JULIE SMITH, Bozzuto Management Co.: We use a similar philosophy, particularly with regards to the Ritz-Carlton. We just had them in for both our managers’ and our assistant managers’ conferences. We focus on [providing] customer service one experience at a time. Achieving our corporate vision requires us to provide unparalleled experiences to our customers, and those can only be delivered one transaction or interaction at a time. That is helpful in training in our employees, because they are able to translate that into everything that they do. Our housekeeper can provide unparalleled service just as well as a maintenance technician or a management representative.
MARK SADOSKY, Equity Residential: We’re fairly large we have over 900 communities around the country and own and manage about 200,000 units in 30 major cities. Being so large gives us the advantages of having a fair amount of resources to develop and deploy service programs. However, one of the challenges I think we all face [is measuring the success of these programs]. At Equity, we’re working on implementing systems that track these service requests, monitor the response time, and follow up with our customers to evaluate our responsiveness on that particular issue. … Who do you think of when you think of great customer service? Nordstrom is one that always comes to mind. But when you read Nordstrom’s mission statement and public literature, they never talk about their customer service. They let their actions speak much, much louder than their words. … My background is 20 years of hospitality technology. … The multifamily industry reminds me of the hospitality industry of five years ago in terms of embracing technology. … Our next steps include deploying these systems that will measure our service response rates: how many calls we get, what types of calls, how frequently we get them, and most importantly, how quickly we respond to them, and was the residents satisfied with the results.
Who do you all look to or consider as a model for customer service?
SMITH: We look a lot at hospitality. The Ritz is probably one of the best examples because they have such a strong foundation. You can’t do this with high hopes, a vision statement, and strong corporate values. You need a strong foundation that is systematic in its approach so that you can consistently deliver the service you want particularly if you have 200,000 apartments. I think it’s hard to deliver that service consistently with 14,000 apartments. I’ve been looking at larger companies like The Container Store. I think Dell is pretty good in terms of exceeding expectations; there’s no doubt that they have tremendous systems in place. We also like Southwest because they’re a fun company. … [I also like Amazon.] I feel like they know me exceptionally well, and I know it’s all technology making it happen.
SADOSKY: I hate to keep bringing up technology, but I find that there is still quite a bit of education needed before people will realize the full benefits that systems can bring to an organization. Typical owners choose to spend dollars on a carpet or a table in the lobby before they ever invest in a piece of technology that would have a return on investment within a year. We’ve mentioned four or five different companies, and at the heart of their customer service is a phenomenal technology engine.
KLUG: We look at luxury auto dealers because we translate our services into a long-term commitment: You have to make that initial sale, but you also have to reinforce it at the right times. It’s a very competitive luxury auto market in Southern California, with Mercedes, BMW, and those types of dealers, and it’s been interesting to see how they rise and fall. There’s one major Mercedes dealer that used to be so excellent. There was constant positive feedback for years on their servicing and how they did follow-up calls, and their business just grew and grew and grew. Now their customer service seems to be going the other way. It’s a good lesson: You put a program in place once, but it takes constant monitoring and evaluating. I know technology is important [and helpful], but in our industry, it still comes down to the person-to-person contact, because it’s such a personal thing, providing a home.
POPE: One of the interesting ones to me is the Diners Club credit card. It’s a competitor of American Express it’s the same kind of program, where you pay your bill every month and it’s not a revolving charge and it’s well accepted by airlines, rental car companies, hotels, and more. I’ve used them for 20 years, and I have yet to have an interaction with someone at that company that is not wonderful. They are just so well-trained, professional, and caring. Every time it happens, you remember it. When it comes to customer service, that’s the impact you want to make on a person, [giving them the memory] of how they were taken care of by someone in your organization.
Next month: How these four executives are tackling the challenge of providing exceptional customer service to residents at their properties.