Keep Your Customers & Increase Loyalty With A Positive Customer Service Experience

With all the products and services we currently rely on to get us through our lives with relative ease, almost everyone will eventually end up needing to call the manufacturer of that new phone, laptop or gaming console for support. We can’t live without our devices, and when one breaks down we need it up and running, right away. What we paid for it, what specifications it has, whether it has the latest and greatest software, all become less important than how quickly we can go back to listening to our favorite artist, checking sports scores or getting back on Facebook. Whether we feel happy with the manufacturer and more importantly, whether we tell our friends to buy the same device, all depend on whether the person we speak to is nice, sounds like a person instead of a robot, gets our issue fixed and makes us feel valued and important. Other things factor in of course, like whether or not we had to wait on hold for 30 minutes listening to increasingly annoying hold music and “you’re now 200th in line to speak to live person who will put you right back on hold” reminders every 30 seconds. Most of us are tech-savvy enough to get the issue taken care of over the phone, or simply don’t have the patience or time to take the device in for repairs or service.

We can all remember at least one experience, so horrible; we decided right then and there to NEVER buy anything from that company again. We’ve either had someone tell us “don’t buy X product, the service is terrible,” or said that to someone ourselves. In the age of “cheaply made so you can buy more” everything, support is what keeps us holding on for that next “new and improved” version, and what keeps companies going.

We all know what it feels like to wait in line for what seems like hours at a fast food place and then be so disgusted with the service we not only left but also dropped a nice little note to the manager in the suggestion box. Where those suggestions are read and implemented the difference in service is night and day. You get a smile, guest treatment even if all you ordered was the $1.99 item get thanked for coming in and compensated for any issues you might have with the quality of the meal.

We’ve become uniquely attuned to picking up on good customer service and reacting radically to anything less. While we might not take the time to talk about how great Mike at Target was but we will definitely write an entire news review (well at least a few sentences) online about how rude and abrasive the cashier was. We’ll talk about Susan in tech support and how quickly she rushed us off the phone without fixing the issue and how ABC Phone Company just told us that new $400 phone is now a paperweight and no, they’re not honoring the warranty no matter how many years you’ve been with them. In the age of the Internet and the decision making process for most customers being limited to typing “is X product crap” in their search bar those few lines turn away quite a bit of business.

So what can you do to ensure your company doesn’t start to see those sales numbers steadily decreasing while costs are being cut and the marketing budget goes through the roof, all to no avail? Turn every front-line employee into the image you want customers to see, every supervisor, manager, and operations executive into an image conservation specialist, a customer satisfaction machine. The formula’s not that complex, there are a few nuances to phone, chat or email support but the basics are the same. Customers want their questions answered as clearly and completely as possible, their issues resolved as quickly and permanently as possible and the fact that they’re paying you and not the other way around to factor into the equation. They’re expecting to be treated nicely, to be listened to instead of interrupted, to not be talked down to because they didn’t know they couldn’t go swimming with an electronic device and to get everything resolved in one phone call instead of 50. They want their email to be read and not get asked the same question several times, they want to have someone answer promptly while they’re chatting and pay attention enough to know they can’t reset their device while chatting with you on it at the same time.

What does that translate to in actual steps to follow? The basics are:

a) Greet – Those first few seconds are going to set the tone for most people. Your personnel need to treat each new call/chat as individual. Be nice and connect right away. Saying “Thank you for calling “ABC Company”, my name is Molly, how can I help you today” with a smile (yes they can hear it in your voice), goes a long way towards a successful experience.

b) Listen – This one can’t be stressed enough. Outside of how frustrating it is to have someone interrupt you mid-sentence it’s even more irritating to have that person take that half-sentence and start to run with it in a direction usually far removed from where you need to go. Let your customer speak and THEN ask questions to fill in the blanks and get a clear picture of what their issues and expectations are.

c) Ask – Don’t be afraid to ask questions to clarify something you might not have understood and always summarize what they’ve said back to them and ask for confirmation you’re correct. You’ll save time and they’ll know you were listening instead of looking at Jeff’s new neck pillow and filling in an “I understand” every few seconds to keep the conversation going.

d) Solve – To the best of your ability and out-of-the-box if you need to. What’s important is that you answer the question or take care of the issue on this call. Having Mr. Jones have to call back another 4 times to get his email working is not going to make him a happy customer.

e) Confirm – Oh, this is a big one. Make absolutely sure the customer’s satisfied, your answer was understood, the device is actually doing what it’s supposed to, that they were able to complete the form or their laptop booted completely before you end that phone call.

f) Close – Thank the customer for calling/emailing, ask if there’s anything else you can help them with and provide them with a quick summary or self-help options and tools.

Be courteous, patient, and thorough. Apologize for inconveniences and empathize with issues. Apply the golden rule; think about how you’d like to be treated if you were the one calling in and have someone with actual experience in customer relationships train your personnel in interaction management. Your customers, and your bottom line, will be all better for it.

Jared Cox

Customer Service Specialist

9y

These steps can be used in any type of sales. I like them and will use them.

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