In every service opportunity there is a sales opportunity, and in every sales opportunity there is a service opportunity.Īll too often in tire and auto service businesses, marketing efforts are focused on increasing store traffic and producing new customers. It is vital to remember that service and sales go hand-in-hand. Customers who feel valued and appreciated from the very start will have the greatest tendency to return for future business.

Simple gestures like making eye contact, smiling and speaking in a positive, enthusiastic manner will normally produce a feeling of customer satisfaction. Very often, it all comes down to providing genuine hospitality. If the customer perceives it as lousy or unwelcoming, you are failing a key moment of truth and leaving the door open to competitors who would happily invite your customers in and take away your business. This initial encounter between the customer and your frontline employees sets the table for the rest of the experience and forms a lasting impression of the entire company in the mind of the customer. No doubt you’ve heard the phrase “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.” That being the case, the first moment of truth takes place as soon as the customer walks in the front door of your store.

In the case of SAS, he made it his job and top priority to proactively manage those 50 million unique customer contact experiences. He called these encounters “moments of truth.”Īccording to Carlzon, “a moment of truth is an episode in which the customer comes into contact with any aspect of the company, however remote, and thereby has an opportunity to form an impression.”Ĭarlzon recognized that each customer contact is a unique, unrepeatable opportunity for a company to differentiate itself from the competition. Doing the math, he reasoned that the average passenger came into contact with five SAS employees during a single transaction with the company.

Unlike the conventional “we need more sales” approach, Carlzon’s brilliant, yet simple plan was to refocus the organization on its most important asset – existing customers.Ĭarlzon made a business case that SAS already had 10 million passengers per year and, if the company did a more effective job in managing those existing relationships, it could turn the airline around and prosper. How did Carlzon do it? And, more to the point, what does this have to do with customer service? Everything.

Scandinavian airlines moments of truth