CULTURE CLUB
Zappos has a unique approach to building customer loyalty: it starts internally, by focusing on the company’s culture, which is defined by its employees. Jennifer Lowney learned more from Zappos’ Robert Richman
Early in its 12-year history, Zappos.com, one of America’s leading online apparel and footwear retailers, made a decision that its business and its brand would be defined by superior customer service. In Zappos’ lingo, it would deliver “WOW through service.”
But unlike many other companies which view customer service through the lens of returns policies, loyalty programs or discounts, Zappos believes that its culture is the foundation for its brand and commercial success. In his book, Delivering Happiness, A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose, Tony Hsieh, the CEO says, “We thought that if we got the culture right, then building our brand to be about the very best customer ser vice would happen naturally, on its own.”
