No this article is not about how to provide customers with good service, sorry but maybe I will cover my thoughts on that area in a later blog posts. This post is about how service in many forms affects your view and interaction with not only the provider but the overall product as a whole. For example, if you went to a restaurant that was renowned for its food, but the service was horrible. How likely are you to go back? How likely are you to choose that establishment regularly? On the opposite of that, what if you went to a restaurant were the food was average but the service was some of the best around. Which one do you choose?

Another angle to this, do you tip your waitress solely on the basis of the service they provided you? Or do you let the cleanliness of the establishment, the speed the food was ready, and the quality of the food affects your decision on how much to tip?

Why am I talking about restaurants and tips in on a technical community site? Well it dawned on me while eating at a local steak place. (Supposedly one of the best) while I was sitting there waiting for a long time for my steak, regularly interacting with the waiter who appeared to be good. How much am I going to let the kitchens problems affect the tip I give my waiter? How often do others do the same? And how does a similar mentality affect other industries.

Do you have software that is good at what it is supposed to do, but the level of support, consulting and training you have gotten from the company or its affiliates affect your ability to use it and does it affect your level of satisfaction with it? Might you not fully know?

I believe you may not actually know how you let it affect your thought process. I believe a lot of people have made good purchases in software, electronics, or other, however the level of "service" they are provided in the form of instruction manuals, documentation, training, implementation or install services blinds them to have a good picture of the end result and may not realize how those factors affect their view.

Is this a bad thing? Is it wrong? No I don't think so, and I think more companies out there need to realize that the end all and be all is not just the product. Your "chain" is your product, your company is only as good as the weakest link in it. So if you make a simply fantastic product that in every respect is the best there is, but there is not enough information on how to use it "right" or not good enough support when you have questions, not good enough support where something goes wrong, or even not enough good people out there to help you put it to use.

So I wonder (out loud sort of) how K2 is viewed. What kind of tip are we going to get? And will that tip be mainly because of the product (a.k.a food) or will it be influenced good or bad, by our support, our documentation, our partners, etc?

I am clearly biased but I would not only tip but would be a regular customer. But it's not for me to decide since I am one of the hosts at this establishment. I am very curious to hear from you on your thoughts. Please leave comments.

Obviously you probably don't run a restaurant but the correlations can be the same. The food you serve is your primary business. For K2 this is BPM software. Our service, our restaurant facilities, bathrooms etc are our documentation, training, consulting etc. Thus rounding out the full K2 experience.

So what does your restaurant look like? Do you provide excellent service? Think about your customers' full experience, what does it look like? Correlate this to your next visit to your favorite eatery. Think about your experience and take notice of everything the cleanliness, the food, the service, the bathrooms, even how the tables are laid out. All of these can affect your overall experience and how you feel about going there.

Then think about how this correlates to your business, what is your table layout? What is your cleanliness? What tip would you get?