Sadly, it all falls apart during the “last mile”—the time between when you hand the customer off to your third-party service provider and when the technician finishes the job. For example, the technician doesn’t let the customer know he’s running late…he doesn’t have the right tools for the job…or he hands the homeowner a messy paper invoice and asks for a check.

Your third-party service providers are a reflection on your home warranty brand, so read on to discover how digitizing the last-mile customer experience—also known as last-mile CX—impacts your customer retention, profits, expenses, and more.

Every Stage of The Customer Journey Is the Most Important Stage

It’s a mistake to frontload all your amazing customer experience capabilities and then let it drop off at the end of the process. This excerpt from a white paper on customer experience by Jolt Consulting Group does a good job of explaining why:

CX is a cumulative result of each and every touchpoint; therefore, the impact of service on customers’ perceptions and experiences with a company must be evaluated through the complete service delivery chain—from service initiation to call centers to online portals all the way through to on-premise delivery of service. To achieve service excellence and improved CX, service organizations must develop best-in-class business processes, create new and unique ways to interact with their customers and invest in service technology to optimize these touchpoints.

Digitizing your last-mile CX helps optimize every touchpoint. For example:

• Omnichannel communication lets the homeowner interact with the service provider in the way they’re most comfortable with.
• On-my-way customer notifications give the homeowner the confidence of knowing when they need to be ready for the service visit. (No one likes wondering if they have time to duck out for a carton of milk before the technician arrives!)
• Automatic appointment reminders mean the homeowner doesn’t have to worry that they’ll forget about the service visit.
• Mobile payments let the homeowner pay quickly and easily using the method they prefer.
• Mobile feedback forms end the experience on a positive note by showing that the service provider cares about the homeowner’s experience.

From the beginning of the customer journey to the end, digitized last-mile CX offers homeowners a great experience that reflects well on your brand.

Customers Always Remember the Last-Mile CX

Let’s say your home warranty company delivers good CX all the way through the entire customer journey, but there’s a minor glitch in the last mile. What will customers remember most? 95% of the time you and your service provider delivered a positive experience or the 5% of the time that it was just “meh”?

Surprise: The “meh” last-mile CX is what will stick in their minds, giving customers an overall view of your service as “just OK” even though you scored well during the rest of the process.

Here’s why: The Peak-End Theory, developed by Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman, says that people don’t average out the highs and lows of an experience—they judge an experience by how they felt at its most intense moment, and how they felt at its end.

So unless you created an intensely positive or negative moment somewhere along the line, that last-mile customer experience is what your customers will remember most.

A Better CX = More Profits

Now we know that customers judge their experience based on the last mile. But how much is that worth to your home warranty company?

We admit: it’s hard to measure ROI on customer experience—so we’re lucky that the smart folks at Harvard Business Review did it for us.

In businesses with transactional revenue models (which are based on the sale of goods), customers who had the best past experiences spend 140% more compared to customers who had the worst past experience.

Even more relevant for a home warranty business are the data from subscription services: members who have the worst experience have only a 43% chance of being a member a year later, while those who have the best experience have a 74% chance of remaining a member for at least another year.

That increase in subscriber retention makes focusing on the last mile CX well worth the effort.

Focusing on Last-Mile CX Saves Money

Sure, digitizing the last mile to create a better customer experience boosts customer retention—but since you have more control over the first portion of the customer journey, why not spend your efforts on attracting new customers instead?

Developing loyal relationships actually costs less than building new ones. This is from a research report by Bain & Company:

Consider the cost of serving a long-standing customer versus the cost of courting one. Across a wide range of businesses, customers generate increasing profits each year they stay with a company. Why? Return customers tend to buy more from a company over time. As they do, your operating costs to serve them decline. What’s more, return customers refer others to your company. And they’ll often pay a premium to continue to do business with you rather than switch to a competitor with whom they’re neither familiar nor comfortable.

Digitize the last-mile CX and you’ll see expenses drop even as profits roll in.

Ready to Improve Your Last-Mile CX?

Businesses that offer digital customer experiences with Dispatch’s Last-Mile CX see a 35% increase in their Net Promoter Score. Reach out for a demo to see how Dispatch lets home warranty companies offer service reminders, on-my-way tracking, instant customer reviews, digital invoices, simple payments from the field, and other features that improve the last-mile CX.

The post How Digitizing the Last-Mile Customer Experience Pays off for Your Home Warranty Brand appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

To boost customer loyalty, it makes sense to start at the end: Customers often judge your brand by the last interaction they have with you—and since that final interaction is usually with your third-party service providers, these partners can make or break your customer loyalty scores.

If you have constant turnover in your service provider network, your customers are the ones who feel the pinch. Miscommunication, missed appointments, service professionals with little knowledge of your brand, and other problems pop up, sinking the customer experience you spent so long building up.

Because service provider loyalty can have a huge impact on customer loyalty, you want to make working with you as easy for them as possible.

So how do you keep both of these groups happy?

How Can I Improve Service Provider and Customer Loyalty?

Consider your service providers and customers as a two-sided market and your field service management software as the intermediary to build loyalty among both parties.

• Offer multiple ways to connect. Keep important information—like job status, contact information, and customer photos—flowing between your brand, your customers, and your service providers to keep all parties on the same page.
• Make sharing job details easy, fast & clear. Use an app that shares customer and job details with your service providers—so the customer doesn’t have to explain the issue multiple times, and the service provider has easy access to the information they need to get the job done quickly and efficiently.
• Increase service provider loyalty with the right tools. A field service management tool that doesn’t integrate with your providers’ in-house software is just another app for them juggle—which can affect your service provider loyalty.
• Let customers have their say. Customers want to be heard, so make it easy for them to share their kudos and critiques.

Now let’s get all the details on the table.

Offer Multiple Ways to Connect

Nothing frustrates a customer faster than communication issues with their order. Whether it’s a missed tracking number or a multi-layered phone tree to reach a customer service rep, every stumbling block put in your customer’s way reduces the chance that they’ll buy from you again.

Your service provider network needs easy communication with both you and your end customers to keep appointments on time and customer information up to date.

In both cases, offering multiple channels of communication can help keep information flowing where it needs to go. For example, you might offer a web portal where customers can upload details about their work orders, including photographs. With access to this information, along with a centralized database of customer information, your service providers can do their jobs more efficiently. An app can come into play for service and appointment updates, reducing the number of customer no-shows.

Make Sharing Job Details Easy, Fast & Clear

Forbes says that 77% of consumers consider convenience a key factor in choosing service providers. If your order or service process is confusing or requires customers to jump through too many hoops, they’re going to start looking for a clearer experience elsewhere.

One sticking point for customers is in getting the details of their service order to the provider. If you’re making your customers explain their situation to two or three different people, they’re going to be frustrated before your service partner ever arrives at their home.

You can eliminate that problem, and increase customer loyalty, with a field service management app that allows your providers to easily view the customer’s history and information. They’ll arrive at your customer’s home with the right tools and parts, and your customer won’t have to repeat the whole conversation they just had with your customer care team.

Your field service management software makes the process more convenient for your service partners, too. You can give them access to product information, knowledge bases, and customer data that they need to find answers to any customer questions and get the job done quickly.

An FSM tool also helps improve service providers’ first-time fix rate (since they’ll have a better understanding of the job before they arrive at the customer’s home), which will further improve customer experience.

Increase Service Provider Loyalty with The Right Tools

The service management tool you choose needs to enhance your service provider’s workflow. Otherwise, it becomes just one more app taking up space on their phone or tablet—hardly the way to increase service provider loyalty.

The right platform gives you visibility into how your service partners are doing, while also helping them do their jobs. Give them an easy way to assign and track jobs, see customer notes and photos, and accept payments in the field, and your providers will be much happier to use the tool.

If your platform can integrate with tools your service providers are already using, like QuickBooks, ServiceMax, and Zapier, it’ll improve compliance even further. No one likes having to enter the same information into three different web portals, or having to juggle payment processors.

But if you can bring all of these pieces of their business together into one field service management tool, they’ll be much happier to use it.

Let Customers Have Their Say

Customer feedback is essential to understanding what you’re doing right, and where you need to improve. Tweaking your business operations based on common feedback is a great way to improve your customer retention rates.

But your customers don’t want to have to type in a URL or call a phone number on their invoice. If you make it difficult for your customers to give you feedback, you’ll probably only hear from the really motivated ones (both furious and thrilled). This can give you a skewed sense of how your customers feel about your field service business.

Instead, give your customers a way to leave feedback instantly. Asking them to rate you and/or your service provider immediately after the job’s done means that the job is fresh in the customer’s mind. And with the right customer feedback tool, you and your service providers can spot trends and opportunities for improvement.

Customer loyalty and service provider loyalty are both critical to your brand’s success. By employing tactics and tools to keep both of these groups happy, you can cut down on customer service-related expenses—and keep your business growing.

Struggling with ways to help your third-party service providers delight your customers?

With robust communication, scheduling, and feedback tools, Dispatch can improve your customer experience from purchase to service delivery. Schedule a demo to see all it can do for you.

The post How to Ace Your Customer and Service Provider Loyalty appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

That kind of discord can have a serious impact on your brand reputation, not to mention your bottom line. HubSpot reporting on customer service shows that it takes 12 positive customer experiences to make up for just one negative experience.

So You Got a Poor Review
Now What?

Turning someone who has left a negative review into a satisfied customer may sound like magic, but it isn’t. It just takes a few important steps:

1. Respond quickly. This helps the customer feel heard. 
2. Offer a solution. Don’t get into online debates with customers.
3. Show appreciation. An apology isn’t enough. Your customer wants to feel valued.
4. Follow up with your customer. Make sure they’re satisfied with the resolution of their complaint.
5. Track customer complaints. This will help you spot potential problem areas so you can prevent similar issues for future customers.

Here’s how to keep complaints from turning into disasters using stellar customer support:

Customer Support Tip #1
Respond Quickly

Today’s fast-paced world requires fast-paced customer support. If someone has left a bad review, the sooner you know about it, the sooner you can address it. The sooner you address it, the more likely the customer will feel heard, which goes a long way toward helping smooth ruffled feathers. 

Responding promptly to negative feedback does more than just appease one disgruntled customer. People tend to tell everyone they know when they’ve had a bad experience with a company—and the longer you wait to respond to an unhappy customer, the more opportunity they have to tell their friends, family, and social media all about it. And the whole time, that customer is getting more upset by your radio silence. This means responding quickly can stop a wave of negativity before it starts.

Worried you could be missing negative customer experiences? Dispatch alerts you instantly when customers leave negative reviews, so you can respond and resolve those problems immediately. 

Customer Support Tip #2
Offer a Solution

Upset customers may say all kinds of negative things about your business in their review—even things that aren’t true or are only partly true. Resist the temptation to rush in and defend your brand or your service provider. Instead of meeting frustration with more frustration, focus on resolving the problem by finding a solution.

Check your service provider’s notes for why things broke down with this customer. Then look to the review to see what you can do to make things right; the customer may describe what result they’re looking for, making your job easier. 

If they don’t, leave a reply asking them to provide further information on the review site, or to get in touch with your company directly. And if they ask for something you can’t give, look for an alternative solution. Even if it’s not exactly what the customer wants, it may satisfy them that you’re trying to fix the issue.

Above all, don’t make promises you can’t keep, and don’t leave a public reply with a solution for one customer that you’re not willing to provide for all customers. From your customer’s point of view, the problem they’re steamed about might already be a case of over-promising and under-delivering, so you don’t want to cement that image of your company in their mind. Whatever solutions you offer, make sure you can deliver on them—for everyone if yours is a public response!

Customer Support Tip #3
Show Appreciation

New Voice Media says the number one reason customers switch to a new brand is that they feel underappreciated. And for many customers, the way you handle their complaints has a huge impact on whether they feel valued—or ignored.

Don’t just say, “I’m sorry” to a customer who has left a bad review. Use your apology as another chance to show you understand their issue, and to show appreciation for their business. Here’s a better way to apologize: “I’m sorry you were inconvenienced when the service provider didn’t arrive as scheduled. Thank you for giving me a chance to come up with a solution for you.”

Customer Support Tip #4
Follow Up

Remember how important it is to make your customers feel appreciated? One way to do that is to follow up with them a day or two after you’ve responded to their review to make sure they’re still satisfied with the solution you offered (and that the solution has been delivered).

This extra step shows your customer you haven’t washed your hands of them as soon as you responded to their complaint. Even those who weren’t entirely satisfied with the solution you were able to offer may think of you more charitably if you show you’re still thinking of their experience.

Customer Support Tip #5
Track Complaints

To reduce the number of negative reviews you receive, you need to address problems before they become widespread. Document every customer complaint you receive and compile that data so you can look for patterns and trouble spots.

For example, if a certain part of the buying process tends to result in more customer complaints than others, look for ways to streamline the process or make it easier for customers to navigate. Or maybe your customers have trouble communicating with your third-party service providers. Facilitate that communication so your providers can better serve customers.

Negative customer feedback is one of the more stressful parts of running a business. But with the right tools and a customer service-oriented attitude, you can resolve those complaints—and keep your customers from searching for a new brand. Schedule a demo today to see how Dispatch can help you stay on top of reviews.

The post Five Tips for Handling Negative Customer Reviews appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

The next day, our homeowner goes to heat up the leftover pizza in the oven—and there’s no heat. So she schedules a repair visit with her home warranty company and tracks the technician while playing Ticket to Ride on her iPhone.

Thanks to experiences like these, homeowners are setting the bar high for brands they shop with.

When it comes to retaining customers, where does your franchise fall along the customer-pleasing technology-line? If you’re not even on the line, customers may be passing you up for a competitor who offers a better experience.

Why Mobile Is Key for Franchises

A great mobile experience is no longer a nice-to-have—it’s a necessity. Americans are viewing their smartphones an average of 52 times per day, and 65 percent of customers say they’d choose one brand over another based on their mobile app alone.

If you haven’t made the leap to a full mobile experience, we understand: For one-off brick and mortar stores, adopting mobile technology is a lot easier than for franchises like yours that have multiple locations.

Here are some franchises that have used their “customer-pleasing technology” to improve the customer experience, boost NPS, and reduce customer churn.

1. Burger King’s App Diverts Customers from Its Rivals

Burger King boasted close to 18,000 locations in 2018, and its app operates not only in the U.S., but also in countries like France, Denmark, and Mexico.

App users get access to mobile-only coupons and a restaurant locator, and at some locations they can even order with the app and skip the line. Even better, in 2018 Burger King used its app to send customers away from the competition right as they were at the rival’s door: The “Whopper Detour” promotion caused the app to unlock a 1-cent Whopper deal when it detected that customers were within 600 feet of a McDonald’s.

The app was downloaded over a million times within just a few days, making it the number-one free app in the Apple App Store. Now, almost a year later, the app boasts a 4.7-star rating with 47,300 ratings, with comments like “very convenient” and “the consistent deals are AMAZING; don’t order BK without this app.”

2. Domino’s App Lets Customers Track Their Pizzas

This popular pizza chain has close to 800 independent franchise owners in the U.S., operates stores from the U.S. to Australia to India—and offers customers an app that lets them order Domino’s food from anywhere, and track it from the instant they place the order until it’s ready for pickup or delivery. On the iPhone app, customers can use Dom, the company’s voice ordering assistant, to add items to the cart and select coupons.

Domino’s is constantly changing and adding to the app to keep customers interested. In 2016, for example, the company unveiled a “Zero Click” app that let customers order simply by opening the app. (Though it did give customers a 10-second countdown just to make sure it wasn’t an accidental order.) And in February 2019, Domino’s launched Points for Pies, where users could take a picture of any pizza—whether from Domino’s or somewhere else—to earn 10 points. After 60 points, users got a free medium two-topping pizza from Domino’s.

3. Merry Maids Boosts Customer Confidence with Its Mobile Experience

Hiring a cleaning service can feel risky to the average homeowner:

1. They’re letting people they don’t know into their home to clean their personal belongings.
2. When the cleaners run late, the homeowner worries that the cleaners have forgotten them.
3. They fret that the cleaners won’t do a good job cleaning their home.

Merry Maids, a 40-year-old franchise with about 1,700 units, has overcome these sticking points with their dispatch service, Team Mobility, and an app provided by Dispatch that’s available at participating locations. Dispatch’s solution increases franchises’ Net Promoter Score by an average of 20%, and reduces time-to-schedule by 40%. Through the app, customers receive updates on arrival time plus information about the cleaning team, fostering a sense of transparency that puts customers at ease. Customers can also offer feedback right through the app, giving the company an opportunity to quickly handle customer complaints and promote positive ones.

4. RE/MAX’s App Helps Homeowners Find New Homes

Sometimes homeowners aren’t looking to deliver a pizza to their home or to have their home cleaned—they’re looking for a new home altogether, and they want to do it without having to leave their sofa or even call an agent.

Enter RE/MAX, the #1 franchise in the U.S., which has 3,700 franchisees inside the U.S. and 4,600 outside the U.S. In 2019 RE/MAX acquired booj, a real estate tech company, and created an agent-branded property search app.

RE/MAX’s mobile app lets home shoppers find nearby homes for sale based on their current location, use interactive maps to zoom in on and search neighborhoods, share property listings with friends, generate turn-by-turn driving directions to properties, and connect with a RE/MAX real estate professional when they’re ready for a showing.

5. Blaze Pizza Blazes a Path for Mobile

Blaze Pizza, which now has 173 franchise locations in 32 U.S. states and Canada, is an early adopter of mobile apps for ordering: They launched theirs soon after opening for business in 2011. The app lets customers order ahead, get deals, and track reward points.

In an article in QSR magazine, Jim Mizes, former CEO and president of Blaze Pizza, said, “We use mobile offers to surprise and delight our app users. We’ve made mobile a focus because we continue to see strong correlation between higher app usage and higher same-store sales.”

Are you ready to surprise and delight your customers with an amazing mobile experience? Reach out for a demo to see how Dispatch lets franchises offer bi-directional messaging, on-my-way tracking, instant customer reviews, digital invoices, and simple payments from the field.

The post Afraid to Go Mobile? 5 Franchises That Are Winning Big with Mobile Apps appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

It’s the ultimate goal.

It’s what they strive for.

However, achieving superior customer experience comes down to the “last mile” – the time period between when the technician leaves for the appointment and the moment the job is complete. How you finish and whether or not you fulfill customer expectations will be how you are remembered and what your NPS is based on.

How and Why Franchises Derail Last-Mile Customer Experiences

Superior customer experiences depend on a variety of factors. When franchisors, franchisees, and service technicians are independent of each other, there are multiple points in the process that break down:

• can be completely disconnected from the technician in the field. If they don’t have the right tools to schedule, dispatch, and monitor the technicians then they’re essentially operating in the dark with no insight into how to improve performance.
• Field Technicians — without a mobile application that automatically informs the franchisee and franchisor about the status of every job then it’s tedious to keep everyone abreast of what is going on. This causes miscommunication, missed appointments, and even double booked appointments.
• Franchisors can be disconnected from the customer and the process, learning about customer issues long after the fact rendering them unable to proactively manage customer care and CX.
• Homeowners can be disconnected from the entire process once a request is made, waiting uncertainly to see if anyone shows up. They become annoyed by appointment “windows” and direct that annoyance toward the brand.

Anyone of these situations can affect the last-mile customer experience. And any one of these has the power to hurt a brands NPS.

The Difference Between Customer Expectations and Realities

A homeowner waiting for a service technician to show up faces several different scenarios. In the best case, the technician shows up on time, is fully informed of the problem, has the correct tool, equipment, parts, and knowledge required to complete the task quickly and with minimal disruption to the homeowner’s day.

All subsequent scenarios include degradation of the last-mile experience:

• The technician does not have the information the customer provided about their problem (According to a 2015 survey by Consumer Reports, more than 65% of customers say a top issue with service is having to repeat information over and over because it’s not being passed from rep to rep.)
• The technician doesn’t have the right tools, equipment, parts or knowledge to resolve the problem.
• The technician disrupts the homeowner’s day and/or leaves a mess behind when they leave.

While all of these issues may seem like technician issues, in reality, many pitfalls stem from a disconnect between the franchisor, franchisee, and homeowner.

Digitizing the Home Service Experience can Improve Last-Mile Outcomes

Digitally connecting every party through a clear and simple system provides each homeowner, technician, franchisee, and franchisor with the ability to visualize what is going on while facilitating superior last-mile experiences.

Check out these six customer experience moments that can turn your service into a wealth of positive feedback and word of mouth referrals. By delivering superior last-mile performances, franchises can avoid “where’s my tech?” call, build good-will, identify top-performing technicians in the field, and improve their bottom line.

Automatic Appointment Confirmation and Reminders

Automatic appointment confirmation and appointment reminders can help keep the homeowner n the loop and ensure they are ready to receive service at the assigned time. These can be delivered to a mobile device via text, direct message, or email.

Real-time technician “on-my-way” alerts

On the day of service, the homeowner should receive a notification letting them know the technician has begun the journey to their house. An “on-the-way” text message can be accompanied by a preliminary ETA window as well as the technician’s name and contact information.

Two-way communication

Two-way communication between the homeowner and technician can ensure the homeowner has the ability to share information and digital photos detailing their problem. The technician can ask questions, and share more specific information about their ETA.

In-the-field payment options

According to the 2016 U.S. Consumer Payment Study from TSYS, 75% of consumers prefer to pay with a credit or debit card, making taking payments in the field a simple solution to chasing payments after the fact.  Allowing the homeowner to make a digital payment in the field increases immediate settling of invoices and decreases the number of accounts that run late or go to collections.

Immediate feedback opportunities

Gathering feedback in the moment provides direct, actionable data and prevents issues from being overlooked. According to the 2019 Customer First: Personalizing the Customer Care Journey Report from McKinsey, organizations must gather direct, up to date customer feedback in order to understand and meet customer wants, needs, and expectations. Providing opportunities for homeowners to leave digital feedback after every interaction can help head off issues and lead to successful service experiences.

Completely mobile experiences

Providing a consistent mobile experience for homeowners can significantly improve their satisfaction with their home service experience. If everything from the first contact to the final feedback can be completed via mobile, there is uninterrupted communication throughout the process. All parties are enabled to share and receive information for seamless customer experience.

By reimagining field service from the ground up and investing in a system that provides continual contact and transparency between franchisor, franchisee, and customer, your home service franchise can improve customer experiences and avoid churn.

Dispatch provides complete connectivity and seamless mobile experience, making improved last-mile customer experiences a reality. Find out more about how Dispatch works or sign up today.

The post How Home Service Franchises are Delivering a Better Last-Mile Customer Experience appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

This process of managing third-party contractors and keeping customers satisfied comes with its own challenges. The first challenge being branding. While the contractor is independent, they still represent your company and your brand, meaning that a poor customer experience on their part is perceived as a poor customer experience on the part of the enterprise.

This means that staying connected with both homeowners and service contractors is vital, and a solution that can connect the enterprise, service pro, and customer together for end-to-end transparency is the key lynchpin in this equation.

In traditional home service setups, the communication between the enterprise, service pro, and customer is limited and lacks transparency.

The Homeowner Experience

The service experience a homeowner has with the enterprise is mostly complaint based. Any and all contact with the homeowner is made to a faceless service company who tells them their problem will be handled by the service pro. The experience with the contractor is mostly passive – with any luck, the pro will be informed with top-level service information and prepared with the knowledge and tools required to resolve it.

The top pain points for a homeowner who needs service include:

• Working with a vague and long service window (Example: Noon-4pm).
• Service pros showing up late or not showing up at all (with little communication).
• Service pros not having clear information about the issue, causing them to not have the right parts required to fix it.
• • Lack of resolution from the enterprise after difficulties with a contractor.

The Service Pro Experience

The experience service pros have with the enterprise isn’t ideal as enterprises require service pros to receive and status work in the enterprise’s job portal. First off, this just adds another portal to the service pro’s plate that they time and time have again said they don’t like using. They already have a job management platform that they enjoy. Why add another to their plate?

Top pain points for service pros who need to complete the job quickly and efficiently:

• Having to status jobs in another job portal.
• Having to take the job information from the enterprise’s portal to place into theirs, causing double data entry.
• Not having the right tools to deliver a modern customer experience to the homeowner.

The Enterprise Experience

The service experience an enterprise has with the customer is mostly support based. Contact is limited to the intake of information about the homeowner and their issue. The experience with the contractor is mostly transactional – assign the task, then compensate.

The top pain points for an enterprise using contractors to fulfill home service agreements include:

• Lack of real-time, end-to-end insight into how service pros are performing
• Ineffective job assignment, tracking, and follow-up.
• Inability to enable maximum output from 3rd-party service pros
• High contractor turnover and failure to retain top technicians
• Loss of customers or clients due to unsatisfactory performance by contractors

Reimagining the Home Service Experience

Dispatch helps bridge the gap on each side of the home service engagement triangle, by connecting all parties with an intuitive desktop and mobile application.

Trusted, timely, transparent communication leads to an improved experience for all parties involved:

The homeowner makes a request or reports an issue. Their request can be immediately entered into the system and sent out to a professional contractor in the homeowner’s area. They can receive verification concerning their appointment request, and follow-up messages that confirm the appointment and alert them that the contractor is on their way.

The contractor is empowered to make contact, gather pertinent information, and schedule the appointment at the earliest mutually convenient time for the homeowner and contractor by leveraging Dispatch’s smart booking experience. Every interaction a contractor takes with a homeowner, get’s automatically statused in their portal and relayed back to the enterprise so that all parties are kept in the loop.

The enterprise has access to a performance dashboard and can verify that the job has been accepted and scheduled, follow the status of the job throughout the entire process, and optimize their 3rd-party network to maximize their potential. The quality of customer experience can also be tracked in real-time, allowing the enterprise to step in and immediately remedy every negative experience as they occur.

Empowering your 3rd-party contractors doesn’t need to be complicated. Leveraging a revolutionary platform to help connect the enterprise, 3rd-party technician, and homeowner together leads to a maximum output of your service professionals.

The post Home Service Revolution: How Technology Enables Maximum Output From Service Pros appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

Perks like free shipping, free returns, instant customer support, white-glove delivery,“hassle-free everything” became the norm. These companies layered technology into their existing customer experience process and transformed their old-school CX into a modern, digital experience.

In this post, we’ll explain how any appliance company can quickly change their technology stack and offer an experience as memorable as Zappos, Amazon, or Costco all while gaining visibility into their entire third-party service network.

Sound good? Keep reading!

What Memorable Customer Experience Looks Like for an OEM

Everyone is still asking the age-old question – what sells in today’s world, an amazing product or an amazing customer experience?

It’s a tough question…

A great product will undoubtedly sell itself, but couple that with a poor customer experience and all of a sudden that great product turns into something that people don’t want to deal with.

I’ve also found that customers often have a hard time understanding the nuances of your product. To you, you have a superior device that stands out, but those nuances that should be your differentiator often go unnoticed by your customers. So, if you want to stand out in your customer’s eyes then focus on what your customers can’t miss – a digital, modern customer experience.

Take an air conditioner for example. According to your customer, the difference between your 8,000 BTU unit and your competitor’s 8,000 BTU unit is small. They both cool down 350 sq. ft, they both are energy efficient, and they both are the same price. So how can your company turn that one-off customer into a lifetime customer who tells all their friends and family?

Easy! Offer an experience they can’t stop talking about.

The moment the customer calls for help

When a customer calls you for help, most likely they tried solving the issue themselves; they watched a few videos on youtube, hit up a forum, read some blogs, and called a friend for advice. When they come to you, they are looking for a quick fix to something that they may have failed at themselves. Offering a digital first-point of contact that is tailored with personalizable preferred times sets the stage for a great customer experience and higher NPS.

Don’t hide behind walls. Give customers a simple way to connect with you

We work with companies to help streamline their scheduling, dispatching, and tracking. Right up front, we offer a “Smart Dealer Locator” on their website. That way when someone comes to your site and clicks on “find a dealer near me,” they can book an appointment with any third-party contractor based on star-rating, location, or other details. Additionally, this process ensures the contractor will have all the information needed to make the fix faster than before – simply because they have the connected mobile tools that provide all the customer information they need.

Communicate clearly and often

Look around. How many people are on their phones? Everyone. When I walk down the city streets I’m constantly trying to avoid the phone-staring dawdlers who look like waddling toddlers. It’s like I’m playing the 2018 version of Frogger.

In order for your company to meet the new expectations of the modern customer, I urge you to look at how you use mobile communications. When a customer schedules a time with your company, it’s best practice to send them a text message notifying them that their appointment has been received, scheduled, and is in their system. And if you want to further reduce your no-show rate, add in a calendar invite file to that message. That way your customers will be able to immediately add it to their calendar.

Master the Last-Mile Customer Experience

The last mile is where your customers need you the most – and so that’s where you gain an edge over your competition. When the day of service comes around, keeping your customer informed is by far the best way to exceed their higher-than-normal expectations. To do this, send appointment reminders, On-My-Way notifications, provide a self-service portal, and send survey requests directly to your customer’s phones the moment the job is complete. This Uber-like experience shows the customer exactly where their contractor is, what their name is, and what they look like, so homeowners feel more comfortable letting the tech into their home.

What this experience does for your organization

2018 is all about brand management and how positively (or negatively) your customers view you and your service. With Dispatch, you have an awesome opportunity to blow your customers expectations out of the water with a transparent and honest experience – improving your brand’s NPS, online reputation, and customer churn rate.

Additionally, it’s always difficult to understand how well your third-party contractors are performing and representing your brand. By providing tools that deliver a modern customer experience, you’ll collect more information about their performance because you, the homeowner, and your techs will be linked. Additionally, any time a contractor interacts with Dispatch, status updates get sent immediately to provide real-time visibility into a network that before was largely opaque.

“With Dispatch, the consumer is surveyed immediately following the service event making the survey more relevant. We have tripled the number of survey responses since using Dispatch. This provides me with a much better snapshot of how my business is performing.

I also love how I can communicate with my consumers via text message. This has significantly decreased the amount of incoming phone calls into my service department, making us more efficient.

Dispatch is changing the scope of service and giving me and my customers a more modern experience.”

Arthur Ashkinazi, Active Appliance

“The visibility and insights into the status of every job from start to finish has optimized the process and customer experience for us. Dispatch is enabling Landmark Home Warranty to manage contractors more effectively via analytics and data.”

Lawrence Flitton, VP of Operations @ Landmark Home Warranty

If you want to learn more about how Dispatch can improve your customer experience, email Dan Raycroft at draycroft@dispatch.me.

The post What Does it Mean to be a Customer-Centric OEM? appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

When customers are informed about what is happening, they’re content, they’re happy, and they have little uncertainty about the job. Alternatively, when they’re not informed about the job, and don’t know who is coming or when they quickly build anxiety about the service as a whole. They build resentment toward the brand and look for the slightest thing to go wrong in order to validate their anger. Say the technician happens to be late, they’ll say, “see, I knew this would happen.”

At the end of the day, customers expect more, they demand more, but most of all, they deserve more.

After working with some of the largest home service enterprise brands in the world, we’ve found that in order to improve NPS and customer satisfaction, telco companies should provide these three things:

• More communication with the customer after the job is scheduled
• Omni-channel communication to match the customer’s (sms, phone, email, twitter, FB, etc.)
• Immediate customer feedback after a job is complete

As other in-home service companies innovate and raise the “customer experience bar,” it’s time for you to do the same. So, if you’re saying to yourself, “we want to improve but don’t know how without overhauling our entire system,” then keep reading…

We are the Experts in Last Mile Customer Experience (CX)

Over the years, we’ve discovered a few things. First, every field service company is different and having one blanket system for their needs won’t work. Secondly, all field service companies have unique levers that can vastly improve customer experience — it’s comes down to collecting the right data in order to discover them.

Our experience has shown that implementing Uber-like customer experiences, and automatic appointment reminders have helped large service companies increase their NPS scores by more than 35% and decreases their inbound call-volume by more than 37%. On a large scale when companies are getting hundreds of thousands of calls a month, lowering these calls and increasing NPS has been game-changing.

The data clearly shows that metrics improve because customers feel empowered. At the end of the day, customers just want to know what is happening with their appointment – reducing anxiety and uncertainty.

It’s that simple.

Customers don’t expect much, they just expect transparent communication, and when it’s not met, they quickly become detractors from your brand, hurting your online reputation.

Our mission is to help every service company deliver memorable (and most of all, repeatable) customer experiences. Dispatch provides modern day solutions to old world home service problems. If you are interested in learning more, schedule some time with us and let’s see how we can help. Send us a note at susan@dispatch.me

The post The Intersection of Customer Experience and Field Service appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

Most industries have adjusted to these expectations by offering memorable customer experiences (CX) with end-to-end communication, and access to real-time information. This is why it’s weird that some industries still seem stuck in neutral, offering up the same weak old CX.

The Home Service CX Struggle

Maybe the satellite dish is down, or the pipes’ burst, or your husband tried to go all HGTV and accidentally cuts the power–whatever the issue, dealing with home repair can seem as overwhelming and frustrating as the accident itself.

When calling your telco company for assistance, most homeowners encounter one of two scenarios:

Somewhere between several minutes and a few hours later, you finally reach a live client service representative. This person, with the best of intentions, often repeatedly mispronounces your name, puts you back on hold, and then asks you to volunteer your time to help fix the problem.

If you make it to this stage in the process, you have essentially acquired a new unpaid job in an area you know nothing about.

Congratulations.

A home service company should never have their own clients helping with home repairs. Imagine a doctor asking her patient to hold an instrument during surgery, or a mechanic asking his customer to pop open the hood of the car and inspect the engine!

3rd-Party Contractors and The Peril Of Disconnected Systems

When a service technician is finally dispatched to a job site, he or she is often a 3rd-party independent contractor working for many home service companies.

3rd-party contractors are increasingly selected by companies looking to expand their market share. In fact, by 2020 over 40% of field service work will be performed by technicians who are not employees of the organization that has direct contact with the customer.

What does this have to do with bad customer experience?

Though contractors are not always the reason behind a poor CX, they are often blamed for it anyway. By virtue of a broken home service system, customers struggle to schedule time with their technicians, and vice-versa.

It’s especially frustrating that customers will typically take an entire day just waiting around to let the technician in the front door. That delay can cause serious damage to the technician’s reputation and their employer’s brand. Whenever there is a long wait, customer anxiety naturally sets in–and a routine service job can get off to a rocky start even before the technician arrives onsite (if they arrive at all).

And if a home repair job requires more than one visit, you might get different technicians, each needing to start over from square one. All of a sudden your initial call becomes a multi-day project, spanning across several contractors.

Yet, it’s not just the customers that find themselves at a loss. Home service companies, franchises, and independent contractors are often left in the dark with little to no communication between one another. They are often left asking:

Fear Not, The All-In-One Tool Kit For The Home Service Space

Thankfully, companies like Dispatch connects customers, 3rd-party technicians, and companies all in one integrated system.

Customers can talk and message with contractors, receive automatic appointment reminders, one-click calendar invites, ‘On-My-Way’ notifications via text, and a much-needed peace of mind about who the contractor is and when they’re arriving.

Customers do not have to download any app because every piece of information is provided through a web-based link where all their job details are provided. All of this transparency helps reduce customer no-shows by 86%.

With Dispatch’s mobile messaging service, both customers, contractors, and their companies are able to share photos and notes with all parties involved. This level of transparency and access has proven to increase NPS scores by 35%.

Back to the Future

Dispatch provides modern day solutions to old world home service problems. If you are interested in learning more, schedule some time with us and let’s see how we can help.

The post It’s Time The Home Service Industry Gets a Customer Experience Makeover appeared first on Dispatch Technologies.

Training Helps

Training is clearly one of the core areas that helps franchisees understand the value of high quality, consistent service delivery. But as President Ronald Reagan said about agreements with the old Soviet Union, “trust, but verify.”  How can a franchisor train the franchises to understand the value of consistent, quality service delivery and verify that they’re actually delivering? One way is to implement a system-wide standard of work order management. This should be a system that has key functionality and high value for the franchisor, the franchisees, and their field service people, as well as the consumer of your services and products.

Have the Right KPIs and Monitor Them

To enable this, it helps if everyone involved is using the same platform and that platform has the processes and procedures built-in with easy to follow methods and checklists. You also need built-in key performance indicators (KPIs) on the core aspects of service quality. Such things as “On time arrival.” If your franchisee schedules to be at the customer’s home at 3 PM, the franchisor needs to know when they actually show up.

Measuring “On-time arrival” every time an appointment is made allows visibility into the consistency of your services system. If you are doing repair work, or other more technical services, what is the “first-time fix rate”? In other words, did the technician have to come back for a second or even a third visit to satisfy the customer? This KPI has a direct correlation to delivery costs, profit, and customer satisfaction.

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