The tyranny of best practices doesn’t work.
Two weeks ago, we talked about the benefits of a testing culture – the whole company ask questions of customers. Last week, we did a simple, single test – easy to implement, easy to gather data. You test every week, you get results.
Now we’re going to show you a bit more on how to elaborate on testing – with multiple questions funneling back to the boss to change the direction of business.
Why is this important? Well, in the tyranny of best practices, the boss does all the thinking and direction – he or she made up the system, that’s what people follow.
Let’s show you another way.
You don’t have to limit yourself to one question.
Each department probably has their own burning questions. Limiting yourself to a single question company-wide might not be fast enough feedback for you and your fast-paced business. What you have to remember is that testing a single question gives you solid feedback – enough data points – to make decisions at the end of the week.
So, if you’re going to stretch the boundaries of testing, you just have to have enough data at the end of the week to make decisions. You might even want to stretch the testing over a series of weeks. Don’t. The weekly testing cycle is precious; it allows the company to move towards objectives fast, and you want that. More than a week and you lose focus and momentum.
Each department asks a different question.
Example: one question per department.
Each department can ask a single question revolving around a particular topic. The topic could be anything; custom service, a product line, or the website. For instance, for a particular product that is lagging in sales:
- Boss & Admin: We value your input… could we have the president call you at your leisure and ask a few questions?
- Delivery person: Would you like me to set this up for you? (Then, seeing a complimentary product in the customer’s home,) How do you like this other product X?
- Service. Would you buy this product again? What was the most difficult thing about your entire purchase? How could we have made your patronage better?
- Sales & Marketing. How do you like the functionality of the product? What would you like to see in future models? Would you like to see different colors? What else do you use this product with? Why?
Focusing on a single problem and tackling it from different angles can be a fun and rewarding process.
Example 2: Different giveaways.
Would you like…. Each department gives something different away. There’s no relation between type of gift and department; you’re just dividing up labor of question-asking and gift offering. The gift could be anything you think of value. You’ll find that only a few of the gift ideas that you have will really be appreciated – valuable data for future offerings (especially before you buy $10,000 worth of t-shirts that are destined to sit on a shelf until thrown away.)
- A Gift.
- A Gift certificate
- Complimentary product 1
- Complimentary product 2
- Free t-shirt
- 10% off your next purchase.
- Instant discount on current purchase
- Put you on our special discount mailing list?
Case-Study: The Auto Body Shop.
Think testing can’t be used in a mechanic shop? Think again. Here is a live case-study of one of our previous clients, Ultimate Auto Center, and the boss, Lew Lombardo.
Information flow.
Look at the diagram below. Note how the input gets pooled to the boss, who makes the big decisions.
Customers are in blue. Note how information flows to the top, but the questions asked are from everyone. TAC is our company.
Now, this looks complex, but it isn’t.
This is the same chart as above, but with questions and actions added.
Click on the image to the right. All we did was show two additional things:
- The questions we asked,
- The development that occurs afterwards.
Let’s examine the roles, shall we?
Boss (Lew).
With the culture of testing, the boss actually facilitates the employee’s and their own creativity. He helps the employees feel like they’re part of something. He also spots “long-range” visions and goals.
- Role: Ambassador.
- Goal: Change the direction of business for the better.
- Customers to talk to: ones that have bought repeatedly.
- Questions revolve around: knowing the enticing bit of information that kept that customer coming back.
- It could be that one of the employees did something really nice for them (fixed something for free),
- or that it was really fast service with a price under what was quoted,
- or perhaps they dropped off the car at the customer’s business before the work day was done (saving the customer time.)
Combo Man (Tom).
The combo man is the liaison between customer and boss and outside sources. He coordinates the work to be done, collects information back from mechanics (and me), and tracks customer service.
- Role: Liaison, Trouble-Shooter.
- Goal: Increase operational efficiency and pool answers together.
- Customers to talk to: Every-single-customer.
- Questions revolve around: how the customer found the business, how to entice the customer back to the shop, if customer service is working.
- Getting the customer to give information about their experience,
- Feeding marketing ideas back to TAC based upon customer interaction,
- Gauging success of website.
Painter (Brad).
- Role: Customer service.
- Goal: Find ways to make the customer happy.
- Customers to talk to: the customers in front of him.
- Questions revolve around: testing various questions.
Master Mechanic (Dwayne).
- Role: Customer service.
- Goal: Making sure that customers understand the complexities of auto repair, running the 11-point Visual Safety Inspection.
- Customers to talk to: the customers in front of him.
- Questions revolve around: gauging the level of customer experience, and whether that customer is either…
- Reactive customer (fix car when broken)
- Proactive customer (regular maintenance schedule)
TAC (Internet Marketing Expert).
- Role: Trend-Spotter.
- Goal: Feed ideas back to Tom and spot trends in the industry of auto repair. Implement changes of operations into sales and marketing tools online.
- Customers to talk to: Anyone customer that I come into contact with (it’s sporadic, but it’s still nice for me to get first-hand experience with them.)
- Questions revolve around: Asking boss and employees what they’re finding, and reshape the next questions to ask.
The Result?
So, what did all this give us? I can honestly tell you, too many things to count. However, we’ll highlight a few things:
One of the things we learned is that we have to build long lasting relationships with customers if we're really going to understand anything. Hence, the Customer Service Record.
- The Customer Service Record above that tracks customer satisfaction over time.
- Two complimentary business ideas that Lew could expand into easily and capture even more of the market.
- The 11-Point Visual Safety Inspection that customers just love
- A website solution that increased our site traffic by 20-30%
- A website solution that lowered our bounce rate by 10%
- A system of capturing testimonials through video
- A Google Calendar solution between Tom and Lew (for better understanding of operations and coordination of employees)
- Rewards system for customers that return more than 5 times
Conclusion.
Building a culture of testing is a powerful way to move your business forward. You could test with one question per week, company-wide, or you can test different questions in different departments. The key is to make sure that you collect enough data so you can make good decisions on what to do next.
But building this culture of testing into your business is just the beginning. You’ll find – as we have found – that testing is fun and enlightening. Questions lead to answers lead to more questions – it doesn’t take long to uncover the real bottlenecks of business – just a little patience and entrepreneurial spirit!
Further Reading:
- Landing page optimization, cycle speed, culture of testing
- Jonathan Mendez’s Blog- Expert Guide to Multivariate Testing Success
- Creating a Culture of Testing- How to defeat the tyranny of best practices
More articles from Think Around Corners:
- Part 1 of the Culture of Testing
- Part 2 of the Culture of Testing
- Google Trends and Google Insights for Search
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