Just five months into its operations, shopping mall 313@Somerset at Orchard Road has received more than 14.7 million visitors, higher than its original target of 10 million.
SPRING Singapore says the mall’s recipe for success can be attributed to its commitment to customer satisfaction.
It entails more than just good service quality.
The mall has also focused on meeting the two other drivers of customer satisfaction – customers’ expectations and the value of its services.
The mall embarked on the Customer-Centric Initiative (CCI) in February last year.
The aim is to maximise its customer experience and to meet its vision of becoming Singapore’s leading retail destination for mid-market fashion, food and lifestyle.
The CCI is a multi-agency initiative that is part of the Go-the-Extra-Mile for Service (GEMS) movement to transform Singapore’s service quality in the retail, food & beverage, hospitality, healthcare and transport sectors.
313@Somerset shared its experiences with Minister Lim Swee Say in the Prime Minister’s Office.
According to the owners of 313@Somerset, one area of focus was to ensure that the interface between customers and staff was seamless.
Queries by customers had to be attended to quickly through a dedicated concierge programme.
313@Somerset has placed its concierge counter prominently at the centre of the atrium and the counter does everything from taxi bookings and shopping delivery to providing interpreters.
When selecting concierge teams, staff who could speak multiple languages was also considered.
This took into account that 30 per cent of its customer base came from neighbouring countries.
Its concierge teams are able to communicate in Mandarin, Cantonese, Bahasa Indonesia, Malay, Tagalog, and English.
The mall set up a dedicated training and career centre to offer in-house training on retail service excellence and business etiquette to the employees of its retailers six months before the mall was scheduled to open.
With the aim of creating a service culture in Orchard Road, it extended the training to employees of other malls as well.
In July 2009, 313@Somerset became the first retail mall in Singapore to be awarded Accredited Training Organisation status which allows the mall to conduct its own training.
To date, over 1,000 employees have completed the accredited training.
Source : Channel NewsAsia – 14 May 2010