Video - Robert Craven interviews Geoff Ramm
VIDEO: 58:33 mins
AUTHOR: Robert Craven and Geoff Ramm
In this GYDA Talks, Robert interviews Geoff Ramm. Geoff is an expert in Customer Service / Experience and Marketing. He is creator and author of Celebrity Service. He’s challenged and inspired audiences across 43 countries to create award-winning ideas to outperform the competition. Geoff’s clients include, Emirates, Warner Brothers & McDonalds. FORBES called him…. ‘A Game Changer’.
Robert and Geoff discuss:
Service – how would you service change if Brad or Angelina was coming in to see you?
Isn’t Celebrity Service just about B2C?
Everyone says, “Go the extra mile and exceed expectations”
Put the Celebrity Service into every touchpoint and then the gap will be filled, and no-one could compete with the experience
The great accountant
Commoditised business need to out-market out-content and out-serve the competition
Customer experience doesn’t start with a P so isn’t part of the 7 Ps
Celebrity Service starts with the culture – examples of getting it into the business
Do you have the happiest workplace? Ask your people what they want and give it to them
Authentic? it needs to be personalised – deliver internal experience
They’ll remember what we said and what we sent:
Consistency
Excitement
Love
Engagement
Bravado
Response
Independence
Thankyou
You and Your Team
Excite people (Elliot’s Magic Ticket)
Put a ‘Loves’ column in the CRM
Transcription:
Robert Craven 00:49
All and welcome to the GYDA Talks. And today I'm absolutely delighted to have the man that really is a legend in his own lifetime. Mr. Geoff Ramm. Mr. Geoff.
Geoff Ramm 01:04
How are you? How's things?
Robert Craven 01:05
Absolutely fantastic. It's amazing to have you on the show as a guest. I'm really excited for the people who don't know who you are, and why I would describe you as a legend in your own lifetime. Jeff, would you like to just explain what you're known for.
Geoff Ramm 01:20
I'm a keynote speaker. So I speak all over the world delivering seminars, presentations, keynotes, to organisations to individuals, really on two main topics. One is celebrity service, which is what I think I'm really known for. And my other topic is all mg marketing. So my content is fun, engaging, interactive, but also challenging. And everything I talked about, Robert, as you know, it's real life examples that really can inspire a team and organisation to create something very, very special within their business.
Robert Craven 01:56
So you talk about celebrity service, let's get straight into it. You talk about celebrity service, but I kind of wonder. So firstly, it'd be great if you define what you mean by celebrity service. But then I'd like to kind of push you back on that and say, you know, we've got an audience here of owners and founders of digital agencies, they are b2b businesses. Yeah. So I'd like to understand whether you think celebrity service is just about the Viva Viva boom, when you go into a cocktail bar, or whether it can also apply to b2b?
Geoff Ramm 02:28
Should we answer that straightaway? Yes, every business, every organisation.
Robert Craven 02:34
Every business?
Geoff Ramm 02:37
We've got, we've got the first bit the first celebrity service. Okay, so for everybody watching today. Okay, you're delivering a high level of service? If I was to challenge you and say, Okay, on a scale of one to 10, one is abysmal. 10 is incredible. What number would you give yourself in all of the countries rather than United spoken and Vala conferences around the world? The global average response I get from this from one is abysmal to 10 is incredible. The average response is about an eight. Okay, which is quite a high number. Now, there'll be people in the audience's and people virtually saying, Oh, I'm a six, on the for a nine, I'm a 10, we might have all sorts of but the vast majority of people will say the roundabout, the eight. So what people are saying is, Jeff, we're quite high. We're quite good. We're quite good. But there's always a little bit of room for improvement. So how do we get from an eight to a nine to a nine to 10? And, and I've been saying this for years, Robert, you know, customer service client experience, we've been hearing the same things over and over for four decades, right. Every book manuals, bigotry, and I will tell you the two things for your digital agency to stand out from the crowd. The first is this must always go the extra mile.
Robert Craven 04:00
It says that on every single website, every single website, the extra mile.
Geoff Ramm 04:06
We spoke be spoke services unless you're in manufacturing Shut up with anyhow. And the second thing. The second we should have a beer we should be doing what we normally do.
Robert Craven 04:19
What do you think's in here?
Geoff Ramm 04:24
The second thing is something again, that we talked about this in business school, college even. So it was go the extra mile and the other one was, we need to exceed expectations. So imagine that now. We've got the leaders of these wonderful agencies listening to you the expert in this field, saying, oh, yeah, we were talking about that. Try and inspire your team to create a greater client experience because you're pitching, you're pitching against three other agencies. For this piece of work, this piece of work, I could set you up for 2021 and beyond, right? And just think of all of the amazing touch points in there that you could really Create some value, not just return on investment, not just oh, this is what we can do here some new technology. I'm talking about a client experience. So celebrity service, it's a philosophy and the philosophy is a question. This is the question. If your next client potential client with a tweet, email, knock on your door, pick up the phone and say, we need some help. We need your expertise. We need your design, we need your innovation, we need your creativity. And they were in a list celebrity, Hollywood, god or goddess. I'm talking, you know that, you know the names. Robert, you're talking Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Cameron Diaz, George Clooney, these types of things. If they were an LS celebrity Hollywood got I got s, and they wanted to come and see you in a meeting in your office next Tuesday at 10 o'clock in the morning? What will be the difference? Right? What will be the difference in service levels and experience you would give that person compared to Jeff from Robert Craven are any normal, normal client, I'm talking about the way you dress, the way you respond to that inquiry, what you see and what you do. And I bet you the coffee that is served to them is not the stuff that we've been having for the last 12 years. What I'm seeing is, everything would change. And when you drill this question into every single client touch point of which there are hundreds, you know, the proposal that you send out the meeting that you set up the room that every just so much, if you were to say, what would happen if we were to deliver celebrity service, to every single touch point, your eight would go to a nine, your nine will go to a 10 you would shift. Right now we think we're delivering a high level of service role fairly successful, we're doing pretty well. Excellent. But have a celebrity would walk in your service levels go to there. And that is the gap. The gap you don't realise exists within yourself within your team within your agency. But it's a gap that if you can fill there's not a competitor in your, in your in your space that can compete with you for the experience that you give. Now, this is just an experience, what you see what you do, how you how you react, what you create. But think of the long term impact. Think of you know what, what is its agency look like in three years, five years time, you shouldn't have to pitch. People should be knocking down on your door for the way you treat the clients that we already know. And they speak so highly of you. They said you're the most amazing agency we've ever known.
Robert Craven 07:50
So the first the first one is we did you know, we we've followed each other around because I suppose 10 to no more than 10 years ago, I wrote customers King hashtag customers King? Yes. And um, we did research then. And we did some research about three years ago, we took 275 businesses, and we asked them on a scale of one to 10. Do you exceed customer? Do you exceed customer experience? customer expectations? Yes. I think it was 79 or 80% of of suppliers that we exceed customer expectations. We then went to the customers. And I think it was 14 plus one for 14% said yes, they exceed customers. So there's a gap between what we think we give you know because I think everything I decided to do is fantastic and people should be really grateful. Yeah, and and what people get which is it's late it didn't give me what I wanted. It wasn't on time it was quite pricey but so so the first thing is, is there's there's a big gap but the thing I really want to talk about is again another another piece of research which was that it's all very well doing Ritz Carlton doing five star giving champagne and and Butler's and get caught just disappears off your shoulder. Exactly, exactly, exactly. As you go to as you go to the as you go to the swimming pool. They they're aware they satisfy your unknown need by coming up to you with a towel and all this kind of stuff. Yeah. And it's awesome. But it's really, really expensive. I mean, five star service is more is I know 10 times more expensive than two star service. If you want to make money in hotels, you know, run a travel Lodge, you know you'll get 90% occupancy rates you'll get 70 quid a night, but you'll have one person working behind reception and and that's it if you want to run Ritz Carlton you got your 12 people behind reception and you're only charging 10 times the price. So So I'm trying to get was it worth it?
Geoff Ramm 10:05
I know where you coming from with regards to Ritz Carlton, you can see you can see the training, you can see what the what's involved, people who go there are paying a premium. And they expect the premium. Okay? And it's interesting to see about sort of his, what the what that would cost? And yes, I would agree, I you can put you can deliver celebrity service or that five star or whatever you want to call it, you can still deliver that. And I'm talking about the art of personalization. Okay, I mean, I go, I go to a hotel, look, I want I want Wi Fi, I want the room to be really clean. I would like a nice breakfast. And you know, what if somebody actually smiled and took a bit of notice, and actually was rather nice. And maybe he's when I walked down the corridor or member staff didn't put their head down? You know, there's lots of things right, that wouldn't cost anything, but would mean the world. Let me give me an example of we'll talk we'll talk, let's talk b2b. Let's talk a little bit of b2b because it's, it's easy to talk about hotels and airlines. And people always seem to be Jeff, where's the b2b? And I said, Well, give me give me a reason to talk about you. But I have got some great examples that one of the one of the examples so my Haley and Haley, my wife and I, our accountant, so we go to see him twice a year. Okay. Just planning and go through the books, you know, sort of March April time, that type of stuff. guy called Steven Paul, lovely guys, almost plus him as a friend in business more than anything else. But we've been with him for three years, okay. 18 years in business three years with him. Haley and I go twice a year, and we go to his office in County Durham. And we you know, let us say repeat the thing we go upstairs recording and you know, handshakes and kisses and cuddles. Remember those Robert can remember we used to do things like that.
Robert Craven 11:54
Remember that? as well. But that's another story. That was a very late night, anyhow.
Geoff Ramm 12:01
Well, you know, we need to live money. So. So we shake hands or hug and then we sit down. And the first question is, can I get you a tea or coffee? Brilliant? Yeah. Five minutes later, tea, coffee, whatever. We've chose white sugar, whatever it is. arrives, right? And for Oh, my word, two and a half years, I saw these mugs would come out. All right. Have you ever been to a car boot sale? And you've seen a box full of like 300 mugs for like four pence each? And you know, somebody's had to clear out and there's all these different brands and different different shapes, sizes, colours, and you go oh my god, it'd be great for us over. I don't know. The bricklayers convention, for example, anyhow. And I'm like, to me, what is the coffee is good. The tea is good. Now that is a good service. Can we give you a ticket? Yes, perfect. Six months ago, he turned to me at the end of one of our meetings. And he said there Jeff, I just wanted some advice. If you've got a few minutes, I said, Yeah, go for it. And as we're walking out the door, he said, I want to bring a bit more celebrity service to my clients. I said, right, in what way? He said, Well, when you come in, when you come in and we welcome you know, we want to just do something with the walls or might do something with this. And maybe he's the setter. He's not a misfit. Just wondering if you had any ideas. Robert Haley, my wife kicked me under the table just like don't don't, because the mugs have been do my head in for two years. And I said, I've got one idea for you. And he said, What's that? I said, What are these? I said you are professional service. Clients are coming in yet potential clients are coming here. They're going to speak to another two or three accountants. You're not the only one. I said existing clients that come in here. The coffee and tea is good. I suppose this this isn't you. Anyway. Um, I would never thought of it on what I'll do. I'm gonna go and get myself some mugs. I said, that's great. But that's not celebrity service. said well. I said, Okay, you know, where coming? He said, Yeah, I said, you know, it's it's Haley and Jeff 10 o'clock Tuesday morning when Yeah, I said, you know, when we come in and I said, you've gone from good service good coffee. He created this. Now that's great. valued. Look at look at the strap line. Yeah. Yeah. And now he does. Now, our friends in the digital world, you know, the cost of this? pennies, right? Think of this. Think of your next client you want to pitch you know, think and imagine right? There's three of them, you know, they're coming in If you've done a deal with a printer down the road, you've got the screen print just with their name on it. Whatever you want to do, you're the creative people remember? And then can we get your tea or coffee? Or water or whatever it may be? And then, and I said to Stephen, now, now, I've got to tell you this, Robert, this isn't just for us. He did it for every single client. Brilliant. Were talking a couple of quid. And he said, Do the take them home? I went home the deal.
Robert Craven 15:24
How many people have called Haley Do you know? The top with this call you asked me about about my feelings about digital agencies. And one of them as I said to you is that if you want to sell something transactional, if you say to them, I've got whatever it is 10,000 Sharpie pens, can you can you sell on a pay per click campaign? Awesome, I totally get it. They know how to do that. They'll sell stuff off off the internet page. But But there's an issue about not about transactional sales, but about about relationship and and what makes one agency different from the other. Because everyone says, as we've agreed everyone says, we offer an incredibly good value for money. We listen to our customers customer first. And what makes us really unique is our we are award winning. We've done research on that, and a piece of research on just under 200 agencies, and all their so called unique propositions. Were one of sort of five or six of the predictable value for money. Award winning blah, blah, blah.
Geoff Ramm 15:29
Yeah, loads of Jeff's, you know, but, and I said, and I said, Don't Don't be really weird. With a tea and coffee, don't go, there you go. freak them out. But just very casually. Just put it down, and let them discover it. Because what I would love to happen, right is a potential client a goal. And as you're doing some filing or doing something in the next room and come back, they've already Instagrammed it. They're already sharing it, I've just come into this meeting, have you seen this, this is what this occur, I'm only looking for somebody to do my books, look at what they've done for me and look at the care that they're doing. before I've even said, here's the business. So, yes, we can do Ritz Carlton. But dare me, there are 1000s of ways in which we can create a celebrity service at any given point, to be the talk of the town that target your sector, and become the number one for the experience that we that we give. there's there's not an agency or a speaker in the world that hasn't won an award. Do you know?
Robert Craven 17:38
So what does make you unique? What it is, is how you do stuff? And and how many so I have the same thing with you with my accountant. So I love my accountant. I love my cat and my accountant is awesome. Not? And it's not just what he does. It's it's how he does it. So the same thing applies to digital agencies. It's not just oh, wow, we can get you an ROI. Oh, are the investment in Oh, wow, we can do this. It's also about how the agency makes the client feel. Yeah. And presumably, your your argument would be that you that you stop being such a commodity, because you're the only one in town who doesn't cut you, you're the only one in town who takes you to the football, you're the only one in town, whatever it is, you're the only one and that then you're in it, then you're it's like the Jerry Garcia thing, then you're not in a you're not in a category you're, you're in a category of one. So is that is your is that your argument that that that customer service separates you out and makes you more profitable?
Geoff Ramm 18:52
In a world, yes. I just done it cut to the chase. In a world of we can all do fairly similar things. And we spoke about this just off air in speakers and you know, we have to out market and serve and out content everybody else for us to you know, get into 2023 and 2022 Four and beyond. That's what we have to do we know that it's ingrained in our head, but in terms of more profitable you deliver a great experience, they're going to come back. There's so many places I've gone to I'm never gonna go back there again, that restaurant, I'm never gonna go back there again. We're under new management. I know why. But I'm still not gonna go back there again, and go back there again, if I'm drunk or somebody's booked it and it wasn't my choice. So it was a great profits. I wish there was a you know, the chart that says if you do this, you get this. There's not That's called life. But but I'm never gonna go back. Not not digital agency, but I suppose creative industries or creative agencies within industries that I've worked with Way back when Robert saw, Oh 19 years ago, I had a and everything everything changed for God's anyhow 19 years ago, I was marketing manager of a mortar retail group in the Northeast of England. We had about 11 dealerships. I was primarily marketing Honda. But we had Chrysler, Fiat, Citroen, Suzuki, Toyota. Okay, that's it. I remember that. Right? So 19 years ago, but of course, we, you we were put out work, we wanted to advertise it. Take radio, for example, radio, okay. Every single radio, there was Sun FM, there was sentry, there was Metro there were loads at the time, you know. So we had, we had four or five people come into pitch. And there's a guy called David Lee, he was at Metro. And he comes in the office, we've used all of these stations before, but this was the this was for when the 51 plate launched came up when they when it all changed. And it was Boomtown for the for the for the industry, it was superb. But of course, we're going to put a quite a bit of money in to boost 51 plate, but also all the used cars that we couldn't get rid of, because everybody wanted the new plate. So we saw four or five different agency designers and agents within the stations. David Lee from Metro, he was the only one that came in. And he came in with this box. Not for me. I was a marketing manager at the time. But the team was about four or five of us. He brought in a lot of CDs, signed CDs from the artists who have been in over the last couple of months. And he said guys, do you want any of these? How you doing? I can get your tea or coffee? Yeah, that's fantastic. Do you want any of these CDs and the whole team like how folk superb is this? And he never once got out his laptop. He never won short as a PowerPoint. You never once you just said what do you want to achieve? Let's come up with some ideas. Now at the time, Robert, I saw other agencies the audit the same came in with a PowerPoint came in with a brochure with prices at the back. Yeah, we've got the biggest reach in Sunderland, we have the biggest reach in Sunderland as the asset you put you're the only radio station in Sunderland, you should have. Am I missing the anyhow? Bizarre, right? However, all for five of them, we're going to we're going to pitch to us. Now I had I had this idea. Right. And it was a bit of it. You know, sort of red Ferrari very famous brand here. It's in the northeast, was in the country. And I always remember, I heard I got a letter, it was this wonderful letter from the head of Honda marketing saying we've seen nothing like it. It was creative, it was different. Fantastic. And I got I got some lovely words from our rivals bodies at the time, which again was was lovely. And I came up with this idea 51 and I came up with the idea of area 51. You know, being this mysterious place, things are happening. It's all very work when you will leave what's what's what's happening, something's something's appeared from nowhere, area 51. And, of course, 19 years ago, we're talking about, you know, Mulder and Scully and all that type of stuff. So these are the ideas I mentioned to every one of the agents in the agencies. We rocked up to the one in Metro with David Lee, the guy who hands out CDs and little gifts for everybody straightaway. You're in the Good Book straightaway. I'm thinking how good is this, you're looking after without even taking any money. That's a bit of a different experience. But when we walked into the room, they blacked out all the windows, they had the music playing and not a bit of dry ice. And you know what? The cost per add the design costs of producing the yard. How many times you know, sort of over the month of it, we're talking about a few pennies or a few pounds either way. But he put himself out there. He did something different to stand out from the rest. It's called a client experience. I wrote about them in my first book in celebrity service as it this is how it's done. This is how it's done. Nobody else cottoned on to that it was transactional. Going back to what you said transactional. You want an ad Jeff, this is what we can do. Here's a couple of concepts. Would you like a tea or coffee and we'll follow up in three days time. And yet we walked into that office blacked out but a dry ice music was playing I was like this is just what we wanted for the for the dealerships. Kids who got the work Am I a sucker for that? What a different person that went? No, no, we're gonna go with the one that's three pence cheaper.
Robert Craven 24:58
Because you're not you're not all thing. As to all people, you don't need to be all things. So what so I thought I get that. So I'm doing some work with that and next to me with with Google at the moment, and I got this yesterday, and inside is a card.
Geoff Ramm 25:13
And so I saw your post on social media
Robert Craven 25:15
And the workbooks and blob sounds. So an example of a little bit surprising or because you get the parcel and your wife says, what's in there? I don't know. I have no idea what it is. That's really difficult to open and then it's brown paper string sealed now and likewise, I'm a sucker for that. But But what I'm what I'm not getting what I'm not understanding is, is surely intellectually we all get that because we all love. We all love the flower and we leave the Italian restaurant we all we all love the human, I go to my account and I get a menu in advance of drinks and pastries. And what would I like? David Gilroy, your unconscious solution sends a biscuit list out to people saying which biscuits would you like? And people always come in and say, I thought you were joking. That's why I asked for the Jammie Dodgers. No, no, we went out and got the Jammie Dodgers. But what's that about? And he's a a digital agency for lawyers. I mean, there's nothing more boring than working with lawyers. Should I say that? And yeah, I know he blows them away. Because no one no one has a biscuit menu. You know, I mean, a coffee menu.
Geoff Ramm 26:28
The level of experience in that in that meeting and that follow up right the level, the level of expert expectation, the level of service is so low. Snakes are going a field day, like how low can we go? You know, somebody offers a biscuit to somebody to effectively get an account worth 10s of 1000s. But they got Jammie Dodgers. Not difficult, but it's that thought process. It comes back to the culture. Do we want to deliver a great experience? Yes or no? So many was one, two, we start to build like a diet.
Robert Craven 27:02
Okay, so slow down, Jeff, because because that just goes let's just go through the lifecycle of an agency owner. Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap. Oh, I could employ someone tap a tap a tap, tap, tap, tap, tap. Oh, I employ five people. Tap, tap, tap and tap. Oh, we've got 10 people. Yeah. The unexpected employer now is an employer now needs to be a boss. Yeah, what started off as I'm a freelancer, I worked really hard. It's now turned into some kind of a proposition of service, which is, oh, we've got our we've got our proposals here. We've got our 12 step process over here. We've got our systems here. Are we giving customers what we want? Yes, we are. No, we're not Oh, look, we've just been sent a ping pong table or a fridge or whatever it is to make us look cool and funky. But people don't think that is it that people just don't think that they should be delivering a service? Or is it they think it's, it's, it's just a soft, Southern stupid thing to do for want of a better phrase? Or? Or is it? Why is it that people don't go out of their way to blow people's socks off? Brackets when it's so incredibly cheap? It doesn't have to be tickets for Wimbledon.
Geoff Ramm 28:19
Okay, okay. So if you look, if you go back, go back to you know, go back to the olden days of Business Studies at school, my favourite subject Business Studies, you know, marketing was was just like, you our our, our, our birth we were born into marketing we are marketeers by birth, we are in your price product in the world for P seven p's and 12 peas on a common piece can you need and because customer experience didn't begin with a P don't set me off, right? I want I want Oh, God, it was it was somebody in some somewhere in the northeast, I went to this event and they went through the RPS. And any questions, I put my hand up, and I was I was 21 at the time. And I said, Well, what is customer experience or service fit in to this model? Doesn't because it doesn't start with a flippin P. Right. So I had this at school, this college university. And you can think, well, it's maybe it's not as ingrained. It's not as ingrained people. Service is important when we know what's important. But who were the trailblazers? Who Where's where's the where's the stories that we that we read and listen to it, business school, or anywhere? Where do we get this information from? We get it from a 20 minute TED talk. You know, where do we get this information from now you and I champion great service, exceptional experiences. But really an app if I go back and look, I'm just making this up here. But if I go back to my early days in business and starting a business When you say you're starting an agency growing an agency, you know, it's about gaining clients getting clients, how do we get more, and we talked about the promotional aspect, we talked about the brand side of things. I wonder how many and I see this time and time again, and I've said this on my welcome back strategy with you, 2020, during COVID, and all the rest of it. And I've said to people, and I've put five videos, you'll have seen them five videos on on YouTube, and welcome back strategy, I said, when people are on furlough, now when we're we've got time, we've actually got a little bit of time to think about things, are we going to come back and deliver a great experience to what we were doing in February as because what we're delivering in February wasn't all that great. Don't Don't beat yourself up. But are we going to have a celebrity service meeting? Are we going to get everybody together and create a greater experience? Or are we just going to come back and do the same? Personally, it's not it's not a it's not a subject at school? It's not a subject at university. You know, it's branding and digital and PR and media. There's not a customer experience? Course. So it's kind of rightly say, Well, you know, is it important? Yes, it is. But we don't find out until we start losing clients.
Robert Craven 31:17
So you'd say you touched on on two things. You touched on culture? And you touched on on how you, maybe you could talk a bit more about about celebrity service and culture, celebrity service? And how do you? How do you ingrain that because people go to work, people go to work, they want to do a good job, they've got a job as a developer, they've got a job as a Traffic Manager, they've got a job as a receptionist. They read the job description, they rock up, they get the company culture, which is where honest, open, transparent, whatever it is data, not their heads furiously. That's interesting. That's the same as the last agency. So how do you how do you if you're serious about celebrity service, I love the idea because I'm, I'm shaking the idea of Ms. Jolie or Brad Pitt coming into my business? And yes, we definitely serve better coffee than we normally serve with cleaner cups. And we do over the place, you know? So, so how do you? How do you make it happen into your business?
Geoff Ramm 32:27
Okay, possibly the best thing I can actually do for yourself and everybody watching now, Robert, is, as I said, at the outset of in our intro, that I talked about real life examples, and that's possibly the but I'm not gonna I'm not theory, if you if you, if you watch my videos and buy my books, this is no theory in there. There's no graphs and charts. If you find a graph chart, you can have your money back. There's nothing. It's real life examples. And the best example I can give you in terms of a culture in terms of, okay, here's, here's one for you, right. And you've just mentioned Google. So that's that's reminded me as well. So celebrity very quickly, celebrity is a philosophy. But it also is a nine stage plan. Okay, it's a nine stage plan. It's a programme. It stands for consistency, excitement, love, engagement, bravado, response, independence, thank you, and you and your team. I've done that a few times. Right. So that's what that's that's what it is. Now, when I do this in keynotes and virtual presentations as you do virtual. Now, when we all do this, when we do this, I pick out certain stories for those certain nine to build into the timeframe. However, before we even get because all that's about delivering externally, before we even get there, we need to deliver internal eternal experience to ourselves to our team to our organisation, and I say it starts with the foundations. So I've got my most favourite story, one of them for building the foundations is what I'm going to say now. So in an audience, participant of event, I'll say, Do you have the happiest place of work right now? Do you have the happiest? Did you do you hop, skip and jump in and work? You can't wait for that email to ping? You think? Oh my god, it's five o'clock. You know, I'm supposed to leave at three. I love it here. I didn't realise Do you have the happiest place to work? Now it's great if it's an audience of 20 or an audience of 2000 year doesn't know. And I say okay, if you had to leave your place of work now. Leave it for good. And on Monday morning, you started at the happiest place to work for in any brand, the happiest. You could choose any brand in the world to work for that which you think will be the happiest? Who would you go and work for? And then I let the audience answer. These are the answers. I get Robert to Google, you've just said it Google. I get Lego. I see it. Yes. Like I said, you know, on your first day in the office is you've got to build your own desk. And I didn't know that. I'm just making it up. I don't know. But it will be good if I care box and said, make your own desk. What else do I get? Apple? At Apple. I get Google. And that's why like, Oh, why, why good. And then the interest model Google is I say, why Google? And they got, they've got a slide. I said, right. So in order for your team to be the happiest that they can be, to want to deliver a great experience externally. Get a slide. And you can see people's faces go on. Now, we can't do that, Jeff. And I said, Well, why why are we Why would you go there? Anyhow, we have this debate goes around, I say, right. Here's my answer. The happiest workforce I've ever seen in my entire life. And I've worked with quite a lot of businesses around the world. The happiest, greatest workforce is a call centre in Wrexham.
Robert Craven 36:10
Really.
Geoff Ramm 36:13
Exactly that they go. No, and people laugh and I go, No, no, no, no, no, no, no, that's a call centre in north Wales, right? And what I say it's a business called Moneypenny. It's a call answering service. So right now Robert, my phone is on my office, foreigners on permanent divert to Moneypenny Lea are amazing. I love them to bits were clients of each other's. Okay. So for how long? Four or five years? I can't remember now. So Moneypenny saw a lovely tweet that somebody put out about me and Joanna, the CEO contacted me, we just connected on Twitter, and she said, Oh, this sounds a celebrity service. This sounds interesting. And we had a conversation. And she booked me to do the very first celebrity service session for the Moneypenny staff. I drove from the northeast across to Wrexham, the day before, I wanted to have a meet Juwanna and have a walk around the offices, because it's a brand new headquarters. It's about three years old, at three or four years old now. Brand new state of the art headquarters, they built it, they build it, it's stunning, right? So I rock up. And I have never seen so many happy staff. In all my days. I thought they're on drugs. It was just a little bit weird. Everybody was like, hi, hi. And I don't even know you. This is really weird. So it's a call answering service. So they take on my called wonderful people. However, however, and this is what I'm gonna, this is for anybody running an agency right now, I wouldn't have ever done this for your staff and your team? Because if you do, I wonder what answers you're gonna get back. Right? So the business was expanding, expanding, I think that the business but similar to me, but at 19 years, ultimately, that and then moving into this purpose built building. But before they did all the final touches, you know, had the building that the plot, before they did this, every member of the staff in their current location received an a five piece of a piece of paper. And on there was we're moving to new premises stay at the art, it's going to be stunning. We can't wait for this brand new journey. But we realise you spend more time at work than you do at home, take away sleep. Right? So what would you like to see in your brand new place of work? What would you like to see? That would deliver a great experience to you and for you to want to deliver a greater experience to our clients? What What can we do? And it wasn't a tick box at the bottom that says pool table. Extra pay shorter hours, all that rubbish nonsense, right? They left it blank. They just left the bottom of thing but whatever you want, just write it down. Put it in the box. And let's see what let's see what would do. Anyhow, it this now this does work so much better. Because when I do this on stage, I'll do this virtually I've only got loads of slides, but I didn't realise we're going to talk about this today. But I'm going to picture it for you. Right. So I woke up to the to the front of the building Star Trek doors, walk through a corridor into the main reception on the left hand side as you go for strain on the left hand side, on a wood panelled wall. There's a etched into the wood. It says this is dedicated to all of the wonderful staff members of Moneypenny that have made it what it is today. You know, and it's a wonderful, it's a wonderful piece. It's a wonderful thing. It's another reason why I honed in on that image. When I come back. There are hundreds of names etched in to the wood. These are the names of the people that have been working there since day one. Some of them have left. Some of them it's delay, but they have been there all etched into the wood. And when I see a building, could you imagine? Could you imagine you your agency, your business, whatever it is a school, a manufacturer, a service, a hotel, whatever, whatever the organisation is a bank, imagine that your name a staff members name is in the foundation's. How would you think that makes them feel? On the right hand side of the wall? Robert, there's a there's a list. It's a shorter list. It's not. There's not hundreds and hundreds of names. It's a shorter list. These are the people that have been there for 10 years. When you reach 10 years in football, you get a testimonial because footballers need some more money, right? It Moneypenny you go on to the tenure wall. And when I'm walking around, I'm gone. How long have you been here? So I've got another three years to go. To get here seven years, let's see. Yeah. And if nobody wants to live, and when I'm talking to audiences and clients, I said nobody wants to leave a call centre. That's unheard of. Anyhow, anyhow, I must have took a dozen photographs that day. It doesn't photographs, right of all the different things that I saw in and around the business. So one person on this FYI piece of paper turned in and the rod is any chance we could have a funky meeting room. Funky meeting room, you know, because these meeting rooms, you know, the same old same old projector stuff. And they built this tree house, this wonderful tree house in the middle of the sort of is stunning. Somebody brought is any chance we can make the toilets a little bit more homely. And the doors to the front of the laboratories are like front doors from your house. Right? They are two more things, two more things. And we talk about culture. Because when I talk to audiences, I say, this is a different culture. Nobody wants to leave. It's a call centre in north Wales. And as it helps it, you just smile, you just smile. I think for me, personally, I think the names in the wall is stunning. For me as well, the most wonderful piece of experience culture for the staff that ever seen. They've got the module wall, the module wall. And there are hundreds of these all over the building. You know, any spare piece of wall? It's not it's not used for a motivational, stupid poster about climbing a mountain, right? Get over yourself. You're not? You're not going to claim it. You know, there's a there's a try before. There's there's a module wall. So for example, Robert, your name is etched in the front, you're a part of our DNA. But what is Robert achieved? What's he done? He must have done something good. Ah, yes. You see, Robert, did he send out a card to that clients, child for passing their, their driving test, or he did this or he did that, or whatever he's done. And what they do, they don't just, they don't celebrate this on the internet. They professionally printed off, mount it, and put it on the wall in a box. This is what Robert did on this day to create a great experience. There are hundreds of these all over Moneypenny. Last one very quickly, because we've got loads more to talk about very quickly. And it's the hero of the story. And there's so much more I could tell you but hero story. He's a bit of somebody wrote any chance of a pope. So they built a pope inside the business. And it is called the Dragonborn. Was there a greater Pope name for a call centre? It's just called the Dragonborn. And of course, what does staff do? They meet, they stay a bit longer. You know, when they when they shift finishes on a Friday night, they'll meet in the bar and meet in the pub. And it just what I'm seeing here is celebrity service is vital for our external clients. But let's get it right first, let's get it right internally. And I wonder how many digital agencies right now have turned to anyone if your team and have said whether you're working from home or in the office? What can we do to make this the greatest workplace that you've ever known? Because I'll tell you what, I bet the answers won't cost that much.
Robert Craven 44:40
Nice. So what do you think the differences between I think the only way I can describe it is a manufactured celebrity service, you know, so head office in Kansas is So this is what we're going to do to make it look like we're going to caring community. Ping pong, tables, fridges, whatever it is.
Geoff Ramm 45:08
Yeah, yeah. Slides.
Robert Craven 45:11
Versus, and I hate the word authentic service. But because it could be manufactured, you could you could say, oh, well, these are the things we need to have in place to make it look like we really care. But really, we're only after increasing ROI really only after increasing shareholder value, versus somewhere that really does care about about blowing people's socks off.
Geoff Ramm 45:39
At look, we you coming back to my favourite pee pee word. And that's personalization, personalization of the client personalization of the team member. But so yeah, if Kansas does see, you know, a pool table basketball court, you know, the most expensive coffee in the world, so be it but the 3d teammates don't even let coffee in also, yeah, it's no. And you see, we come up with these ideas, they can everybody be happy one blankets will sign a check. And it's all done. That degree of personalization is what makes the experience go back to what Moneypenny have done. It's not the toilet doors. It's not the module. It's not the Pope, it's the fact that the flip and asked what would you like, and they listened. They listened. And for me, that that art of personalization, imagine you come up with an idea for a poem, or you came up with an idea for whatever it may be. And they actually did it. We talked about you know, the they don't listen to us. They don't listen to us. We've got a suggestion box, but it's you know, it's had cobwebs on it for six years. No, I can't find the key.
Robert Craven 46:48
It's got to go from the bottom up. You can't be imposed from above.
Geoff Ramm 46:52
But it's got to be asked from the top down as well. Yeah, we ask from the top down and the ideas. The ideas are there. Guess why? Because everybody is at the coalface there's a nice little 70s reference northeast, everybody the cool fears, if they, they they're speaking with clients all the time, they they're working with the teammates and colleagues, they're coming up with ideas during the during the break. But it's it's for me, it's hard to harvest and these ideas and they will, what can what can we do? What can we do? And you know what, this year? My word this year, more than any other time in history. This is the time clients will remember what we said, but also what we sent. That's it. And I've said for business, I said it's actually I'm writing my next book. I'm following you, Robert, I don't know how many books I can do it. But I'm writing my next book, right?
Robert Craven 47:48
Oh, you got a 10 year headstart on me.
Geoff Ramm 47:51
I said, and the back of the book, it's trying to remember this. I'm trying to say, so much easier to see on stage, isn't it? But I've said that, you know, if the whole world isn't talking about you, you're not delivering an experience worth talked about. You know, in order but I do 2020 This is the year clients and indeed staff DME but but clients that's the good clients for now, because I know that people will get freaked out if you know well that's that's who pays the bills, I get it. But will they will remember what we sent. The remember what we said. Now the first week of lockdown. This will freak some digital agencies out. Ready? Now for anybody right in the digital world, this is called in for anybody under the age of 30. Right. This is called discard Horst
Robert Craven 48:52
card, or like a thank you card. Yes, thank you cards and
Geoff Ramm 49:00
ideas spread, Robert No, no.
Robert Craven 49:03
Don't tell him don't tell anyone at all. They all want one.
Geoff Ramm 49:05
So I've got here is a story of a client of mine a wonderful piece of celebrity service. I got the photograph. And there's a message on the back that says Look, these are unpredictable times we're living in if anything, no 100 100 Every single one. But I send it to every single client around the world. It costs a fortune, cost of flip and fortune in airmail, it doesn't matter. But I've been sending out postcards and I ditched my, my newsletter but as soon as this happened, I did that. Whether it's Robert Craven, Jeff from any agency, any business, any school, any organisation any call centre in Wrexham, we've got to stand out now, during the craziest thing I've done all year now I'm proud of a lot of things that I've done. And like you, Robert, we've we've tried to help as many people as I can. I don't know how many podcasts. I don't know how many videos, I can't remember how many just things just helping our clients Just to keep going and uplifting the spirits and give them ideas. But the most craziest thing I had, so every year for 18 years, every have 18 years in business. I've always done Christmas hampers chocolate. So Grace, our daughter and I we go to the local supermarkets, you know, when September happens and everybody mourns on social media can't believe it can't believe it, you know, the selection boxes are out. And you know, everybody mourns about Christmas. And all but Chris and I are the only ones that don't mourn, right? Because we're like, yes. And in October, Chris and I take about three trolleys each quarter as there are test scores 11 o'clock at night, and we fill them full of selection boxes, chocolates. But we have got a box. And anybody who's booked me to speak at their conference in this year 2020. It's a thank you, just as you said, Thank you, I get a card, I always have a different card every year handwrite the card, hand rank the card. And I send this out. This is bit different. But like you so many of our live events have been postponed to 2021. I mean, I don't know how many days we can fit into 2021 at the minute, but it's all being pushed back. But our clients, my clients need help. They need support. They need an uplift, they need a smile and my biggest My biggest piece of celebrity service, I suppose this year and I'm a b2b. I'm a business to business person was I needed to put smile on faces. So I rang up the main man himself in June, and I called Santa Claus. I said, are you busy? He said, Well, he said no work one day a year. I said, I need you to come out of semi retirement. He said before I said my clients need some help. He said, Well wait, I said I'm going to bring Christmas forwards from December to June. And I created a merry summer Miss campaign. Robert. This is the card which looks like Father Christmas hat. But
Robert Craven 52:11
I can see very good.
Geoff Ramm 52:14
Okay. All the digital creative people are going to get this
Robert Craven 52:18
but remember paper more paper.
Geoff Ramm 52:22
But I put it out. I put my hand wrote the message there. But I actually put in a printed message. I said, Look, this year everything is turned upside down. It's not easy to keep track of the day, month or season. With this in mind. I'm bringing Christmas forwards. And every and I looked at clients who I've worked with over the last 234 years Moneypenny included and Balfour Beatty and all these wonderful organisations and I just I sent them a box and I said, just thinking of you, you know, it's crap. It's awful right now, but put a smile on your face. And I didn't need to do it. My accountant will tell Steven will tell me you shouldn't have done that. He got one by the way. We've just got to do you and I How many conventions do we go to where we're sat in between speakers that says you've got to do something different and then nobody shows us how, Jeff how are we different?
Robert Craven 53:18
So to wrap up so you've told us what you're doing next which is there's a new book on on the blockchain Yeah, that's that's very exciting people can get hold of your links and stuff at the end of the at the end of the show. So you've got your your brother in law your son in law your cousin in law whatever it is that a lovely meal haha and Bobby's have lovely meals a couple of bottles of wine brandy, you're coming out of the restaurant. They turn around you know, say So, Jeff, I've been running this digital agency. Can you just give me your your pearls of wisdom? Your golden nugget, Tommy, What do you think I should do with my business to give it this celebrity service you keep talking about what's your what's your one liner? Jeff? What's your one liner Jeff, it'll be your.
Geoff Ramm 54:11
Wow the first in celebrity is excitement. Right. And excitement is not about telling jokes and it's not about juggling in the office when it comes to see and being all you know flash. Excitement is putting a smile on somebody's face. I've just mentioned that there with with the Marisol in this campaign. excitement for me. There is a video on my website. There's a video actually on YouTube. And it's called Elliott's magic ticket. Right. It's one of my favourite stories. Right. And it was the last conference I did before locked down. So what happened to Celtic Manor, it was revision Express. And this is what this is about six, seven minutes long called Eliot's magic ticket. Have a look at that. Have a look at that video. Because it's about it's about spot In the opportunities and take an action. I'm not expecting anybody with this digital agency, Robert Wright watching this right now to say, Oh, we'll get mugged with the names on it. It might not be appropriate, it might not be the thing. But create your thing. Yeah, Spot the opportunities. And, you know, we talk, how many who's got, you know, CRM systems, we've got a database of clients, you know what this. So that's the first nugget I'll give you, I'll give you a second one. As you go into getting into the tax, you have to get two bottles of wine is the second one, just as I give it to the taxi driver, and he'll tell you, Okay, this is an your CRM system, there's a column that's missing, and it's been missing since day one. It's the column that will change everything. Right. So right now you have for name Christian name, surname, date of birth client, website, staff, what the views when the views when they're all that rubbish, right? It's basically marketing database. It's not CRM, customer relationship notes. It's a bloody marketing database. So using it to spam the living anyhow.
Robert Craven 56:05
Calm down, calm down.
Geoff Ramm 56:07
Is a column missing, right? There's a column missing. And that column is called Lux. Lux. What does the client love? What do they love? And it could be it could be yachting. It could be they could I don't know, I guess it could stand collect, they'd love to travel. They may love astronomy, they may I don't care what it is. But I'm just saying that once you populate that column, once you populate that column, the magic can happen. I'm a huge Star Wars fan. Right? I'm a bit of a little bit of a geek. You can see some of the things behind me signed photographs from some of the staff. Kelly Fisher and if you see that one there, only Fisher because that's my favourite. That's it as a Oh, wow. And when clients know about this, yeah. If I go into a hotel room or what, whatever it is. That is when I know they've listened. That is no one. No, they've took an opportunity, and they've took action. And you know what, if you can do it for less than a fiver, it means so much more.
Robert Craven 57:20
Perfect place to finish, you might just add about five people a year spot my endless mentions of Barolo wine, which is only 15 pounds in Tesco, all good assets. But on a serious note, Jeff, that's been absolutely fantastic listening to you the idea of Brad Pitt coming in. And I just know, they wouldn't get the same service. Other people get that it's just, it's just the idea of them walking through the idea of what we would do for them. And it's just kind of made me see that idea of it's not about customer service. It's about treating them like celebrities and all the things that go on. Thank you so much for being awesome guest much for entertaining us and giving us too much food for thought. It's been absolutely fantastic. Thank you very much indeed.
Geoff Ramm 58:18
Pleasure. All the very best. Take care.