[Crown Customer Service Awards] And They're Off!

Editor’s note: Batzner Pest Management won PCT’s “Best-in-Class” Customer Service Award for medium companies ($750,000 to $6,000,000 in annual revenues) in 2006. On the following pages is a profile of the company’s award-winning customer service programs.

It’s no Indy 500, but Batzner Pest Management’s annual Madagascar Hissing Cockroach Races help build employee morale which, in turn, makes employees more willing to provide good customer service.

“If you get everybody on the team thinking the same way, it just kind of permeates down,” said Jerry Batzner, president of Batzner Pest Management.

That “team thinking” leads to not only happier and more-productive employees, but to ones who are more apt to provide excellent service which, in turn, brings in more and better business.

“Your callbacks go down because you’re delivering a higher level of service,” Batzner said, “Satisfaction is higher, customer surveys get increasing results every year and you don’t have employee turnover. That’s great.”
Batzner noted that the company’s retention rates for customers and employees both are above 90 percent.

ROACH RECOGNITION. The cockroach races were part of a move five years ago to improve the company’s customer service level, both to its external customers and to its own employees.

In addition to the races, Batzner implemented a program that encourages employees to reward one another for going above and beyond. The program has the company’s 75 employees give one another points in recognition of great customer service. At the end of each month, employees can redeem points for gift cards to local restaurants, gas stations and stores.

“It’s a self-pride type of thing,” Batzner said. “It makes the day go a lot better. A lot of times people give good service day in and day out and people just take it for granted.”

The company also surveys its customers randomly each month and the responses are posted on a bulletin board in the office. Batzner said about 40 percent of the surveys are returned, and 90 percent of those are satisfied with the company’s work.

Batzner Pest Management, based in the Milwaukee suburb of New Berlin, Wis., covers the southeastern corner of Wisconsin and northern Chicago suburbs. Jerry Batzner’s great-uncle, Ed Batzner, founded the company in 1946, and it has expanded to include service centers in Fond Du Lac, Madison, Oshkosh and Racine.

The young Batzner started working with the company when his parents, Al and Gloria, took it over in 1972, while he was still in high school. He’d get off the bus, start cleaning up the shop, catch a ride home with his dad and take care of some service calls on the way.

A CHANGING INDUSTRY. And in the last 25 years, he said, customer service has had a big impact on the work of pest management professionals.

“You see a lot of it in our industry. Companies have really embraced it. The expectations of the clients are higher,” he said.

Not only are customers expecting more from their pest control companies — things like “green” products and Internet-based service requests — employees too, want more from a company. When they get it, Batzner said, they’re willing to work hard making sure customers are satisfied.

“If you want to attract key, star players, you have to change who you are as a company, because there’s competition for good people,” he said. “If a person doesn’t have a propensity to give good customer service, you’re not going to get it no matter how hard you try. Sometimes you can’t get the people interested in giving good customer service unless you recruit them.”

SAY WHAT YOU MEAN. Open communication is vital to maintaining a good customer-company relationship, Batzner believes.

“You have to make sure that you completely understand what the customer is asking,” Batzner said. “We really sell what our service call is going to be.”
Batzner recommends having employees — service technicians, sales representatives and customer service representatives — repeat back what they think the customer is saying, just so they understand totally what (the customer) wants.

Constantly delivering good customer service will allow you to build relationships with your customers — relationships that become strengthened each day. Those relationships, Batzner believes, will keep customers happy even when you make a mistake — if you’re late to a service call, for example.

“If you do it all the time, your (customers) are a little more forgiving,” he said. “You can’t just turn on good customer service...you have to do it all the time.”

The author is assistant editor of PCT magazine.

Tips for better customer service from Jerry Batzner

Follow the golden rule. “There’s the old adage ‘Treat others as you would like to be treated.’ I think that’s real important.”

Don’t try to get water from a stone. “If a person doesn’t have a propensity to give good customer service, you’re not going to get it no matter how hard you try.”

Maintain clear, open lines of communication. “More often that not, (the customer’s) resolution is far less than what you’re thinking it’s going to be.”
Exceed customer expectations. “Try to give them something more than what they’re asking for.”

Spreading the word

Batzner Pest Management’s annual Madagascar Hissing Cockroach Races have brought the company plenty of media attention, especially from TV news programs throughout the country.

Helping attract the media have been creative marketing campaigns. Batzner’s Marketing Manager Chris Venuti, with the assistance of Jordan Fox, a media and PR consultant, spearheaded this year’s effort.

Three weeks before the event, Batzner press releases were hand-delivered to all local TV/radio stations and newspapers. The releases were dropped off with a customized media kit attached to a package of gummy centipedes with a card that read: “Please enjoy these gummy centipedes while you review our attached press release. It’s time again for Batzner’s annual Madagascar Hissing Cockroach Races!”