“These days, offering a great product or service, even if it’s at the best price, may not be enough to win and retain customers. The modern customer has come to expect excellence in customer service and it seriously impacts their purchasing decisions. For instance, research shows 55% of consumers are willing to pay more for a guaranteed good experience. And companies are on the hook for providing that good experience, given that it’s six to seven times more expensive for companies to win new customers than keeping existing ones. Good customer service pays.”
Request a FREE Conversational Software demo and learn effective customer service.
Woveon, a software customer service startup, realizes the value that your customer service provides and how important it is to keep a flourishing business. Woveon is an easy-to-use online application providing businesses a centralized location to manage their customer channels, such as social media, emails and phone calls. Using machine learning, social listening, a wide breadth of data, and a clean user interface, Woveon helps prioritize inquiries, identify valuable customers, and suggest personalized content. It simplifies online customer relations and makes businesses more efficient in managing the touchpoints they have with customers. We strive to ensure businesses can scale and respond back to all their customer enquiries.
These 5 Aspects of Customer Service Prove the Importance of Good Customer Service
1. Customer Loyalty
Customer loyalty is one of the key features to successful business. When a customer is loyal, they will keep buying products, turning into more and more revenue. But how does a company identify and keep these customers happy? With Woveon, identifying important customers and helping with their every need is easy! Woveon has created AI (Artificial Intelligence) programs that identify businesses-valued customers in multiple ways. Say someone has shopped at an e-commerce website multiple times and has a great buying history but has now run into some trouble. If they contact the store via multiple channels such as social media or email, a representative from the business can pull up their information and understand they are a valued customer. They can focus on their problems more quickly, and this keeps up customer satisfaction.
2. Knowledgeable Staff
Nothing is more frustrating than calling customer service and feeling more apt than the “resourceful” representative. This is why it is so important to have knowledgeable staff who don’t just stick to a script and set of instructions. Your employees should be able to problem solve on their own. In order to do this, one should hire people who show interest in their business and understand its products. However, having knowledge on more than just the product is important. For smaller businesses, getting to know your customers and being able to talk with them more on a personal level can be very important. With Woveon’s technology, this is a walk in the park. Woveon’s recorded conversations not only help with consistency, but it can also help a customer service rep get to know the client more by reviewing past conversations. Although this may not apply to all businesses, small to mid-sized companies can really benefit from having personable customer service reps who are extremely knowledgeable about their product and clients. So before hiring any applicant, make sure he/she is enthusiastic about the product or service the company provides.
3. Online Marketing and Social Media
Most people don’t associate online marketing with customer service, but with so many online interactions going on between customers today marketing teams and customer service work hand in hand. Woveon has the ability to simplify and better market your customer service. With so many different social media platforms, it can be hard for companies; however, integrating all channels onto a single page makes it extremely easy to keep track of all customers conversations.
Try these 5 Creative Ways You Can Use Customer Service to Amp Up Your Online Marketing!
Companies should see social media as a huge opportunity when it comes to advertising and customer service. People contact companies over Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram all the time. Just the other week, I was on a United Airlines flight, and I had tweeted at them. They responded asking me how my flight was going within minutes. This is a great example of how customer service over marketing channels is so important. It shows to their followers how much they are invested in their customers and that they truly care. This also shows that the companies are up to date when it comes to interacting with customers. They are open to change and customers want to see companies that embrace change like they do.a
4. Customer Apologies
Everyone makes mistakes, some you can control, others just happen. It is always better to apologize first and then move forward. When it comes to customer service, the representative is almost never to blame; however, the customer may think differently. A customer service rep should apologize not only for the inconvenience the customer is going through, but also so the customer can sense that the rep personally cares about the problem.
Click here for 5 email templates to get you out of angry customer situations.
If you are nice to your customers, they, in turn, would be more likely to reciprocate. Of course, there will be good and bad customers, but as long as you are willing to be upfront, apologize for any mistakes you could have made, and are ready to solve the problem, most customer interactions will go smoothly. Remember, solving the problem is only half of the interaction; being fast, knowledgeable, and polite completes the customer service process.
5. Happy Staff = Happy Customers
Forbes’ Rodd Wagner writes, “The formula is simple: Happy employees equal happy customers, asserted an article last fall in CEO Magazine. Similarly, an unhappy employee can ruin the brand experience for not just one, but numerous customers.” Happy employees = happy customers works. It’s a fantastic sentiment. It’s the right strategy. It is miles ahead of and far more on course than the assertions of the anti-happiness crowd. And if you need to boil down to a few words the connections between employee experience and customer experience, run with it.”
Staff retention is crucial to your company for improving customer service excellence. Research shows clearly that staff stay when they are happy and respect the company in which they work. Their happiness translates into excellent work when dealing with important customers.
Customer Service
Susane Friedmann, a writer on customer service says, “Customer service is an integral part of our job and should not be seen as an external extension of it. A company’s most vital asset is its customers. Without them, we would not and could not exist in business. When you satisfy your customers, they not only help you grow by continuing to do business with you but they will also recommend you to friends and associates.
The practice of customer service should be as present on the showroom floor as it is in any other sales functions and pertinent in the overall company environment.
Get started with a Customer Service Charter! Set the standards of customer service you expect your employees to deliver and your customers can expect to receive.
