Amazon Interview Questions
Prepare for 54 Amazon interview questions covering Leadership Principles and bar-raising scenarios.
Question 17 of 54
Amazon is known for exceptional customer service. What does excellent customer service mean to you?
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Rachelle Enns is an interview coach and job search expert. She works with candidates to perform their best in employment, medical, and post-secondary admission interviews.
Amazon believes excellent customer service goes beyond doing precisely as you're expected; it's more than having a smile on your face when the customer is looking. They view excellent customer service as actively seeking out opportunities to deliver more than the standard and thoroughly listening to your customers when they tell you what they need. As Jeff Bezos has said, 'Start with the customer and work backwards. It's our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better. Obsessing over customer experience is the only long-term defensible competitive advantage.' Pay attention to the language of their culture and the keywords they use, and where possible, incorporate those keywords or statements you most identify with in your answer.
Rachelle Enns is an interview coach and job search expert. She works with candidates to perform their best in employment, medical, and post-secondary admission interviews.
"I know that Amazon aims to improve every customer's day by delivering over and above their expectations. I appreciate that Amazon tweets back to every complaint, has a strong team committed to every social platform where customers might leave a comment and that you never have to wait long for a meaningful reply from a customer service agent. If I can change my customer's day for the better, I have done my job delivering exceptional customer service."
Rachelle Enns is an interview coach and job search expert. She works with candidates to perform their best in employment, medical, and post-secondary admission interviews.
"Kate Zabriskie, the author of Business Training Works, once said, 'The customers' perception is your reality.' To me, this means that if my clients think my team does not care about them, they likely do not. Excellent customer service starts with proper training and setting high standards for my team from the get-go."
Kevin Downey has an extensive background in business management, recruiting, branding and marketing. He's volunteered his career coaching services at job fairs, lecturing on interview techniques and crafting winning resumes and cover letters.
"Customer service means exactly what those two words mean when you put them together. If you want someone to be a customer, that means they want to try out your brand or are loyal to it. Otherwise, they are not your customer. Service means tending to one's needs. To serve their needs. So when you put them together, you are saying that you want someone to be your customer, and their patronage is earned. To serve them is to tend to their needs and make sure all of those needs, both conscious and sub-conscience needs are both met."
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Anonymous Answer
Customer service is everything for any business. Being customer-obsessed, I think excellent customer service is that we provide the best deliverables to our customers beyond their expectations. Listen and analyze their feedback properly and try to make changes in our service to provide the best.
Rachelle's Feedback
These are all fantastic ways to deliver exceptional service! Here are some words from Amazon's Leadership Principles on Customer Service. You will want to consider adding in 'Amazonian' language into your responses: "Customer Obsession: Leaders start with the customer and work backward. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. Although leaders pay attention to competitors, they obsess over customers."
Anonymous Answer
It means putting customer requirements first, attending to all of the customer needs, and going the extra mile to make sure that the customer is satisfied.
Cindy's Feedback
Good! Can you show how you've put your understanding into practice?
Anonymous Answer
I truly connect with the Customer Obsession leadership principle of Amazon. For me, paying attention to your customer's needs and focusing on how to help them is key to a business's success. In my role, a customer can be a candidate or a hiring manager, for example, and I always want to make sure they have a quick answer to their needs, besides asking questions to better understand how could I help them.
Amanda's Feedback
Good! Your answer demonstrates that you've done your research about the company's culture and values. Consider improving your response by telling the interviewer about the skills you use to consistently exceed customer expectations and go out of your way to help customers solve their problems such as active listening, critical thinking, and empathetic approach, or clear communication.
Anonymous Answer
I know that Amazon keeps its customers on top of everything. I believe the same. In my opinion, the customer is always right, even when they may not be right. We always have to give the best service to the customer. If the customer complains about even a small thing, it means there is a problem in that supply chain and we are responsible for solving this problem. We should never conflict with the customer and always be constructive. We always have to show that we understand them and they can trust us because we are the people who will solve this problem for them and we have to make them trust us. The customers must be able to say this sentence, "there is a brand specialist who is called as Hülya at Amazon and she will definitely solve any kind of problem for us"!
Amanda's Feedback
Terrific response! You clearly have experience and expertise working in customer service and equate service excellence with empathy, problem-solving, and constructive communication.
Anonymous Answer
Excellent service is customer-centric rather than product-centric. It is about recognizing the customer as an individual and seeking business success via customer delight. When I go on Amazon to purchase an item, they frequently recommend other products that I hadn't thought of, and they are so good at it that I often buy more than I planned, and I'm happy to do so. I often joke that Amazon gets it right because they don't try to sell shampoo to a bald guy (me).
Marcie's Feedback
That's a witty joke :) and true! Your observation about customer service being customer-centric instead of product-centric is right on, but be careful not to confuse savvy advertising with customer service. While seeing recommended products is helpful, you might want to talk instead about an instance when you experienced amazing service over the phone, email, or in person - when someone handled your inquiry or complaint with kindness and patience. Just something to think about!
Anonymous Answer
Strong customer service in every aspect of the customer journey. From purchasing to delivery to use.
Marcie's Feedback
You're right that great customer service matters throughout the entire purchase journey. You might also discuss how customer service means being friendly, professional, informative, timely, and resourceful. Talk about a time when you went above and beyond for a customer to show the interviewer how much customer service means to you.
Anonymous Answer
Exceptional customer service is built upon trust, commitment, and follow-through. My behavior as a trusted customer advisor heavily influences the customer's perception of our company as a whole. Looking for reassurance that our automation solution would work as advertised, the customer asked for a means of proof. Rather than relying upon the anecdotal 'it should work' approach, I set out to find a creative means to produce hard data because I knew the customer would need this to convince their upper management. I created a looping control script that repeatedly executed and reset our automation pipeline repeatedly so that over a 24-hour period the pipeline had been tested 24 times successfully. The customer was very happy with the results because it provided them with the hard evidence they needed and demonstrated that I would go the extra mile and put in the hard work to assure all stakeholders are happy with the project's results.
Marcie's Feedback
Excellent! Your response follows the STAR (situation, task, action, result) method perfectly, making it logical and easy to follow. Because of your example, the interviewer will be able to clearly see that you're capable of providing exceptional customer service and envision you doing so for their company too. Awesome response!
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