Marc Sokol

M Squared Group, Inc.

A psychologist with an eye for the ways organizational dynamics make it possible or impossible to delight customers, I see the world from the eyes of customers, employees and leaders who strive to transform customer experience.

Will ‘big data’ become your worst nightmare?

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Posted on 2011-10-12

Image by shvmoz via Flickr

Could this happen to your company….

When the executive convened a group of senior leaders to dig into the competitor’s practices, they found that the challenge ran deeper than they had imagined. The competitor had made massive investments in its ability to collect, integrate, and analyze data from each store and every sales unit and had used this ability to run myriad real-world experiments. At the same time, it had linked this information to suppliers’ databases, making it possible to adjust prices in real time, to reorder hot-selling items automatically, and to shift items from store to store easily. By constantly...

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Tribute to Steve Jobs and all inspired by him

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Posted on 2011-10-05

Image via Wikipedia

You probably know by now that Steve Jobs died today, October 5th. His life story can be read here. Below I invite you to pause to consider one of the many comments in response to his passing. This one is a fitting tribute to Jobs’ spirit and actions; it’s good advice to all of us:

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes.

...

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How will your company rate on the ‘Customer Worry Index’?

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Posted on 2011-09-23

Admit it: You worry.

You worry that the new teller who just said “oops” when they mistakenly transferred your money from the wrong account will still get it wrong despite reassuring you it is now correctly transacted. You quietly shake your head as you walk to your car, noting to not go to that teller again.

You worry that the service rep, the 5th service rep with whom you are now speaking, has no idea how long you have been trying to get someone to give you a sense that your problem is understood and that they are authorized to help you.

You worry, that there is a minefield somewhere ahead, as the very enthusiastic people who just sold you a Nook e-reader, can’t actually answer any technical questions, and the nice young guy in the back of the store who can answer your questions tells you that the technical people in Corporate really don’t know what they are doing either: “it’s hit or miss whether you get a helpful response from...

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Good and great: Choices that shape customer experience

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Posted on 2011-09-20

Perhaps you know the phrase, “Good is the enemy of great”.

Popularized in recent years by Jim Collins, the phrase suggests that satisfaction with just being good keeps us from achieving really great things.

And taken as a touchstone for guiding customer experience, this can easily show up within the vision and call to action for customer-centricity of some organization.

Guess what?

Great is also the enemy of good enough!

That’s right; sometimes good enough is well, good enough.

Somewhere someone reading this is rolling his or her eyes right now. Don’t we say, “good enough for government work”, as a way of referring to work of limited quality?

Great and good enough can each be the right measure of what is needed, depending on the situation. And different...

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The new rules of marketing still include the old rules!

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Posted on 2011-08-29

Jason Fell shares a thoughtful post, “The new, new rules of business marketing“, building off the recent revised edition of The new rules of marketing & PR.

Let’s take it one step further and note practical ways to apply these in support of your best customers and for those whom you want to become best customers!

Personas persuade....

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Customer service leadership among big banks: The time is now!

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Posted on 2011-08-24

In addition to the overall 2011 Customer Experience Ratings, Bruce Temkin recently published a summary of ratings for Customer Service across multiple industries.

I have worked with a variety of financial institutions over the years, so I am naturally curious how they score. I also know many well intentioned, customer-...

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Wanted: customer experience leadership to fill a vacuum. First one to do so, wins!

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Posted on 2011-08-16

The 2011 Temkin Customer Experience Ratings are out. I look forward to most anything Bruce Temkin has to report about the state of customer experience, and this report is worth a look.

This is the graphic that always grabs my attention. What do you notice?...

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Networking for hungry marketing professionals

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Posted on 2011-06-02

For the marketing and business development professionals who read this blog….

Two guys are walking down the same street at separate times. Each is hungry, each is looking into the windows of stores where there is hot food, and each has a pocketful of money.

Only thing is that one of these two guys doesn’t realize he has a pocketful of money. So he looks into the window and blames the world for being a hard place and stays hungry. The other guy uses the money in his pocket to secure a good meal.

Networking is a lot like filling your pocket with money. Some people just don’t realize that they have great resources already available to them, or think that they can’t get what they desire in life. They just focus on the world being a hard place, while they remain hungry for a job, a new connection, a deal, or whatever it is they desire.

So take a look inside your pockets, not for business cards of people you met at...

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The enduring emotional connection of going beyond your own imagination

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Posted on 2011-06-02

Image via Wikipedia

Recently I’ve been focused on a phrase a client of mine has begun to use, “beyond imagination”.

My vision is to create a Global Research & Development Center that isn’t just great; I want others to experience it as beyond imagination!

He is wondering how to best engage his employees, his peers and other business units across the company to so they will deeply resonate with his vision. He aspires to create an organizational capability that will become an industry benchmark and a new reason for customers to remember his company. He wants to raise...

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Four lessons your customer service function can learn from “The Royal Wedding”

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Posted on 2011-04-29

If you were among the billion or so people who watched The Royal Wedding today, the word that should come to mind is ‘Brilliant’!

And your customer service function can learn valuable lessons from the ceremony and it’s design:

1. Inclusive. Planning a wedding always leads to tough decisions whom to invite. This couple had a clear view to include people who have made a difference in their lives, even if it be the butcher, the baker or the pub experience maker. It says that they don’t forget about the people (or in your case, the customers) who have contributed to your success along the way.

2. Transparency....

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