43 pages • 1 hour read
Ken Blanchard, Sheldon BowlesRaving Fans: A Revolutionary Approach to Customer Service
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1992A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Index of Terms
“Charlies”
Charlie the fairy godmother is the driving force of the plot and the main source of direction when it comes to creating Raving Fans. He is a supernatural figure with a passion for customer service, describing himself as customer service incarnate. Other characters remark on how he’s been in a bad mood about the state of customer service for over a century. He has appeared to and helped multiple people over the years and shared with them the secrets of Raving Fans-level service.
The 2001 edition of Raving Fans includes a dedication to seven customer service experts it refers to as “Charlies.” It also uses the term to describe any influential figure in the field of customer service, and the acknowledgements at the end of the book is titled “Charlie Awards.” This section lists individuals to whom the authors express gratitude, including Hugh Goldie, Chris Hemmeter, Richard Kroft, and Ted Ransby, who receive brief descriptions of their customer service achievements. Top of the list, however, are Richard L. M. “Dick” Dawson and Kerry L. Hawkins, both of whom worked at Cargill Limited, a Canadian company whose management team were eager participants in the development of the Raving Fans system. This indicates that Charlie is less a character than a symbol; he doesn’t develop or expose much of himself throughout the narrative, as he’s ultimately meant to represent the standards that anyone in customer service should strive to meet.
Customer Service
Customer service is the assistance and support that a company offers to its customers. In business studies, customer service is considered an intangible asset. This means it is something that can be of benefit to the company but isn’t measurable like a traditional material asset, such as machinery or staff. Nearly all businesses require some level of customer service in their day-to-day operations, and some make it a major part of their brand identity.
The most obvious type of customer service is that of sales assistants in a retail store. They welcome customers into the store, help them find products, give information on products, and process the customer’s purchase. However, every company has customers in some form. The Area Manager’s fairy godmother, Charlie, explains that a manufacturing plant sells its services to suppliers, a restaurant has diners, and even government offices have members of the public they have to deal with. Customer service is an intangible asset; it is something that differentiates a business from its competition. The main way of measuring the success or failure of customer service is through customer retention and satisfaction. Maintaining these results is the skill Charlie is hoping to teach the Area Manager by stressing The Importance of Excellent Customer Service.
Raving Fans
“Raving Fans” are customers so impressed, overwhelmed, and enthusiastic about the customer service they’ve received that they become incredibly loyal and vocal about how much they love a company. Raving Fans are distinct from satisfied customers. A satisfied customer has their expectations met and perhaps slightly exceeded. However, this means very little according to Raving Fans, as the general expectation of customer service is extremely low thanks to the overall poor standard across the market. Raving Fans, by contrast, find that their expectations aren’t just met but exceeded to the point that they’re utterly dazzled. Raving Fans are hard to keep—their expectations are constantly changing, and only a flexible, customer service-focused company can keep up with their demands.
The concept of Raving Fans is intertwined with the work’s moment of publication. In the Foreword, Mackay argues that the wave of quality products in the market is about to crest and break, meaning that companies can no longer rely on better manufacturing to outperform the competition. In response, the customer service crest is on the rise, and Raving Fans advises that companies would do well to surf it to success.
