Customer Centric

mmmmm VS mmmmm

As a French, I have by definition a limited experience in wines from abroad!
So, I asked advices on Italian wines from 2 operators via their customer service before purchasing:

Chateauonline.com (French company,#1 player in France and in Europe, pure web player with a partnership with the retail network, Repaire de Bacchus, 35 stores in Paris area)
Lavinia.com (Spanish operator with stores in Barcelona, Madrid, Geneva and Paris and an on-line shop).

I had registered to their Newsletter already more than one month prior seeking advices. I am not a member of their loyalty programs: Le Club (Lavinia) and Le Club Paradis (Chateauonline).

First…I read what I get
The 2 brands are quiet active with the “send” button as I received 32 newsletters from Chateauonline and 18 from Lavinia in less than one month! Chateauonline offers are focusing on discounts across a vast range of French wines (Bordeaux, Champagne and regional wines). Lavinia geared its communication on discounts on Bordeaux (Primeurs 2007, about 50% of the emails). The rest of their newsletters was highlighting each time a different main topic. I have appreciated the qualitative wine description from Chateauonline which is supported very often by an expert’s reference (Parker, Guide Hachette…).

Examples of offers
- Common themes: Primeurs 2007, Fathers’ Day – Chateauonline & Lavinia
- Special offer (not directly linked to a specific wine): Friday 13th (-13%), Free delivery, Special discount (up to -20%) - Chateauonline
- Goodies or specific animation: Special Quiz, CEO wines, Thursday Club, Summer Offers - Lavinia 40 sec. video to convince about a wine, Flash sales, 10 years anniversary - Chateauonline

Second…I try to get advice
I sent by email a request at the end of June to their Customer Services in order to get advice on a selection of Italian wines for a first purchase (with a maximum budget). I received a reply from Chateauonline one week later with the direct phone number of their wine expert. I called and left a message and… I am still waiting.
I sent a reminder the same day to Lavina and received the day after a very friendly answer with a list of various wines from different regions.

As a consumer I will enjoy the bottles I bought from Lavinia as a marketing professional I could see some opportunities in their customer service approach:

• The most important is always to come back to a client or a potential customer
• An alternative to the mass sending of generic emails could be a more segmented Newsletter based on basic preference criteria fulfilled during the registration process (e.g. preferences for type of wines, type of offers, and frequency of news…). This is not the case today for both sites.
• Initiate some follow-up after the purchase in order to build loyalty via a personalized customer approach (in the case of Lavinia)

Que Choisir, a major French consumer magazine ranked Lavinia #1/9 with a score of 16.3/20 and Chateauonline #5/9 with a score of 12.6 in a survey published in 2007.

Let’s see if being a regular client over time will change the spin of this first experience.