Because of the draught here in Atlanta, the ultimate leagues down here have been banned from wearing traditional soccer cleats (too hard on the fields) and we are forced to wear "turf shoes"; kind of like shorter cleats, but extremely difficult to find. One of the girls on our team sent us this email:
"Got my turfs from zappos.com. They have free shipping both ways, so you can order a few different pairs/sizes to try on. They typically upgrade your shipping, so there's a very good chance if you order them today that you'll have them for Saturday. So far I think I hold the record for most impressive ship time. When I ordered my turfs a little after midnight, they arrived at my apartment about 8 hours later... Needless to say, I'm a huge fan."
Since I had no luck finding these turf shoes at any local stores, I checked out Zappos.com. I was reluctant to buy shoes online, but I was running out of options. I was delighted to find a huge plethora of shoe options on their site. I ordered a pair, they arrived within 2 days, but to my dismay, they were too small. I had a game coming up on Saturday and I needed shoes! So Thursday night I called Zappos and got one of the best customer service experiences of my life. She helped me navigate the website to find a different sized pair (they had over 250 options!) and she helped me print a prepaid UPS label to return my old pair. She sent my new pair of shoes to me upgraded to next day shipping at no extra charge and she did not require me to return my original pair first. She trusted that I would get it to them eventually. I got off the phone with her at 8:30 PM and my new perfect shoes arrived THE NEXT MORNING! I am officially a Zappos.com customer for life.
At our game on Saturday, our team was discussing where to track down these hard to find turf shoes. A couple of us both gave rave reviews about how much we loved and recommended Zappos.com. One of the guys joked, “Are you getting some kind of commission? You sound like sales reps." A girl on my team responded best, "No, they are just so great and cool that I want to tell all my friends about them.”
I challenge all of us to find ways to wow our customers the way Zappos.com has wowed me. They have really nailed what it takes to get good word of mouth marketing. As I said, I will be a loyal Zappos customer for life and I sure will be talking them up every chance I get.
On a side note, I chatted a bit with their customer service rep while we were processing my order. She was telling me that a large amount of their order fulfillment is done by robotic arms picking and restocking items from shelves and packing them down a conveyor... I am excited to see this innovation! Aaron - "Securing happy customers is the best investment you can make."
Canadian Shoppers