In this week’s blog, we’re going to cover Shep Hyken’s recent video, *How Amazon Sets the Standard for Every Business.” Before we even get going, consider how evocative that title is. It’s easy to imagine that there are a lot of business owners out there thinking that they don’t compete with Amazon, so how is this applicable? As Hyken explains, every business’s customers have been “Amazonized” in some way, so this applies to us all.
Hyken begins by pointing out the major challenge your company faces: when it comes to the customer experience, customers aren’t just comparing your business to your direct competitors, they’re going even beyond that: they’re comparing you to every customer experience they’ve ever had. That might be with any kind of business, big or small, locally or globally. Because of the hyperconnected age we live in, where each of us ends up doing business with companies all over the country or even the world, the bar gets set higher all the time. No business can afford to be complacent.
Amazon began in the 1990s as an online bookseller, an industry they revolutionized before moving on to turn the rest of retail on its head by 2010. They’re now the most powerful and influential retailer out there, with a market capitalization of over 1.75 trillion dollars. As prolific as Walmart is, you might be shocked to learn that they’re merely a quarter of that size.
Given their meteoric rise and overall ubiquity now, you might think comparisons between Amazon and your business are unfair. What’s fair hardly matters, of course, but Hyken has an example of a client healthcare organization that ordered a half-million-dollar piece of medical imaging equipment that really hits our new reality home:
As it turns out, this medical equipment arrived way ahead of schedule. While most of us would be happy to receive an order early, in this case, this delivery was unexpected and Hyken’s client hadn’t yet prepared the location where the machine was going to be installed. They just couldn’t believe they weren’t even notified that it was going to be delivered: “when I order toilet paper from Amazon, they send me an email to tell me it’s on its way!”
Hyken tells us to think about that: his medical-organization client just compared the delivery of a $500,000 x-ray machine to a toilet paper order from Amazon. The company that delivered that machine might also have said that was an unfair comparison, as Amazon isn’t a direct competitor—at least as of now, you can’t order that kind of equipment from them—but again, it doesn’t matter. Consumers have been conditioned to expect a higher level of customer service.
“You may not compete with Amazon, but Amazon is molding your customers’ perceptions about what goes into good service and a positive customer experience,” Hyken says. This includes everything from convenience, to communication, to delivery, to customer support, and more.
When it comes down to it, your most important product should be the customer experience. When you realize that, you discover that everyone else is a competitor, not just the businesses in your own industry. Given that realization, you must ask yourself this: has your business adapted to meet these kinds of expectations?
The Brandt Group specializes in the customer experience. Through our world-class tools like mystery shopping, feedback surveys, focus testing, leadership development, staff training, and seminars, we partner with our clients to help them develop the best customer experience possible. Our clients are constantly testing and evolving their sales and service processes to better customer engagement, build stronger customer loyalty, increase employee satisfaction, and enhance profit. A well-prepared business is ready to face down any competitor, whether that’s the one down the street or the behemoth online.
