Customer Service
An online music gear retailer tackles customer experience with a 'Sweetwater' difference
Sweetwater Sound Inc., an online retailer of music instruments and audio gear, is dedicated to investing in an "old school" approach when it comes to customer experience and the strategy is all about personalization and relationships.
April 27, 2021 by Judy Mottl — Editor, RetailCustomerExperience.com & DigitalSignageToday.com
Sweetwater Sound, an online retailer of music instruments and audio gear, is dedicated to investing in an "old school" approach when it comes to customer experience and the strategy is all about personalization and relationships.
As Sweetwater Sound Inc. CEO and Founder Chuck Surack explains, it's never about making a sale but providing the best experience during every interaction. That's why the retailer's sales engineers spend 13 weeks in training before every interaction with customers and that training continues twice a week after the initial program.
Surack defines CX as building long-term relationships with customers, making sure they feel valued and forging a strong connection.
"Although we've embraced technology to enhance the customer experience, we've continued to hone in on legacy areas like telephone communication to meet consumers' expectations and shopping needs, and to invest in the one resource that will know the ins and outs of our customers and understand their needs better than anyone: people," he told Retail Customer Experience in an email interview.
Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, the 42-year-old company served over 1.5 million unique customers in 2020. The influx of customers helped propel the company to cross $1 billion in revenue in 2020. Sweetwater added over 400 jobs, increasing employee headcount by nearly 30% during the year. The retailer had opened a 480,000-square-foot distribution center a few weeks before the pandemic lockdown and the facility, which is nearly four times the size of the previous one, was expanded over the summer with the addition of 50,000 square feet. Guitar purchases also grew 50% year-over-year in 2020, while sales for other stringed instruments, costing less than $299, increased 70%. Its annual GearFest event, which in 2019 drew more than 18,000 to the campus in Fort Wayne, Indiana, was held virtually in 2020. Over 125,000 gear fans worldwide tuned in for more than 16 hours of content in the two-day live stream.
Here's more insight from our interview with Surack:
Q. Let's start with how the pandemic has altered/changed how Sweetwater Sound is operating. Were you forced to shut down?
A. Throughout the pandemic, while we were never fully shut down, we did have to alter some of our operations and close parts of our campus in order to ensure the safety of our employees and customers. The majority of our employees transitioned to working from home, but we were able to continue to ship items using a limited warehouse crew. Even before the shutdown, we put stricter safety and sanitization protocols in place. The campus is now fully open.
Q. Getting back to business requires a ton more work given the pandemic requirements relating to safety and health, has that proved a huge challenge and how did you approach it and any tips or advice you can share to fellow retailers?
A. The measures we put in place to help maintain our operations during the pandemic helped prepare us for the transition to reopening. We have a maintenance team that's dedicated to constant cleaning, especially high-contact areas like door handles and stair railings. We have provided masks and hand sanitizer and placed floor decals to help with social distancing. It's been important for not only our customers to know that we take their health and safety seriously, but for our employees to know that it's our biggest priority right now. In making those safety measures obvious, we have ensured customers and employees that we are taking the proper precautions as we reopen. The biggest piece of advice I can give to retailers is to ensure they are keeping on top of customer service. While things still may not be "business as usual", we can still provide the highest level of service that our customers have come to expect. How retailers engage customers does not have to change.
Q. What has Sweetwater Sound been doing to engage with customers?
A. Sweetwater's business is built on creating personal connections with customers. To accomplish this, we ensure that all of our sales engineers are properly trained in order to fully understand customers' needs. Our sales engineers spend 13 weeks in training before they're able to interact with customers and then undergo additional, continual training twice a week beyond that. That commitment to making sure our employees have the tools they need is uncommon within the music retail industry. The relationship that sales engineers form with customers is essential. It's never about a sale, it's about providing the best experience possible during every interaction. Because our sales engineers truly are experts, they are able to guide customers' purchases to ensure they have what they need. Beyond that, we offer free tech support and numerous online resources. During the pandemic, our sales engineers have checked in on our regular customers just to see how they are holding up. The human connection has been appreciated by many of our customers.
Q. Why is customer experience so critical to your brand?
A. From the very beginning when Sweetwater started, it's always been about building long-term relationships with our customers. It's getting to know them and what they want to do musically. As we get to know them, then we can start to get a sense of what's important to them and make product recommendations based on that. For all retailers, customer experience is critical to meeting the demands of the modern day customer. Customers want to feel valued and that the person they're talking to on the other end has their best interest and goals in mind. They want to ensure that they're receiving proper guidance and strong insights. For Sweetwater, we are looking to forge real connections with our customers by creating deep, meaningful experiences. Building that loyalty is why our customers keep coming back.
Q. How do you describe the customer journey at Sweetwater — is it omnichannel or is it distinct experience based on in-store, online, mobile, etc. and how much is driven by customer feedback/expectations?
A. Our customer journey is omnichannel, while we remain dedicated to investing in an "old-school" approach to customer experience that is fully centered around personalization and relationships. Although we've embraced technology to enhance the customer experience, we've continued to hone in on legacy areas like telephone communication to meet consumers' expectations and shopping needs, and to invest in the one resource that will know the ins and outs of our customers and understand their needs better than anyone: people. Never has that need for Sweetwater's 1-to-1 personal connection been more necessary and welcome than right now during the pandemic.
About Judy Mottl
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