BEST PRACTICES IN
creating
A HIGH-QUALITY CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
“Customer service is what we do. Customer experience is what they receive.”
—Alan Steel, president and CEO, Jacob K. Javits Center, New York City
The customer experience is the accumulation of each contact—or “touch point”—your
customer has with your event. These touch points will be provided by your organization
(including you, your staff, and other departments within your organization) and by your
vendors and suppliers (including your general service contractor, hotels, audio-visual
provider, transportation provider, and your host city). But for your customer, these touch
points are from one organization, one event, and one experience.
Learn how to create a high-quality customer experience—one that will convert your
attendees into advocates, your exhibitors into enthusiasts, and your event into a mustattend experience.
Develop a Service Vision and Values Statement
A high-quality customer experience begins with a strong customer service vision and clearly articulated values that address the
needs of all of your customers—attendees, speakers, and exhibitors (and, in some cases, an attendee who is also a speaker
whose company is an exhibitor!). Developing this service vision and values statement may be driven from the top down with
cross-departmental employee input (for corporations) or by members and volunteers (for associations and nonprofits). So …
where do you begin?
“We receive constant feedback from our customer surveys, and they tell us what matters most to them,” says Katy Wild,
executive vice president of customer experience at Freeman. “The key points we hear are: 1) Simplify things—make my life
easier, and 2) No surprises—make things more predictable for me and be transparent.”
Developing your service vision and values statement is about listening—listening to the voice of your customers and turning
what you hear into actionable plans to improve their experience.
© 2014 Freeman Expositions, Inc.
Share Your Service Vision and Values Statement
Consistency is key to delivering a high-quality customer experience. Customers
should expect and receive the same level of excellent customer service at every
touch point. So once you’ve established your service vision and values, share it
with everyone involved in your event, regardless of their role, ensuring that they
know and understand your expectations.
Introduce your service vision and values statement to your organization during inperson training. Record the training so that others can benefit from the content,
including any Q&A or interactive activity. It’s often the unscripted segments that
provide insights into how well the message is resonating with those tasked with
delivering the customer experience. Another option is to conduct a live webinar
specifically designed for virtual audiences that can be shared with employees,
volunteers, and vendors to ensure your service vision and values are clearly
articulated with key stakeholders.
To reinforce the message, post the statement in public areas, such as your
organization’s front lobby or conference room. Distribute wallet-sized cards to
your staff. Create a regular column in your employee newsletter where members
of your organization explain how they incorporate the statement into their
interactions with customers. Ask your IT department to program a screensaver
that can be installed on employees’ computers as a constant reminder.
Reinforce the Message: Freeman employees are given a wallet-sized,
laminated card that includes the Freeman Service Vision, Standards, Purpose
(“connecting people in meaningful ways”), and Values (integrity, empathy,
innovation, enthusiasm, performance excellence).
© 2014 Freeman Expositions, Inc.
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Engage Your Vendors and Suppliers as Partners
CES Shares the Love
The International CES® offers special
customer service training for the
family and friends of CES employees
interested in working at the annual
event. This approach engages a
special stakeholder group who may be
familiar with the event and, because of
their personal affiliation, share in the
goals to make the event successful.
On-site temporary assignments range
from attendee registration, speakerready room assistance, coordinating
room turns, or providing directions and
information. Volunteers wore colorful
“Ask for Help” flags and were easy to
spot at the event.
Select your vendors and suppliers carefully and thoughtfully, as they play a
critical role in providing a consistent, high-quality customer experience. Share
your service vision and values statement with them early in the process,
emphasizing your expectations that everyone—from the wait staff at the closing
banquet to the shuttle bus drivers to the front desk clerks—will enthusiastically
embrace it. This is essential, as your customers won’t remember what company’s
name badge a person was wearing, only that a person at your event was rude,
unhelpful, or disengaged.
Collaborate with the host city’s destination marketing organization (DMO) or
convention and visitors bureau (CVB) for an added level of engagement. DMOs
and CVBs have a vested interest in helping to create a high-quality customer
experience. DMOs can connect you to the local resources that best suit your
needs, including charities for your event’s “give back” day; inform you of other
events taking place in the city during your show dates; and suggest one-of-a-kind
experiences for your attendees—and they provide these services at no charge.
“People don’t want to just be satisfied…they want to be ‘wowed’ by the entire
experience,” says Wild. For large events, the local airport may be your customer’s
first opportunity to be “wowed” in person. Some airports will allow organizations
to post welcome signage so that attendees feel welcomed and appreciated from
the moment they arrive. Also, consider setting up a registration desk at the
airport near the baggage claim so that attendees can pick up their name badges
while waiting for their luggage.
Make the Attendee’s Life Easier: CES offered
badge pick-up desks at the airport.
Union employees and their supervisors often have as much, or even more,
contact with customers at show site as do you and your staff. Starting at move-in,
hold daily meetings with union personnel, acknowledging the important role they
play in providing a high-quality customer experience for your attendees and
exhibitors. Post your service vision and values statement at labor check-in desks,
© 2014 Freeman Expositions, Inc.
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You Never Get a
Second Chance to Make a
First Impression
Establish a special program for firsttime exhibitors to your show. Call and
email exhibitors regularly to remind
them about upcoming deadlines, to
offer opportunities to promote their
presence at the event (especially
complimentary opportunities), and to
ask if they have any questions. Once
on-site, have a customer service
representative stop by their booths to
thank them for exhibiting and answer
any questions they may have. After the
event, follow up with a personalized
email or phone call to thank them
(again!) for their participation and ask
for suggestions on how to improve
their experience when they exhibit
again next year.
Pay special attention to the first-time
attendees at your event to ensure they
become long-time attendees. Before
your event, send a “before you go”
email that includes information such
as where to pick up badges, details
about networking events, and how to
download the event’s mobile app.
On-site, offer a first-timers reception,
hosted by your long-time attendees
and organization leadership, to
encourage networking and to
demonstrate your appreciation for
their participation.
and distribute wallet-sized copies to each union employee. Consider creating a
handout with answers to exhibitors’ frequently asked questions, including who
to contact with last-minute requests for supplies, furniture, or building
materials. Providing union employees with this information and empowering
them to help your customers engages them in your service culture and
emphasizes the importance of their role in the success of your show.
Turning Complaints Into Compliments
Service recovery—resolving the customer issues when things go wrong—is an
important part of managing the customer experience. Be sure your front-line
team members have guidelines on how to resolve challenges a customer is
facing. Experienced supervisors and management staff should have some
flexibility, especially on-site, to address issues promptly. The goal is to build a
relationship with the customer based on trust that problems will be resolved in a
timely and fair manner. And be sure to follow up after the event to ensure they
were satisfied with the resolution.
If You Can Measure It, You Can Improve It
You can put new customer service initiatives in place, but without measurement,
how will you know if these initiatives were what the customer really wanted?
Post-event surveys are a great source of metrics, especially when the survey
questions are thoughtfully written and offer several “free-form” response areas
(e.g., “If you selected ‘none of the above,’ please provide more detail in the space
below”).
Be sure your survey includes a “contact me” option that allows participants to
opt-in to a follow-up call or email. When you contact unhappy respondents, ask
for more details about when and where their expectations weren’t met, apologize
for any inconvenience, and make amends (e.g., discount on registration fees for
next year’s event, complimentary access to recorded sessions). When you contact
happy respondents, thank them for their support, encourage them to share their
experience with others, and let them know you look forward to seeing them again
next year. Both of these groups—and anyone you contact who falls on this
satisfaction spectrum—will know that their voices have been heard.
Once you’ve listened to the voice of your customers, share what you’ve learned—
both positive and negative—with your internal staff. Then, challenge them to
create actionable plans that will improve the customer experience and better
serve the organization’s vision and values. Review the ideas and suggestions,
and set short- and long-term priorities.
© 2014 Freeman Expositions, Inc.
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J.D. Power Certification
Freeman has been recognized for
contact center operation customer
service excellence for a fifth
consecutive year under the J.D. Power
Certified Contact Center ProgramSM.
The Certified Contact Center Program
distinction acknowledges a strong
commitment by Freeman’s Customer
Support Center operations to provide
“An Outstanding Customer Service
Experience.”
Provide Rewards and Recognition
You rely on countless people to provide your customers with a high-quality
customer experience. When you reward and recognize those people, you increase
the chances that those people will continue to perform while inspiring those
around them to do the same.
On-site, make it a point to “catch” people providing exceptional customer
service—helping a lost attendee, soothing a grumpy exhibitor, etc. Hand out fiveor ten-dollar gift cards on the spot to anyone—no matter who they work for—who
goes above and beyond.
Compliment your staff members who are living up to your organization’s service
vision and values. When a customer takes the time to praise an individual or a
group, share that praise far and wide—with the individual and with the individual’s
supervisor, and then at employee meetings and in the company newsletter.
Key to Freeman’s success was
examining its own processes, and then
looking at best practices from
companies outside of the events
industry, according to Wild. Freeman’s
customer service team spent time with
employees from companies known for
providing a high-quality customer
experience—including Zappos, UPS,
Starbucks, and Victoria's Secret—to
learn how they integrate culture, value,
training, and measurement. The team
used these visits to improve on
Freeman’s existing award-winning
program.
A more formal approach would be to link Customer Service Index (CSI) scores
with employee compensation or bonuses. For example, if your CSI scores meet or
exceed 90 percent, or if your CSI scores improve by five percent over the previous
year, everyone receives a bonus.
Another form of recognition is to seek feedback from your team on the service
values and vision statement, training, and metrics. An organization’s challenges
will continue to evolve, and your customer experience program should evolve with
it. Your team will appreciate being heard and contributing to the evolution of the
program and will have a greater stake in its success.
Additional Resources
Selected by Katy Wild, executive vice president, customer experience, Freeman
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Service Failure: The Real Reasons Employees Struggle with Customer
Service and What You Can Do About It, by Jeff Toister
Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose, by Tony
Hsieh
Seth’s Blog (www.sethgodin.com), by Seth Godin
EmpowerMINT.com (blog.empowermint.com), by Destination Marketing
Association International
Best Practices in Creating a High-Quality Customer Experience
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Establish vision and values/standards
Communicate roadmap with internal stakeholders
Provide ongoing training
Engage suppliers and partners
Create a “first-time” program for attendees and exhibitors
Resolve customer discrepancies quickly and escalate when needed
Track and measure success—and areas for improvement
Empower team members to make suggestions and provide issue resolutions
Recognize individual contributions and accomplishments, and highlight behaviors you want others to
emulate
© 2014 Freeman Expositions, Inc.
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