2. Better received Instead, a better way was to enable the shop they did, whether they had
When initial discussions were held consumers to do the talking to video been there before, what they expected
about undertaking a project to research cameras in the privacy of their own to happen, how they expected to be
and document the state of customer homes. For the first project, Rosenfeldt treated, etc. After the service, the con-
service in the car repair business, recruited all of the respondents himself. sumers gave a wrap-up of how things
Rosenfeldt knew that the edicts to He went to an electronics retailer and went, including what was good, what
improve service would perhaps be bought 150 video cameras and sent was bad, what could have been better.
better received internally if they were in them out with instruction packets. Rosenfeldt edited the hundreds
the consumers’ own words rather those The goal was to learn about the of hours of videotape down to the
of Midas corporate. “It occurred to me ideal car repair service, not just at most important, impactful responses
that the best way to get franchisees on a Midas location but anywhere, so and set about distributing the video to
board is to have somebody else basically respondents had to complete a handful franchisees over the Midas corporate
say what they should be doing and hey, of tasks. For the first assignment, they Web portal, on DVDs in the mail and
wouldn’t it be great if that ‘somebody were asked to look at scores of photos via various road shows to explore and
else’ happened to be real, live custom- that represented many of the things that explain the results to internal audiences.
ers?” could happen in an auto service experi- The franchisees’ response? “We
Qualitative was naturally a first ence and express their thoughts - have found that it was among the best,
thought for getting in-person feedback they experienced the same thing, what most effective research projects we’ve
from customers but Rosenfeldt says that did they think about it, etc. ever done, for two reasons. One, we
previous efforts to convene customer Next they were asked to make learned a lot more than we typically
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focus groups for franchisees didn’t go an appointment for some kind of car have about what the ideal customer
well, as many shop owners don’t have service - an oil change, new brakes, experience should be. And two, the
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the luxury of being away from their etc. - at any service provider of their success we had in actually converting
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businesses for extended periods of time. choosing and explain why they chose and convincing our franchisees was so
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To purchase paper reprints of this article, contact Edward Kane at FosteReprints at 866-879-9144 x131 or edk@fosterprinting.com.
4. you, we care about your employee, you are acknowledged as a customer,” gold!’
your manager, who is actually the one Rosenfeldt says. “A lot of what you look for is the
who will make or break this business For the “explain” portion, it’s all little tidbits that really drive a certain
going forward.’ It was a good choice about listening and responding. The point home and this was a perfect
because it’s absolutely true - when you manager has to tell the customer what example. We could use it to say to the
walk into those stores, if you don’t like repairs were made and why, no matter shops, ‘Here is exactly why you need to
the guy behind the counter, we’re in how minor. “The customers appreciate do the things we’re suggesting because
trouble.” when the manager actually says, ‘Here is you’re going to get a bunch of Mildreds
The notion of treating each cus- what we did and here is why. Do you who are not going to come back!’ ”
tomer transaction as a unique, one-time have any questions?’ Even if it’s just for Securing the participation, support
event is long gone, Rosenfeldt says. For an oil change - take them to the bay, and buy-in of the International Midas
Midas, the focus is now on building show them the emptying out of the Dealers Association, the influential
long-term relationships, getting custom- old oil, talk to them about the different organization of Midas franchisees, was
ers to come back and providing total types of oil there are. If you’ve been to critical, Rosenfeldt says. “When it
car care. “We are now in the preven- a Jiffy Lube, they do a lot of this stuff came time to develop the new service
tive maintenance business, such as oil but Midas is not a quick-lube place and model, we had franchisees involved in
changes, which people come in more we were not set up for that and so those the writing of it, so it wasn’t just Midas
frequently for. The problem is, the oil behaviors were not ingrained in the saying, ‘Here is the new service model,
changes are $21; brake jobs are $300. employees’ brains but that is something go do it!’ They were enthusiastic to be
The margin is significantly lower on oil we are getting better at and are working involved in this because of what they
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changes. If you come in once for an oil on now.” had seen from the research. They knew
change and we treat you poorly, and In addition, there is a specific script how important it was and they wanted
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you don’t come back, we’re going to in which managers ask if the customer to be a part of it.”
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lose money on the proposition. So our is comfortable with what was done,
whole model now is to get them in the if they need something re-explained, Sales improvements
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door with an oil change, wow them etc. “They are trained to not let the While Midas is fighting the same eco-
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with our customer experience and have customer out of the door unless they nomic headwinds as most businesses
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them come back again and again for completely understand what happened. these days, Rosenfeldt says that shops
more oil changes and more expensive The benchmark for success, when we that have adopted the new processes
work. When the shops have adopted do some quantitative customer research, have seen marked sales improvements
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this model of service, to focus on the is, would you be able to explain what and also increased numbers of repeat
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long-term relationships rather than the happened at Midas to your mother? If customers. In particular in the Northeast
short-term profit, the shops make sub- they say yes, then we are happy that it - the focus of much of the research and
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stantially more money over a longer was explained correctly. If they say no, the service improvement efforts - sales
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period of time.” then we haven’t done our jobs.” and customer counts are up after both
The “thank” includes, of course, had been trending down since 2005.
‘Ridiculously simple’ thanking them for coming to Midas, More than anything, the research
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Three main components of the Midas perhaps a coupon for a return visit, and results have helped focus the com-
service model are greet, explain and a conversation about setting up the next pany’s attention on the value of earning
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thank. “When you are a shop manager appointment. and keeping each customer’s busi-
and a customer walks in the door, you ness, Rosenfeldt says. “For Midas, this
need to do three things: greet them, Effective video snippet research represents a deliberate and
explain what you are doing and thank While a goal of this type of research is thoughtful process that has led to the
them,” Rosenfeldt says. “It sounds to build a big, wide-ranging picture of ongoing development of an effective,
ridiculously simple, but it almost never the problems that need to be addressed, measurable means of understanding
happens in this industry. We have it’s the small findings that can have the what a differentiated customer experi-
found that when shops are able to exe- greatest impact. Rosenfeldt cites one ence is, how to train to it, how to
cute those behaviors consistently, our particularly effective video snippet from measure its delivery and how to inte-
customer satisfaction goes way up. Our a woman who had been a customer of grate it into our culture.
customer retention goes way up and a Midas shop that had been using the “Just as at any large organization,
people come back and they purchase new service model but had switched especially one that is largely franchise-
more services from us.” back to the old ways after a managerial based, there are differences of opinion
To be sure, “greet,” for example, change. “She said, ‘Jack, the new man- on marketing and other operational
goes well beyond just saying hello. ager, is nothing like the old manager issues. But when you have a central
“There is a whole new process around Joe was. Joe used to really follow these theme to rally around, it kind of focuses
what an exceptional greet looks like. procedures. Jack doesn’t and now I’m them on what is important. Do we
It encompasses the way the whole not going back.’ And she went on to agree on every single thing? We do not.
shop looks, the amenities that you describe all of the things that were miss- But we know at the end of the day it’s
have available, the tone of the way ing and why she wasn’t going back. As about happy customers coming back.
you talk to the customer, how quickly I watched it I said to myself, ‘This is It’s as simple as that.” |Q
To purchase paper reprints of this article, contact Edward Kane at FosteReprints at 866-879-9144 x131 or edk@fosterprinting.com.
