You
must focus on the three important areas in order to satisfy your
home buyers and watch your customer satisfaction ratings go up:
deliver homes 100% complete at closing, close on time, and provide
responsive warranty service. NAHB Research Center surveys* indicate
that if you consistently follow all three rules, you will have
loyal customers for life. Miss one, and overall customer satisfaction
levels plummet.
When customers sign the contract, they
are 100% satisfied that they are buying the best home for the
money or they would have bought elsewhere. From this point forward,
maintaining 100% levels of customer satisfaction depends entirely
on how well you deliver.
Deliver the Home 100% Complete
Nothing says "quality control"
to home buyers like a final inspection with no punch-list items.
Customers expecting a sizable list are truly impressed. They
feel their builder has acted in their best interest to protect
them. They enter the warranty period confident that there will
be little or no problems to fix.
Kennedy Community Development, 1997
National Housing Quality Award winner, performs a 600-point inspection
one week before closing. All items, without exception, must be
fixed prior to the customer's final inspection. Kennedy’s
satisfaction ratings are consistently in the high 90% range.
Deliver on Time
Delaying a closing date can be a
crisis for your home buyer. Sales contracts that give you rights
to deliver anytime within a year are meaningless at ensuring
customer satisfaction. If the buyer believes you are responsible,
imagine what kind of referrals they are giving.
T. W. Lewis builds in the Phoenix
area where scarcity of trade contractors can upset closing dates.
When customers sign a sales contract, they are given a range
of expected closing dates. Six weeks before closing, after construction
progresses through several of the scarce trades, a firm closing
date is set. Using this method, customers are prepared to remain
flexible so that a crisis is avoided.
Responsive Warranty Service
Customers make most home buyer referrals
during their warranty period. Therefore, it is extremely important
to maintain, or even improve, customer satisfaction levels during
this time. When callbacks occur, remedy the situation promptly
to show you accept responsibility thereby maintaining customer’s
confidence. Each callback is a customer satisfaction "moment
of truth" that has lasting effects.
Neumann Homes, Naperville IL, has
a 15/24/7 warranty customer response program. Ken Neumann, President,
says "We have a commitment to respond to all customers in
some form within 15 minutes of their contact, solve the vast
majority in 24 hours, and complete all work on major issues in
7 days." Currently 74% are completed in 24 hours and an
additional 23% are completed within 7 days.
Examine data from your own customer
satisfaction surveys to find how these three keys to customer
satisfaction provide you with an opportunity to improve customer
satisfaction.