Summary of Raving Fans-Ken Blanchard & Sheldon Bowles

Summary of Raving Fans-Ken Blanchard & sheldon bowles

Raving fans is written in a parable style in which the story teaches you how to deliver what a customer really wants by instituting effective systems and making raving fan service a constant feature, not just a passing fad.

The story starts with the new area manager of a business who was very nervous about his new job. As he was sitting in his office one day his fairy godmother by the name of Charlie (No, it’s not a lady) showed the area manager the three secrets to create raving fans, the ultimate in customer service. The fairy godmother took the area manager to a small department store named Varley department store where he showed him how excellent the customer service at the store was. The area manager met Leo the owner of the company who gave him his first secret to creating raving fans.

Leo gave the area manager a shield bracelet and told him to look on the shield to find the first secret to creating raving fans. It simply read “decide what you want”. The area manager was somewhat confused about this statement as he could see no relevance of it to customer service. After some time Charlie took the area manager to a grocery store that was known for its best customer service, people drove more than forty miles just to shop at Sally’s grocery store. Sally gave the area manager more insight on what “decide what you want” meant. She said that you should paint the perfect picture of your business and how you want it to be in your mind’s eye. You should picture exactly how your customers will be served and how the business will run on a daily basis, she says that sometimes it may seem impossible but as you slowly put your dream together everything will fall into place. She told him about how she pictured her business and how she kept her vision of perfection built around what the customer wants in her head and worked towards it so that the store could be where it was at the current state.

The area manager was then taken to a manufacturing plant where the second secret was revealed to him. The plant manager told the area manager to have a look on the other side of the shield bracelet and it read “discover what the customer wants”, again he was disappointed by this quite obvious statement. Bill (plant manager) explained to the area manager that all you need to do is discover the vision of what the customer really wants and then alter your vision if needs be. The area manager was confused and said, “Hold on, if what the customer wants is to be the same as what I want why did I have a vision in the first place?” “Good question. Three things to learn said,” said Bill. “First, unless you have your own vision, how can you understand the customers’?” A customer’s vision has meaning only in the context of your own vision.

 Second, when you find out what customers really want, what their vision is, it will likely focus on one or two things. Your own vision has to fill the gaps.

Finally, you have to know when to ignore what the customer wants and, if necessary, tell the customer to take his vision elsewhere to be fulfilled. This statement struck the area manager as pure heresy. “I mean, you just don’t tell a customer to take a hike,” he protested. “You don’t, unless their vision is so different from yours that no fit is possible,” replied Bill. Having your own vision before you talk to customers also puts you in a position where you can understand the customer’s vision. It also allows you to fill in the gaps between your vision and their vision, so you have a complete picture.

The third and final secret was “deliver plus one”. The secret says two things. First, it tells you to deliver. Not sometimes, not most times. But all the time. No exceptions contemplated or allowed. Second, it talks about plus one percent. I’ll get back to that, but first of all we have to talk about delivery.

Consistency, consistency, consistency, interjected Charlie. Consistency is critical. Consistency creates credibility. “When you creating raving fans it’s a fragile relationship. They’ve been burned before and they don’t trust easily. You’re trying to pull them in while they’re usually trying to resist,” said Andrew (the owner of the best service station ever) to the area manager. Consistency will overcome resistance.

The rule of one percent reminds us that all we have to do is improve by one percent. If we improve by one percent this week, and again by one percent next week, by the end of the year we are ahead by more than fifty percent. Flexibility is also a magic ingredient. We need to be open to change in order to create raving fans. Flexibility allows us to keep up with the changes in the market.