever. I tell my kids all the time. And they're like whatever dad. We probably are to some extent replaceable. I mean, there's this old joke. It's so Someone comes to New York and the old crusty I don't know theatrical agent or something says. So you think you're one in a million? Kid? There's eight guys just like you here. All right. So because you get the joke. Okay. Okay, good. Thank God. So, how many people are in London right now?
Robert Craven 29:42
There's about eight, ten million.
Micah Solomon 29:44
Yeah, so you think you're winning a million? Well, that's great, but there might be 10 others just like that. So if there are, you know, nine to 10 others like you, the extra service touches are a great way to increase your profitability now. Why? is an increased profitability. Number one, you get more customers who have added let's back up number one, you'll keep your customers let's say you got them already. Number two, they will be more forgiving of believe it or not of price increases, they'll be more forgiving when you have little fumbles foibles, they will tell their friends, it's quite a, it's, it's quite a civilised way to improve the bottom line, and it's a multi faceted way to improve the bottom line.
Robert Craven 30:35
So why doesn't everyone do it?
Micah Solomon 30:46
Well, more people do it, then you realise? Well, one of the things that I get a lot is, oh, you're in customer service. Customer service is a dying art. I hear that a lot they get from older people. Customer service is a dying art. Well, I don't think that's exactly true. I think customer expectations, including yours and mine have risen so quickly, that companies are having trouble keeping up. Go back, I don't know, 10 years, online inventory was never expected to be accurate, right? It only became real time that only became the expectation with Amazon. Before that, you could take people's credit cards for something that was totally not in stock. And it wasn't clear that it wasn't in stock. And that was fine. I mean, I don't think anyone liked it. But you weren't the only person, the only company. You weren't the only company making that customer centric decision. I think timetables have improved. I think Customer Service employees are probably about as friendly as they were before. And yet we complain more and more, because we do have, I think, some better examples, probably at every price point, probably at every price point.
Robert Craven 32:05
So. So does that mean that it's a lot about managing expectations? So don't tell people they're going to get a five star service? And it'll be delivered by closers play tomorrow, if you know, it's not going to be. Is it the old thing about under promise over delivery? Is it? Is it the same thing about you staying in contact with people about letting them know what's going on? And, again, I'm going to argue that the whole email website, dealing with a system rather than a person, creates an expectation because everyone says we can do this in 24 hours, you know, Amazon, certainly in Europe, was promising 24 hour delivery, and then 12 hour delivery. And now they don't really quite and for a long time, they used to just give you your money back if they didn't deliver on time. And now it's kind of within the next day or so, you know, even with Amazon Prime claims to always be there by nine o'clock the next morning, sometimes Sunday. So there's something about how you manage people's expectations. And if you over promise you, you're gonna get punished for ultimately?
Micah Solomon 33:26
Well, that's true. I think the issues of time are very, very important to clarify them, you don't want your customers falling off what I call the clip of dissatisfaction. So that is when they lose faith that you're going to be able to do things on time for them. And this is an internal metric from Starbucks, which they don't share with the number of minutes, but in every market, there's a number of minutes after which customers are frustrated with how long it's taking. And if that happens once in a while, they come out, they give you samples of things. They make sure the merchandising in their stores is interesting. I mean, not very many people are buying those $400 Espresso makers, but it gives you some eye candy to look at while you're in line. And if they are consistently falling down, they're consistently disappointing their customers in terms of time, at least here in Seattle, what they do it tribes their real estate acquisition, right, they build another Starbucks and then the next quarter, the next quarter or half a block over is where That's where they've been build their next shop. But every industry has this cliff of dissatisfaction. And the problem is you can't just compare yourself to your competitors. I quote in the book, I believe that this quote in the book, a friend of mine who ordered some custom furniture, I mean, not like custom, not like built by a cabinet maker, but you know, kind of custom, you know, semi semi custom, and he was told it would be 12 weeks, and he said 12 weeks. He wasn't trying to be a jerk he had just litter really never heard of anything that took 12 weeks? Well, it turned out that was the norm. And I'm not talking for real, you know, someone gets out there, Sander insights, I mean, customer this case just means a different configuration. He just wasn't trying to be a Turkey and had never heard of anything taking 12 weeks in our era. And the problem is that that industry, at least at that time, thought their competition was other similar businesses. They didn't realise their competition was IKEA, where you take it home and put it together yourself. Are there dogs like that? Oh, those are called akitas. Right. I never want to get an Akita because I was afraid I'd have to put it together at home. But sorry, I'll be here the whole interview. Try to feel…
Robert Craven 35:43
But I'm reversing. So I did a piece of work at Warwick Castle, the number two most visited tourist site in the UK. Oh, wow. And they discovered that if they put a sign up saying 45 minute cue from here, the longer they put the sign up, like 55 minutes, the more people will queue. So they were trying to do what they're trying to do is they're trying to tell people don't queue here because it's going to take too long. And of course you queue for 45 minutes, you go down the stairs. And it's a dark, damn kind of cellar, really with a few sort of metal objects and a story saying that someone got us strung up there and that's it. But, the longer the queue and the wait was going to be, the more people would actually join the queue and almost like a fear of missing out and going on. So I think the psychology of people is really fascinating.
Micah Solomon 36:49
So that is rare. Let's just say that prints aren't gonna work for everyone but that's very interesting.
Robert Craven 36:55
But the high quality names in customer service Ritz Carlton, supposedly virgin and so for those that have a reputation hasn't hasn't just happened. I mean, I love when our cleaning lady comes up to me and says, I'm going to buy a pension. Oh, fantastic. Who buying the pension with it. She says, Oh, I'm going to buy a pension with Virgin with Virgin financing. Oh, wow. That's fantastic. Why is that and she goes, Oh, it's that nice Richard Branson man. Now, there's so much going on and so much going on in that story about her feeling that Virgin brands and the Virgin promise the brands and personality that the fact that she feels safe and she wouldn't go to any of the other 132 suppliers that would all be banging on her door demanding money. There is something going on. About Virgin, Zappos, Ritz, Carlton and 1000 other people. So why, why is it that they stand out? Is it that they are the ones who stand out? Because they do exceptional customer service? Do they stand out? Because they've designed it? Is it? What is it because they're profitable? So they can afford to do customer service? Is it just young minded? Is that there? What is it that's going on there?
Micah Solomon 38:32
Well, that's a great story. And I spent some time with Richard Branson that I discussed in the book, we were having breakfast and some of these themes came out. Let me tell you some of the things you can do to be more Richard Branson, if you want to be more virgin. I mean, you've got one of the things right already, you're not wearing the tie. You're not wearing a tie. He's a tie. So what we were talking about was the service on his Virgin Atlantic airlines. International is an international airline. And he was not saying that his service is better or worse than the Middle Eastern and Asian airlines because some of those are spectacular. However, he wants it to be different. And so we were talking together well, how should we describe the difference? And he said, Well, what was that? What was that old movie and we came up with this term Stepford customer service. So that's what he wants to avoid. He doesn't want every one of his flight attendants, first of all, to have to be female, second, have the same haircut, be the same age and so forth. Those guys succeed with that style of service. But that's not what he was looking for. He wants him to bring more of their personality to work. So most customers today don't like Stepford service anymore. I mean, they like it better than no service, but they're looking for something that feels a little more authentic and what I call in the book I call peer on peer, it's no longer like this service that you see in historical recreations of Buckingham Palace where the right and the arm, the hand behind the arm, I mean, the hand behind your back and, you know, and you're being very servile, though of course with those dramas, we know that most much of that civility is actually passive aggressive, but because they do actually think there's a period of the royal family, they may be right. But that's not the style service that people are looking for at any price point these days, unless it's a historical recreation. I quote some, I quote Richard Branson saying that he doesn't want that. I also quote a fantastic three Michelin star restaurant tour here in the states, because this place is very fancy and price points very high. He gets these promising young people who want to work in his restaurant, and he hires them. Then the first day they're on the job, they start prancing around with the towel over the arm. And it's like, what? What a terrible movie from the 50s. Did you see? He says, I don't want and this is the money quote. I don't want the imitation of a waiter. I want the real thing. And we're talking about somebody who's charging without alcohol for two teetotallers it's probably gonna cost them $500 Yeah, 400 pounds or whatever that translates to be
Robert Craven 41:20
230 Nice. If you've got five minutes before we disappear.
Micah Solomon 41:27
I've got four and a half. No kidding. I'm here. You know, there's not a lot going on right now. It already is.
Robert Craven 41:32
Okay, fine. So, I'm gonna throw some quickfire questions at you want a one word answer, because it was interesting. So what's your favourite? Well, it might be five words, but not many. What's your favourite? What's your favourite movie? Witness. Okay, okay, good. Good. Good. I'd go for Pulp Fiction myself.
Micah Solomon 41:55
Another way, but it was two words. Yeah, perfect.
Robert Craven 41:59
Favourite albums. favourite album.
Micah Solomon 42:03
Oh, this cookie we enter is controversial. Welcome interstate managers by weird fountains. Shoot out the lights by Richard and Linda Thompson. All right, Jessica. Yeah. Okay. Rumour inside by Richard Topsy. Would be faced by Crowded House.
Robert Craven 42:24
Okay, fine. Cool. So what's the go to phrase that you say all the time to clients? Are you talking all the time? Ergo. You said it again? What's What's it? What's that phrase that you use? Okay, say,
Micah Solomon 42:38
I'm afraid I say cool a lot. I think it's a cool a lot
Robert Craven 42:42
better than awesome. Because Awesome. It's like, it's not awesome. I mean, it's awesome. With all but cool. Cool. I'll go with cool. And what do you reckon? as many words as you want now, really? What's your wreck, your consistent recommendation to the business owner or business manager when you meet them, you meet them? And they say whatever business they run, they run an accountancy, a law firm, a marketing firm, and they're talking about business? What's the recommendation you make nearly all the time?
Micah Solomon 43:20
Well, what's going wrong? Or what could go more, right? Sometimes it is one big thing, right? Maybe you could as the kids say, Today pivot. And it would make a big difference. But a lot of times, you're pretty much doing things right? And then it becomes a lot of small things. Do you know how to apologise? Do you know how to listen? Is the beginning of each customer interaction good? Because that sticks in our brain a lot? Is the ending just a toss off? Or do you try to end it properly? There's a lot of little hiring. Are you just hiring for technical skills, which we know can be important in certain positions? Are you also hiring for pro customers? personality traits, these things make a difference.
Robert Craven 44:02
So that's, that's, that's fascinating, because that stuff that that we kind of, we kind of know, we should know. Or we probably do know that we know but somehow, so many of us just don't have the attention to detail.
Micah Solomon 44:18
Well, if that's a problem, I have arranged my book. So the end of every chapter has a little cheat sheet. It's like it's like a cliff notes, but it's called. And your point is Micha. And so if you have a short attention span, there's 5 or 10 points for the chapter. No, that's that you don't have an excuse anymore.
Robert Craven 44:41
Brilliant. That's fantastic. And at the end of the the end of the show, the contact details and so on will be there. You can get it on Kindle. I know because I have it. So it's final question I guess really is what's next for you What is next for you because it has been a brilliant conversation. Jim, it's been one of those things where you, you're going back saying, so let me just think about my business. Let me just think about how we onboard people, let me just think about how we, we've, we've, we deal with people in the middle and how we deal with them at the end. Let me just think about how we make people feel. So I've loved the conversation. But what next for you is more of the same thing, different small businesses, big businesses?
Micah Solomon 45:27
Well, I work with almost any size business. One of the household names worldwide, I believe, is the Museum of Modern Art and working on this project was so much fun. So it was improving what they call the visitor experience. So they just underwent a nearly $500 million renovation and reimagining the galleries at this iconic Museum in New York City where there's starry night and all these other unbelievable, unbelievable works of art. And someone who I think was very wise on staff thought, well, if we get the artwork better lighted, and we have the explanations better, we'll get all that right. But our staff isn't trained or hasn't had refreshers in providing an X excellent visitor experience one on one, then it may not be as great as it could be. So they hired us for what I'm sure was just a rounding error of what they spent on everyone else, don't worry, I was not $500 million to work with us. And we worked on these finer points of customer service or what they call the visitor experience. So that was very exciting. But I never know what the next phone call is going to be. It might be a bank wanting to be the four seasons of bank you get my it might be something in the service industry, it might be in manufacturing. So as this great old songwriter, it wasn't it wasn't Irving Berlin, but it was one of those old guys and someone said what comes first, the music or the lyrics, and he answered the phone call.
Robert Craven 47:11
That's a fantastic, fantastic place to end. It was absolutely Sammy Khan. I think my father adored so my father could go on and on about Sandy. Thank you so much for being a brilliant guest. It's been a long time coming as interview. And it's been worth the wait, it's been great because your approach is refreshing, refreshing, common sense, if that kind of makes sense. And, and everyone, it's like everyone knows what customer service should be. But we don't. We don't get around to putting it first. And you're just you're just saying put it first and then everything else will fall round it. So it's been an absolute pleasure. So thank you very, very much for being an absolutely cool stroke. Awesome.
Micah Solomon 48:07
Well, thank you, Robert. It's been epic. Cheers.