Customer Service Champs on the Bloomberg BusinessWeek List

Content marketing can tell your story.

The 2010 annual customer service champs list in BusinessWeek was published recently, and it's similar this year to last, with the notable exception of the entry of L.L.Bean at No. 1. It says a lot for the changing nature of our customer relationships as consumers that e-commerce and online businesses rank so prominently in this list. Amazon.com, Zappos, Apple, USAA and, of course, L.L.Bean are all brands with minimal or limited retail presence.

BusinessWeek's list consists of companies that are passionate about customer service and—no surprises here—whose customers are passionate about their brands in return. Brands with a story to tell and those that have deep relationships with their customers that go way beyond the transactional predominate. This engagement occurs at multiple touch-points and at multiple levels, and it results in a loyalty and advocacy among their fans and followers that sets them apart from their competitors and indeed the majority of other brands. Companies with a story to tell derive great benefit from telling that story well, which is where we—and content marketing—come in.

For us, apart from the satisfaction of having three of our clients in the Top 25 (Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, Southwest Airlines, USAA), the list provides both a vindication of the efforts that content marketing brings to support and reinforce brand loyalty, and it also supplies us with a "prospect list" of companies who have similar beliefs. For here is a group of businesses that truly believe in the integrity of their service, their people and their customers and go out of their way every day to show it. And they also believe in communicating with these day-to-day customers and creating a dialog with them—whether through verbal or written communication.

We love all of our clients, but it’s always a special treat to spend time with Southwest Airlines—where we recently attended their 2010 marketing planning meeting. The fact that, as a business partner, we are invited to a high-level internal strategy meeting at all speaks volumes for the attitude and transparency of an organization that—year after year—wins accolades such as the BusinessWeek survey for its inclusive and amazingly successful business culture.

It's hard to put your finger on the exact magic formula or pixie dust when you are under the hood. It looks from the inside (as well as the outside) like a bunch of smart, energetic, motivated people having fun and talking coherently and collaboratively about the challenges of the year ahead. And the CEO always comes to spend a couple of hours giving them the big picture and inviting questions and comments.

Hmmm. I wonder what their secret could be . . .

Posted By: Craig Waller