Winning customers over

Winning customers over

By Tjipto Ramuni

The quality of goods and services are measured by how well
they satisfy customers. Satisfaction keeps customers loyal and
returning for more.

JAKARTA (JP): Seafood restaurant Kedai Selera on Jl. Kebayoran
Lama in South Jakarta has only nine serving tables, and in
addition to vegetables, lists only four main ingredients: meat,
poultry, prawn and squid.

Patrons, however, are spoilt for choice because the restaurant
turns the ingredients into almost 100 entrees.

The owner, who has never taken any marketing courses, explains
that what he is selling is his ability to satisfy customers. This
he does by meeting customers' expectations of taste, service and
ambience.

Food is served in a relatively short time -- even if one has
to wait, one would not get impatient as the owner has provided
each table with magazines and other reading material. "Our
customers have stopped complaining about waiting for their
orders," the owner said.

In addition, when a customer orders nasi goreng (fried rice),
that's just what he gets. The owner watches the expression of the
customers when they taste the food -- if displeasure is noted, a
replacement would be offered.

How does the owner know if his customers are satisfied? When
patrons return to the restaurant the next week, the next month or
even after three months?

When they do, the proprietor knows his food and service have
satisfied them.

"Even if only 3 percent of the guests return, I would consider
my business a success," the owner said. If he had a 100 customers
a day, three of the guests were expected to return for a second
visit. Therefore in a month, the number of returning customers
would be 90.

It has been two years since the restaurant was set up.
According to the owner, if he failed to maintain the 3 percent
return visits, he would take that as a sign that he was incapable
of satisfying the patrons and would close the outlet.

Light example

The restaurant cited above may be small, but it is committed
to the principle of total customer satisfaction. It emphasizes
the importance of keeping its customers by ensuring customer
satisfaction.

The customer is either pleased or disappointed, which
according to marketing literature is the result of customers
comparing their impression of a service or product with that of
their expectations. If they returned for more, it shows they were
satisfied with the service or goods.

Marketers believe keeping customers cost less than attracting
new ones. And books and manuals have presented convincing data on
how much cheaper it was to maintain customers than to seek new
ones.

Marketing guru Philip Kotler has even calculated that if a
company is able to prevent a mere 7 percent of its clients from
going over to a competitor, its profit margin will increase by 25
percent. In some companies, the increase may even reach 85
percent.

'Solutions'

A deeper look, however, would tell us that customers were also
seeking solutions to their problems.

One would not be satisfied with the purchase of a commodity
unless it solved one's problems too. For instance, a luxury car
might please its new owner because of its comfort. However, the
owner would not be satisfied if he discovered there was a
scarcity of the car's spare parts.

There is a long list of companies that failed to provide total
customer satisfaction in Indonesia.

For example, companies that offered the AMPS cellular system
initially had a good market, but later its insecure system caused
duplication of numbers. Customers were soon flocking over to
companies that offered GSM service. Besides, the GSM operators
further satisfied customers as clients could replace their
handsets anytime they wanted -- something that could not be done
with the AMPS system.

Indonesia's newspaper and magazine publishers have long known
how difficult it is to satisfy customers in terms of content,
access or distribution of their publications.

The publications may have good content, but what good are they
if they are not available when the readers want them? If they
could be easily accessed, but had poor content, readers would not
want them either. Besides, in the media business, customer
loyalty is usually high -- which is why no national publication
has been able to break Kompas' domination of the market.

Another example is the warung tenda (tent cafes) business that
flourished following the economic crisis in 1997 as they used
celebrities to attract customers.

However, the business had a very low level of customer
satisfaction in terms of product quality and service. Not many of
the cafes exist today as they had failed to satisfy customers on
their first visit.

In the PC business in Indonesia, large companies prefer
branded imported computers over cheaper, locally assembled ones.
This is because the branded PCs, which have a clearly defined
quality standard, solve companies' problems. So when companies
need new computers, it is likely they will buy the same brand.

The locally assembled computers, on the other hand, do not
often stay in the market for long. Those which do, survive
because its traders imitate the service provided by the imported
PC traders.

Local producers, in fact, should provide even better service
if they wished to steal the market from traders of imported PC.
That would mean giving a higher level of customer satisfaction,
for example, by offering a three-year warranty where traders of
imported PCs only give between six and 12 months warranty. Or by
providing higher specifications at lower prices. Only then can
they compete with imported PCs.

Customers generally do not purchase any product on offer. They
buy goods and services that satisfy their needs and solve their
problems. This is why in marketing, the term "quality" no longer
points to how a product is produced, but more on how a commodity
or service satisfies customers.