KYKLO Customer Success Managers are Really Tied to Customer Success
Except for a handful of snarky corner bars scattered along the backroad by-ways of America, Warm Beer, Bad Food, and Lousy Service doesn’t seem to be the motto of many businesses. Truth is, everyone boasts of world-class service and rambles incessantly about helping their customers.
Further examination reveals otherwise. Whatever generous help they provided early in the buying decision seemingly disappears once the customer “signs on the dotted lines.” Instead, the customer finds themselves sitting on hold for long periods of time, being assigned a case number, and explaining their situation to a new person on each request for help. Even worse... after a long wait, and being asked a new set of mindless questions, the customer is asked for a new purchase order – this time for support services.
KYKLO is different. We believe the success of the customer is directly tied to our success. Ironically, it’s a simple, and different approach. Our Customer Success Managers (CSM) are given a general directive – do everything possible to make our client’s experience great. Not just great from a KYKLO system perspective but successful in any tangible way.
The CSM’s goal is to help KYKLO clients push the limits of their digitalization investment through continuous improvement. Sometimes the improvement comes with a subtle tweak of page layout, other times the change is a small announcement reminding the customer the inventory levels displayed are updated in real time. Each of these leads to the goal of continued customer success.
Rather than tell you about our Customer Service Managers, we asked Alan Watson, President of Lakewood Automation, to share a few of his thoughts on the role. The best job description comes from this comment: “Our CSM, Siobhan Baggott, is like a part of our team. We have a standing meeting once a week, to review issues and lay plans for improving our system. She knows our people and they know her even to the point of knowing about her cute little dog. We know how she works, and she understands us equally well. When we need to talk to KYKLO about anything, we call Siobhan. It’s a single point of contact.”
In a world where customers are known by their ID-code and problems are identified by case numbers, the whole concept of a single point of contact is important. Again, quoting Mr. Watson: “We recently changed our ERP system. We must have something like 22 people to deal with. It turns out we must spend lots of time just keeping track of who said what. Each call involves finding the case number, rehashing the history of our issue, and then following up later. And lord help us if we didn’t write down the case number and the person’s name. This whole process wastes time and sometimes creates aggravation. KYKLO’s CSM alleviates this issue completely.”
This single point of contact concept allows the CSM to understand not only the client’s business but to understand the inner dynamics of the business. Things like customers served, important suppliers, and target markets are explored. The relationship assists in driving the whole process forward.
The CSM becomes an active participant in setting the distributor’s digital strategy. During our conversation, we asked Alan if his CSM had brought any particularly great ideas to the Lakewood Automation. His response was: “We brainstorm as a group. Our CSM is an active participant. In that type of setting, it’s hard to say precisely who had the original idea, but I will say, the outcome of our sessions is much better because of Siobhan’s participation.”
Mr. Watson is an active member of the Association for High Technology Distribution (AHTD) and currently serves on the AHTD Executive Board of Directors. He has a keen understanding of the industry. We felt it only appropriate to ask his opinion on the importance of a strong internet presence and webstore for AHTD-type distributors. Without hesitation he said: “Even if you are a small to midsized distributor, customers expect a world class effort. As for AHTD members, we are high tech companies. Everybody needs to continually find ways to upgrade their website, so they look technical and modern. A webstore is an integral part of today’s business environment. Customers expect them.”
We told Alan we were happy that KYKLO is part of the Lakewood Team. He reminded us we were official members of his team because he equipped our new coffee room in KYKLO’s Buffalo office with official Lakewood coffee mugs. Allow us to lift our cups in appreciation to our teammates at Lakewood Automation.
The KYKLO Team is here! Give us a call, we look forward to chatting about your business.
