Employees Are Key To Electronics Retailing

October 27, 2009 Leave a comment

Here’s how Best Buy CEO Brian Dunn ended a recent blog post on CNBC:

You should be happy with what you purchase. This means that the product works the way you expect it to before you walk out of the store, or when you get home. If not, you’ve overpaid at any price.

Dunn’s post discusses the importance of knowledgeable staff in the consumer electronics space. He points to a study by The American Consumer Institute that shows how often consumers selected different attributes as being important for their electronics purchase:

  • Product quality (85%)
  • Knowledgeable staff (77%)
  • Finding someone to help (74%)
  • Lower prices (70%)

My take: True! Dunn’s comments are consistent with my previous post about Wal-Mart’s new tech support as well as my research which shows that customer service trumps price across most industries. When consumers chose a retailer, the need for higher customer service increases with age. There are 2% more Gen Y that want good customer service than those that want low prices. For Seniors, the gap between customer service and low price is 14%.

That’s why retailers need to focus on the 4th law of my 6 laws of customer experience: Unengaged employees don’t create engaged customers.

The bottom line: Don’t sell electronics, help people chose and use them.

Filed under Customer Connectedness, Customer experience, Employee Engagement, Store/branch strategy Tagged with , ,

About Bruce Temkin, CCXP
I'm an experience (XM) management catalyst; helping organizations improve results by engaging the hearts and minds of their employees, customers, and partners. I enjoy researching and speaking about these topics. I lead the Qualtrics XM Institute, which is the world's best job. We're igniting a global community of XM Professionals who are inspired and empowered to radically improve the human experience. To achieve this goal, my team focuses on thought leadership, training, and community building. My work is driven by a set of fundamental beliefs: 1) Everything starts and ends with human beings, so you need to understand how people think, feel, and behave; 2) XM is a discipline that needs to be woven throughout an organization's entire operating fabric; and 3) Building the XM discipline requires a combination of culture, competency, and technology.

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