Customer service has many advantages. First of all, it lets you know when the customer is about to stop subscribing to your service and move on to another. This way, you can address their concern and stop them from shifting service providers. Secondly, it lets you know of any room for improvements in your product and/or service. Thirdly, it increases the number of your sales. Once you satisfy a customer, they are more likely to refer you to others in their circle as well.
Now that we have established that customer care is important, it is our job to explore ways to improve our customer service teams. One way to do that is by replicating the practices of companies that have demonstrated great successes in this field. One of these companies is Xfinity. Xfinity customer service has long been considered the hallmark of the brand's success in the internet industry. Today, to improve our customer service processes, we will be looking at what successful customer service teams avoid doing to increase their success.
Disregarding Service Requests
To stress how bad disregarding service asks is, we need to put ourselves in the customer’s shoes. You ordered a bag online but it came in the wrong color. You are frustrated and email the bag’s manufacturer of this mishap expecting an apology and remediation of the mistake. Instead, what you get is nothing; no response from the company. Considering you were already frustrated by the initial mistake by the brand, you can only imagine how angry you would be when there was no reply whatsoever to your mistake. For sure, you will not buy any products from this company again. All this is why it is crucial for a business to give regard to service requests. Approximately two-thirds (62%) are culprits of the disregarding of service requests, as per the Customer Service Benchmark Report. For the sake of your happiness and the success of your business, we would highly recommend making all the efforts to ensure your brand is not part of the 62%!
Not Resolving An Issue
Okay, suppose, as a business, you avoided what we were warning against in the previous paragraph and you actually did give regard to and responded to the consumer’s complaint. That is a good first step but it is also just the tip of the iceberg. After responding to the complaint, you need to do whatever it takes to resolve it. That may be getting information from the customer and/or communicating with other departments in your company. One out of every ten customers reports that complaints made by them were never catered to, as per a research published in the Northridge Group State of Customer Service Experience report.
Lengthy Wait Times
To highlight how important shortening wait times is, let us go back to the bag example but add a little twist to it. Instead of emailing the bag company, you decide to go ahead and call them to file your complaint. Instead of making you feel better about the situation, they make you wait for tens of minutes in the call queue. This may very well be as, if not more, frustrating as the no response to the email. Thus, if you own a business or are an agent for a business, ensure that the wait time is not too lengthy.
Unknowledgeable Customer Care Staff
The last thing an already-annoyed customer wants is to be talking to a person who does not know what they are talking about. According to research promoted by Microsoft, poor employee knowledge ranks amongst the most annoying customer care staff characteristics. So, what should you do once you know this? Well, if you are a business, you need to make sure that you are training your customer service team well so that they have enough knowledge to deal with situations. On the flip side, in the case that you are a customer care personnel, you have to not shy away from escalating a situation to your boss when you cannot handle it.
Lack Of Etiquettes & Manners
In the case that you want to piss someone off, the best thing you can do is get pissed off yourself. The same goes for customer service. If you say something bad to the customer, they will not only say bad things to you but they will also never buy the product and/or service of your company again. On the flip side, if you display good manners, the customer is much more likely to cooperate and be satisfied with your work. Thus, it is very important to remain composed through stressful situations.
Wrapping Up
This is it for now. We hope that the customer service world is a bit familiar to you now.
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