Steven D. Levitt, author at the Freakonomics blog, writes about what he calls Outrageously Good Customer Service. His story is a great example of a company which is

• using information about its customers to determine the most important, highly valuable customers
• deploying dedicated employees whose task is to “monitor” these high value customers
• actively working to deliver a remarable customer experience by ensuring that their product or service offering is delivered in the best possible way

 

Here are Steve’s experiences:

Number 1:
Halfheartedly, I approached the counter and said that I had a seat on this plane, but it was probably long gone. The woman behind the gate, Carlene Boyd, replied, “Is your name Steve Levitt?” I said, “Yes.” She said, “I thought you might show up. So I saved your seat until the last second. Here it is, feel free to board.” I didn’t think to ask her why she thought I would show up so late. But that one simple act was enough to make me loyal to American Airlines until the end of time.

Number 2:
As I sat down to a dinner of fast food Chinese, my cell phone rang. The caller was a United Airlines employee named Michael. (Sorry, Michael, I can’t recall your last name.) He said, “I see that you’re at the airport and your flight is delayed a few hours. A seat opened up on an earlier flight, so I grabbed it for you in case you wanted it. It leaves in forty minutes, so you’ll have to hurry.”

His conclusion:
I have no illusions as to why American and United are nice to me: I travel way too much and they are the major airlines serving Chicago. I am a good customer. Still, compared to all the other things that airlines can do — serve warm nuts, show good movies, give a few inches of legroom — I would trade it all for a few more instances in which the airline does something out of the ordinary to get me home faster to see my wife and kids.

And this is exactly the point of remarkable experiences: doing something out of the ordinary makes your customers perform better (being at home with your kids earlier) and they will most probably come back next time they need your service.

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