The Internal Customer - "Customer Policy Development"

I was reading one of the associate blog sites involved in the development customer service Customer Relations: The New Competitive Edge" written by Meikah, where she brings up an interesting point about customers. The internal customer to be exact.

When push comes to shove the internal customers (employees)usually get the raw end of the deal. Why, because they are seen as an expendable resource, a necessary evil to splitting up the work loads, but not as a quality asset.

In the realms of customer service and customer acquisition, studies have shown that it is the employee, your internal customer that has the greatest effect on the customer buying cycle, repeat customer business, and on going customer relationships. Should I also mention the business culture here as well.

What this means is you better train them not just in their job functions, but a lot more in customer service and relationship management and yes this means the floor clerk, accountant, and warehouse personnel. If you have one employee train them if you have 500 train them and then hold on to them at all cost. Every employee adds value to this customer service and development chain. They maybe the single greatest element to the success of an on going business.

Customer service policies have to cover all aspects of what is a customer; In this case the internal customer or your employees should be the first consideration in their impact on a business, both negative and positive.

Yes training should be a part of the policy mix. It wouldn’t hurt management either.

Please share your comments, they are always welcome.

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