My American Express card has chronic trouble with its magnetic stripe, especially at Walgreens stores. The other day, while making a purchase at a busy Walgreens, my card was having the same trouble. I expected the cashier to ask if I had a different card, or cash, or to manually enter the number on the card. Instead, she took a plastic bag, wrapped it around the card, and slid it through the machine. The card ran right through. I told the clerk it was a pretty cool trick, and she replied that a customer taught it to them.

The plastic bag around the credit card is a great trick, but Walgreens didn’t think of it. It’s not in their employee handbook, and it likely won’t come up at a staff meeting. Nobody at the Walgreens I went to is going to tell it to people at other stores, and Walgreens corporate isn’t going to submit a flier about it. It’s likely that nobody at a manager meeting is going to bring it up, and nobody will tell it to a district manager to spread to other stores. It’s just a trick that the clerks in this store know. Except that the clerks didn’t think of it themselves - they found it from a customer. And customers are the people who will spread it, because despite all the hype around knowledge-management and information sharing, in industries with separated business units with high customer touch points (i.e. retail, hospitality), your customers are still your best communication tool.

Whenever my American Express card won’t scan again, I’m not going to reach for another card. I’m going to ask for a plastic bag, and I’m going to teach a new store the same trick. Customers share information for you all the time. Store managers get suggestions about what another store is doing well, or something they’ve tried somewhere. Customers create a network outside your organization that you have no control over, that you never see, and that you interact with at random times. But by proactively communicating with your customers, you don’t just engage them, you create a human network that continuously improves your business.

Categories: Business and Economics, Customer Engagement, Social Software, Users as Partners