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The Britain Brunei
Business Forum (BBBF) held a Masterclass on Branded Customer
Service, at Laksamana College on Wednesday, 27th
July 2011.
Mark Grieves lead the
class in an engaging and enlightening way describing the
practical steps regional and international brand, and
service leaders, take to put their businesses ahead of the
competition in the minds of customers to significantly
increase their profitability.
Aside from
being a member of the BBBF, Mark Grieves
is a
recognised expert on designing and managing the
Branded
Customer Experience,
with nearly
30 years experience gained internationally with brand and
service
leaders such
as Orange, Telkom (South Africa), Microsoft, Tesco, Virgin
Group, BPL (India), National Westminster Bank and OCBC Bank.
He is also the founder and director of several start-up and
SME service businesses, including BEaM Sdn Bhd. He has
extensive expertise in customer-focused, revenue and
profitability growth; loyalty creation and improvements in
customer advocacy and brand value management. He is invited
all over the region to give such talks and classes.
The highly
interactive Masterclass included a mixture of best
practices, case studies and personal experience to provide
‘tips and tricks’ to help turn ‘average’ customers into
‘loyal’ customers, and become advocates of an organisation’s
brand. Mr. Grieves suggested that Brunei should look to
their neighbours, other than Singapore, as an example of
excellence in customer service.
Singapore is
a world-player but countries much less developed, or as
wealthy as Brunei, such as Cambodia and Vietnam, as well as
Malaysia and Indonesia, are already well on the way to
upping their service game
One of the
lessons to take from the Masterclass is for organisations to
know what their customers really value, and to provide an
‘experience’ rather than just the product or service.
Experiences leave with a customer feelings and lasting
memories, and it is through these ‘feelings’ and
‘experiences’ that a customer becomes loyal to a brand.
Improving
customer experience is both a critical challenge and a huge
opportunity for Brunei businesses: excellent customer
service is the basis of all success; Brunei’s ASEAN
neighbours are already investing heavily in doing this; and
the government is actively encouraging Brunei business to
improve its effectiveness and rely less on subsidies to
compete.
The high
demand and expectation in Brunei, among customers, users of
services, locals and visitors, for better customer service
was an important reason for the Masterclass. The BBBF’s
role
is to contribute to the improvement of the overall Brunei
business environment as well as UK-Brunei trade and commerce
relationships.
Among those
who attended were employees of HSBC, Standard Chartered
Bank, G4S, Adinin Works, Asia Inc Forum, BIG and Megamas
Training Company.
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