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If you don’t take care of your employees… they won’t take care of your customers

Guest post by: Mark Johnson

Article Overview: Delivering the brand from the inside out ---- ensuring that every employee is engaged and motivated to consistently deliver on your brand’s promise ---- is crucial to driving customer loyalty.

If you don’t take care of your employees… they won’t take care of your customers

The recent findings on employee engagement are alarming. A May 2009 survey by consulting firm Watson Wyatt Worldwide (now Towers Watson) of 1,300 workers at large U.S. employers found that engagement levels for top performers fell close to 25% year over year. Employees overall experienced a 9% drop in engagement year over year. A March 2009 survey by Gallup found that 52% of U.S. workers 18 and older were disengaged and an additional 18% were actively disengaged. Not only does this level of active disengagement cost businesses an estimated $416 billion in lower productivity, but it also costs in terms of loyalty. And I'm not just talking employee loyalty.

Conventional wisdom (and loads of research) tells us that loyal employees have a direct, positive impact on customer loyalty and retention. Delivering the brand from the inside out ---- ensuring that every employee is engaged and motivated to consistently deliver on your brand's promise ---- is crucial to driving customer loyalty. Which means that even the most creative marketing in the world can have only limited impact if your employees don't deliver on your brand's promise.

Yet, how often do we see marketing and human resource professionals working together to drive both internal and external engagement? At most companies, the answer is "not very." Too often the departments work independently from one another, rather than joining forces so that sum of the parts is greater than the whole.

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Article Tags: business, customer, human resources, loyalty, Loyalty 360, marketing



Related Forum Posts
Women care about employees - I think women entrepreneurs care more about their employees than men so it makes sense that they would consider how the new owner would impact the employees.
Re: a legacy - [quote="TheRainmaker":36ce5c3z]sounds like your grandfather left a real legacy. It reminds me of Dale Carnegies famous quote, 'people dont care how much you know, until they know how much you care' An interesting side bar is the idea of customer loyalty. I recently worked with a large bank on their new 'loyalty' program. I called it like I saw it, they didnt have loyal customers....they had hostages. If anyone reading wants to learn more about delivering great customer service, they should read "Raving Fans' by Ken Blanchard and "how to win friends and influence people' by Dale Carnegie Two of my favourite resources... The third resource I can always count on was my dad. Although he died almost 18 years ago, he raised me and my 5 brothers and sisters with a strong work ethic, a respect for people of all backgrounds and a healthy respect for time. In fact, I am often teased for always being early or at least very punctual and I find it sad that in today's world, we seem to have lost a lot of the basic tenets of common sense and courtesy.[/quote:36ce5c3z] Very true - its important to create loyal customers and I've always felt that great customer service is a great way to start that process. If I deal with a company and its clear they don't care about my business and they don't support me, I look around for someone who does. Why support a business that won't support me? Chris
Too Successful for Marriage? - Hey Everyone! This is one of my favourite topics so forgive me if I rant... There is a huge piece missing in all of these discussions and that is, what are the men doing/going to do differently? The focus is always on the women and how we have created this but in reality in the men who have become obsessively insecure about 'their' roles in the relationship, etc. Perhaps if there were more education or relationship coaching for men, it would help. Right now, the majority of information is focussed on the women. Men clearly dont know what is 'expected' of them anymore. These arent our fathers times. There was an article in Men's Health last year which was actually promoting the fact that men can relax a bit and be 'taken care' of by their successful wives and girlfriends. Give me a break - if I was single and I wanted to take care of something, or some-one it would be my business or my dog. Men these days seem to have lost all THEIR Ambition and drive. If they, the men, could catch up with the women in self esteem, empowerment etc., we'd all be much better off. I think women, while wanting a relationship, are doing the right thing in remaining single until they find a confident and self secure partner. I dont think women are looking to be the BREADWINNER all the time, but we shouldnt get punished by it. J
a legacy - sounds like your grandfather left a real legacy. It reminds me of Dale Carnegies famous quote, 'people dont care how much you know, until they know how much you care' An interesting side bar is the idea of customer loyalty. I recently worked with a large bank on their new 'loyalty' program. I called it like I saw it, they didnt have loyal customers....they had hostages. If anyone reading wants to learn more about delivering great customer service, they should read "Raving Fans' by Ken Blanchard and "how to win friends and influence people' by Dale Carnegie Two of my favourite resources... The third resource I can always count on was my dad. Although he died almost 18 years ago, he raised me and my 5 brothers and sisters with a strong work ethic, a respect for people of all backgrounds and a healthy respect for time. In fact, I am often teased for always being early or at least very punctual and I find it sad that in today's world, we seem to have lost a lot of the basic tenets of common sense and courtesy.
Re: What would you like to see be invented? - I don't know why, but when I saw this thread I immediately thought of that Huey Lewis song, I want A New Drug. I want a new drug One that wont make me sick One that wont make me crash my car Or make me feel three feet thick I want a new drug One that wont hurt my head One that wont make my mouth too dry Or make my eyes too red Also, this new drug should not have worse side effects than the reason I have for taking it!! Tim


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