(This post is one of six in a series.)
As, I pointed out in the title of this blog as well as my first post, field service is not hard. There are about 6 steps in the process. Some are more important than others, but without quality execution at each level, your field service quality will be poor.
Step 1 is to make a sale, and not a promise. I've never been in sales. I don't like selling (and I sure as hell hate being actively sold to). I am a looker, a shopper and finally a buyer; I proceed in that order at my own pace. Don't push me, Mr. Shitty Suit Car Salesman.
I don't have any insight for you on the sales and marketing channel. I'm not a marketing guy and, in fact, I think most marketers are retards. (This is in the colloquial sense; I don't mean they have developmental issues. Idiots was not a strong enough word.) Not all of them, but most. In fact, some marketers are goddamn geniuses. There's not a lot of middle ground between the retards and the geniuses.
Examples:
I had another example, but I forgot. I'm still about a pint low on coffee this morning.
I'm not going to buy anything from these companies in the foreseeable future, but I like these commercials for several reasons: (1) They engage the viewer with a novel situation or presentation, and are fantastical enough that they do not extend any commitment for delivery to a reasonable person; (2) They are either part of an ongoing multi-part campaign pushing brand awareness, or they focus on the company's perception of customers (Nationwide); (3) they aren't actively pushing a product down my throat and telling me why I need it and how it will solve my problems.
Number 1 is key. These campaigns are good because they aren't making promises.
In field service, this is hugely important. Most of the time, field staff have no idea what is actually being pushed to the public through marketing campaigns (this is an internal communication problem outside the scope of this post). When it comes to a specific customer, only the customer, CSR, and maybe call-center QA teams know what was actually promised by the sales rep.
This is bad. A fleet cannot deliver on the promises of its sales team if it doesn't know what those promises are. Since the communication does not exist, the sales team should be making as few promises as possible, all of them within the control of the field staff: "Our technician will be there between 10 am and noon...and he'll be able to answer all those questions you asked me about your wiring situation."
If a CSR, in an effort to save a sale or retain a customer, promises that the tech will check out the TV that isn't talking to the stereo, or will get some ancient computer hooked to the Internet, or some other atypical service, it is a setup for failure UNLESS THE PROMISE IS STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE. The customer is almost certain to be disappointed and/or the field technician is certain to be frustrated and possibly late for a subsequent appointment.
Just make the sale as accurately as possible. Don't make promises your team can't keep.
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