When have you seen force or friction impact a company’s ability to grow?

[mbarba]

Revenue Operations, or RevOps, is integral to taking an inbound approach to business and speeding up your company’s flywheel.

Why are those important? Let’s define terms first:

• Inbound is a method of attracting, engaging, and delighting people to grow a business that provides value and builds trust.
• The flywheel is a model adapted by HubSpot to explain the momentum you gain when you align your entire organization around delivering a remarkable customer experience. Rather than thinking of your business as a funnel, with leads coming in at the top and customers coming out at the bottom, think about your business as a circle — as a flywheel.

When thinking about how to spin your company’s flywheel faster with RevOps, there are two important concepts to keep in mind:

1. Force is what allows your business to scale by spinning your flywheel faster and faster. This looks like when your customer has a great customer experience and tells their friends and colleagues about it.
2. Friction is what grinds your business to a halt, if not addressed. This is when your company provides your customers with a bad customer experience, and they also tell their friends and colleagues about it. In turn, this slows down your flywheel.

Here’s what I’d love to hear:

1. Share a time when you had an amazing customer experience and you saw a company grow faster and faster because of their wonderful customer care.
2. Share a time when you had a poor customer experience (please don’t name names or organizations) and how you saw that type of poor care affect their business.

[STripathi4]

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[MsShona]

1. Share a time when you had an amazing customer experience and you saw a company grow faster and faster because of their wonderful customer care. I brought my minivan through Carvana back in 2017. Back then they were a new company -- and people thought that I was crazy to buy a car online (sight unseen). But I had just had twin boys and their older brother was 1 year old. I had no ability to go out and go jumping from dealership to dealship to find the perfect minivan (and yes, with 3 baby car seats, that's what I needed). Carvana brought the car right to your home. You had 7 days to call them up to take it back if you didn't like it. My ex was a mechanic. So I didn't have much to lose. It was a fantastic experience. The delivery driver was also a notary that took care of the title paperwork. They handled the financing. If I opted to trade-in, they would have taken my old car too. He even brought extra promotional toys like frisbees (my kids were too young for those....but he didn't know that) and little bounce balls when he heard that I had little kids. Since then Carvana has grown by leaps and bounds....and even have some other companies trying to get in on the online car sales marketplace.
2. Share a time when you had a poor customer experience (please don’t name names or organizations) and how you saw that type of poor care affect their business. I usually prepare and file my own taxes. But 2 years ago I had a child custody trial that was scheduled in Febuary. I knew that I was getting a sizable tax refund back....but there would be no way that I would have it in hand in time for the trial. I owed my attorney some fees that exceeded my retainer and I didn't want him to go into the trial knowing that I owed him (may have been fine, but I didn't want to take any chances!). So I went in to one of those tax preparation places that advertise instant receipt of your refund. It was a terrible experience. The woman preparing my taxes gave me vibes that she was pretty inexperienced with the software and the process....and I had a very simple return. Also I had no idea that the advertised rate was just for your tax return. It didn't include the schedules. I thought that I would be paying $150 tops and my bill ended up being $400! To make matters worse, I had to pay another fee for the rapid refund. I was given a Visa card that would not be activated until the next day. I asked what the card balance was, and was told they had no idea. They would review my return and then let me know. The next day I received a text message that I had been approved for a rapid refund of $500. So I paid $400 to get instant access to $500. My tax refund was for more than $7K. I was livid. There is a (good) reason why those tax preparation outfits are going out of style. I hope that they become completely obsolete in the next decade or so because they take major advantage of people (there is no reason why a simple 1040 tax return with a few schedules for childcare and student loan interest credits should cost $400).

[Stefanos_GR]

oustanding experience :really enjoy when companies have really simple registration process with required data only the email 🙂 - love this kind of companies 

Poor experience :registration process with issues 😞

[Eloy]

1. Not to be THAT GUY, but Hubspot is actually a great example of Force - its rare for me to encounter such a speedy and attentive customer service team. But after just a few calls, I know I can count on them and would recommend as an avid customer.
2. Call centers tend to create purposeful friction when all of the inbound calls arrive at tier 1, it is possible that a customer requires tier 2 support and oftentimes the inbound team is not trained to identify these situations well and just generate friction for the caller through the insistence of not escalating.

[KClancy9]

1. I was traveling with my young toddler and she was just not having it. I tried everything I knew to do to help calm her. A flight attendant gave us some grapes from her lunch and magically my toddler calmed down. This helped all the passengers have a wonderful flight and helped a frustrated mother overcome a difficult time.

2. I walked into a grocery store to buy a cake for my kid's birthday. I walked up to the bakery and the lady started to huff that I bothered her. I asked a few questions and then picked out a cake. She said I don't have time for this and walked away. A second employee came over and tried to help me. I asked for the manager and she said the first lady was her manager. I left without buying a cake.

[RPeraza]

1. I believe I have seen the positive effects of customer services in the last position I was in. I noticed customers were happy and recommended the service we would offer.

2. The effects of poor customer service are something I have witnessed a lot. People seem to forget to listen to their customers and take everything they say into consideration. This is a big issue because word of mouth is very impactful.

[ARamirez8]

Amazing customer experience - After complaining about wrong delivery, customer service responded immediately and processed the refund right away with a special coupon to compensate for the inconvenience.

Poor customer experience - It takes too long or almost impossible to reach them over the phone and I had to send multiple emails/follow up before I finally received a reply.

[AAguilar2]

1. Share a time when you had an amazing customer experience and you saw a company grow faster and faster because of their wonderful customer care.

Coommunity managers that repsond to clients in a time efficient manner and with a sense of humor are amazing. One time during pandemic a food delivery app had issues with the ETA of delivery, the CM provided solutions and credited the customer affected. The credit was applied to their account and available for a second time use, guaranteeing a better experience the second time. 

1. Share a time when you had a poor customer experience (please don’t name names or organizations) and how you saw that type of poor care affect their business.

A financial insttitution was not time effective and made me go to the bank several times for the same issue, they were unable to provide a solution on the phone/email and I had to physically go into the office, this is a waste of time and energy.

[virensmehta]

According to me, a great product backed with faster onboarding is a force and anything which is not in like with this is friction to create customer delight.

[RSantoro]

Positive experience: Our customer success team is often mentioned as a differentiting factor to competitors. It is showing through referrals and increased customer engagement

Negtive experience: my personal experience with a SaaS company, when it comes to changing the type of product requested. Their inability of flexibility caused us to end business with them completely, instead of simply changing within their product offering

[GCreech]

Positive Experience - We recently purchased a new dishwasher. The installer arrived early, installed the dishwasher quickly and went above and beyond in cleanup and installation. We will go back to this company for additional appliances.

Negative Experience - We found a bug in a jar of spaghetti sauce. When we contacted the company, the response was delayed and not very heartfelt. We haven't purchased that brand of spaghetti sauce since that issue.

[RNee]

Our biggest friction is generating quotes and completing security reviews in a timely manner for potential customers. We've made some human and technology investments to create more force than friction. 

[CEOKevinK]

Force: Hosting and Promoting Special Speakers on LinkedIn and Meetup

Force: Recomend Special Speakers for Tasks Performed Well on LinkedIn

[ahoulne]

For is when a new resource is brought in to the team.

Friction is when there are either too many or not enough hand offs for the client experience.

[HDoherty]

1. My partner and I recently bought a couch and it was a seamless experience. Starting at the website the pages to design our couch made it easy to see what it would look like and even see what it would look like in our space. The ordering process was easy and although there was a delay in delivery we consistently got updates and were always able to get questions answered swiftly. 
2. Recently a dentist's office I went to overcharged me on a bill. It was a mistake on their end and while I did all the work to remedy the issue they provided little assistance and never offered an apology. That experience has made me question if I want to continue to go there or find a different provider. 

[EEyerman]

1. A great example of a positive customer experience I received was at Anthropologie. From the moment I walked into the store, there was someone ready to help me get a dressing room, bring me different options to try on, and even add new styling elements to an outfit I had already picked out. They were so kind and could tell they actually cared. At the check out the cashier made sure I was enrolled in their points program and she mentioned: "So you get extra points and offers on your Birthday" which was a way she was able to make me feel special and valued. Although this is just a small retail example, they were able to sell more because they made me feel comfortable, supported, and valued from the moment I walked in. 

2.  A negative customer experience I faced was when I was on a family vacation recently and we purchased tickets for a tour of the town. We ended up getting stuck in a bit of traffic and being a few minutes late for our slated time. Instead of waiting for us, they took off on the trip without us. When we tried to get a refund, it was nearly impossible and was such a poor and unforgiving experience. This then caused me to leave a review of my experience which other tourists will be able to read and will factor into their decision process of the tour. 

[amber-square2]

I'm curious about #2 - did you call the company ahead of time to tell them you were running late? Did they say they would wait for you?

I'm just thinking about the other people on the tour - maybe it would have been a huge point of friction for the people who got there early who would have then had to wait longer for it to start, or for the next tour group that may start late if they held up your earlier group. I can definitely see how your point of friction may have even been a force for someone else! 

[nthatcher-airbr]

Amazing customer experience example: When I was reaching out to this company through a phone call, they had all my details already available through cross-reference with my phone number. This made troubleshooting my issue much easier. They were also able to 'guess' what the issue was that I was having based on a recent interaction with the website/product. Additionally, I was able to get the issue resolved without needing to be transferred to another agent. 

Poor customer experience example: The opposite was true here. Even after providing special instructions for my delivery, the information that I provided was not handed off to the other people in the organization- in this case, the delivery driver. Because of this, the delivery was unsuccessful and I was charged a fee by the company. 

[CBecker0]

I see force and friction in Nordstrom. 

Examples of force is that they hire sales people to be walking the floors of the shoe department to help you find what you're looking for. These sales people deliver an amazing customer experience by bringing out all shoes you need, suggesting new shoes, and helping you determine your size and fit. Next, Nordstrom also provides free deliveries and returns, no matter what - it could have been a year since you bought the shoes, the shoes could be completely destroyed, it doesn't matter! This is a force, as they are investing $$ in this area of business. And, personally, it really delights me. I find myself promoting Nordstrom to all of my friends all the time, because of the phenomenal customer experience I always have. 

Some friction in Nordstrom is that they don't have many locations. When I lived in Washington state, I had to drive over an hour to get to the nearest Nordstrom. Another example of friction are their high prices. But, they put this up front and make it clearly visible from the start, so the buyer knows what they're getting in to when looking at a pair of shoes. 

[Listen2sunrise]

Hi @CBecker0, thank you so much for the sharing.  "Another example of friction is their high prices. But, they put this up front and make it visible from the start" ---- I bet that this is good friction. One quote I take away from the Revenue Operations course is "every high-value experience has friction". A price tag is a tool that a business can use to position and differentiate itself in the market. It works as long as the overall customer experience (particularly the peak-end) makes people feel the price tag is worth it, IMHO. 

[BukunmiOdetayo]

I love the force idea of JUMIA, an online store in my region. The entire process is easy and smooth, from shopping to check-out and payment. Also, the delivery system is superb, and customers can return products bought if they're not satisfied. I haven't talked about their feedback loop! That is the craziest. I am still being asked to review a product I bought over 3 months ago and told I can still return it if I do not like it. That confidence and trust they're building in their customers are top-notch.