You don’t spend all that effort and time gaining customers only to lose them because of poor customer service. Customers have higher expectations than ever, and businesses need an edge to ensure they keep them.
Many companies lack the tools and resources to change the landscape of their customer service offering. There is significant value in customer communications.
What happens when customers have no visibility to the status of their requests? Even if you are giving full attention to the customer’s request or problem, if they don’t have any communication from you, they can’t appreciate your efforts.
As a result, they may become frustrated, or place calls to multiple people in your organization to request an update. This generates additional work for your employees, due to taking multiple calls related to the same issue.
Newton’s 3rd law states – “Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.” We aren’t discussing the laws of motion here, nonetheless, we are determining reactions for every customer interaction that occurs.
Newton wasn’t part of a customer support team, but his concept demonstrates the relationship between customers and the staff supporting them. Customer service communication demands appropriate responses, accurate information, and detailed expertise for every customer interaction.
How do you encourage self-help in your customer service department?
This is a self-help land in which we live. My daughter decided to swipe a parking garage beam her first week as a legal driver, and I had already replaced the bumper from a learner permit incident with a fire hydrant. This led me to YouTube to learn how to fix my mangled door (which looks pretty good, by the way).
- Arm your customers with the tools to help themselves! They will love you for it, and you can even encourage customer success story submissions for a monthly prize drawing.
- Develop and tend a healthy knowledge base for your customers and employees. A customer service knowledge base is like a garden if tended well; you will see and enjoy the fruits of your labor.
We live in a consumer market. 3 in 5 Americans (59%) would try a new brand or company for a better service experience. (Source: American Express Survey, 2011) Difficulty maintaining incident management and resolution can be a disjointed process for customers, therefore streamlining communication is necessary.
What does re-structured customer service communication entail?
- Workflow automation can generate follow-up and status messages to your customers at predetermined steps along the way to resolution.
- Sending automatic confirmations that you received their request is a great first step, but additional communication as you work to resolve the issue is welcome information to the customer.
- Responding to requests immediately is a huge advantage. Customers won’t doubt you (they get a status update).
- These notifications go a long way toward establishing customer confidence in your service levels. They also make for a more efficient operation within your service team when such communications are automated.
Customers will leave and go elsewhere if they are unhappy with the service you provide or they don’t feel you care about their needs. Communication is the cornerstone of loyalty, customer preservation, and good word of mouth. It is critical to communicate and respond to every customer on every issue.
Communication automation enables you to act swiftly and helps customers know that you are working on their issue. It is an expectation that if ignored could cost dearly. Contact Novo Solutions today to learn more about Customer Service Software.
For more information check out this free article about the benefits of workflow automation: https://novosolutions.com/cr/manufacturing-customer-support-workflow/
