8 helpful tips to improve your customer service quality

21/01/2020

Happy customer holding a phone with a happy face

 

Happy customer holding a phone with a happy face

Quality customer service is the foundation of any business that wants to be successful. Technology such as e-commerce has given consumers access to more choice than ever before. So today, it’s absolutely essential to focus on providing excellent customer service.

If this isn’t a priority for your business you are at major risk of losing your clients to competitors who do prioritize customer satisfaction.

The meaning of customer service has changed over past years from one-on-one interactions in person or on the phone to include social media and other online approaches in front of a much larger audience. If you want to boost your customer service and therefore improve your sales, follow these tips to be more successful.

1. Understand your mission

What is the purpose of your business, and why does your product or service matter to your clients? It’s important to stop and think about this before even trying to modernize your customer service approach. Once you have discovered your mission, break it down into long- and short-term goals. These will help you measure your progress, so you can track the results and improve accordingly.

2. Seek feedback

Getting customer feedback is absolutely crucial to improve not just your customer service, but also your business as a whole. Find new ways to get feedback from your clients, such as sending surveys to them by email or text.

3. Stay ahead of responses

Social media is extremely quick and it’s easy to use for just about anyone. Customers are also using these platforms to discuss their experience with a company, positive or negative, which is visible to their whole following. These customers typically expect a response within hours, so it’s helpful for brands to connect with them by responding to all types of feedback quickly on whatever platform their customers are using.

4. Cross-sell

You can increase your sales easily without running a whole new marketing campaign by making sure that your sales representatives are using every possible opportunity to cross-sell. Cross-selling is when you offer an additional product or service on top of those the client is currently considering, especially when they’re related. For example, if someone is trying to purchase a backpack, you could offer a rain cover to go along with it on their outdoor activity.

The more items you can add on to the initial purchase, the more sales you’ll get. This is a hugely important skill to teach sales reps and customer service agents because it’s a proven way to boost your sales and leave customers more satisfied.

5. Offer value-add services

Customer service representatives don’t only respond to issues and help clients. They should also be offering knowledge and information about the brand and services. Sharing knowledge is a great way to give your customers some value and be foremost in their mind when they need advice or information. Your social media platforms are the perfect tools to provide information to all your clients.

6. Create a referral program

It’s a good idea to create a referral program by offering incentives. People love free things, so the best way to make sure you’ll get lots of quality referrals is to ask your client to refer your company to their community in return for some form of incentive. Studies show that those who are referred to a company by existing customers are 18% more likely to remain loyal customers.

7. Train your representatives

Your customer service team is the heart of the operation, so you need to make sure they’re well trained on all of the above. Customer service representatives are often the only interaction point a client will have with a company; they’re truly the face of the business. When they’re trained properly, and empowered to make decisions to support client satisfaction, they will be your most valuable tool for your brand identity and products.

8. Be responsible

If you’re the head of the company, you’re ultimately responsible for everything that happens. You give support and direction to the team, so if you want a strong customer service team that will go above and beyond. You need to be a leader that takes the blame when things don’t go well and gives credit to others when things go right.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the contributing author, and do not necessarily reflect those of the Forum for International Trade Training.

About the author

Author: Aimee Laurence

Aimee Laurence is a freelance writer. She enjoys helping companies improve their client relationships and build a returning and loyal customer audience.

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3 thoughts on “8 helpful tips to improve your customer service quality”

  1. It’s a really awesome blog, thank you for sharing such a very well written content. Keep it up! I hopew we’ll get more content in futire. If you want to know more about customer service kindly visit – *https://www.businessideasjobs.com/2023/01/improving-quality-of-customer-service.html*

  2. These are some helpful tips and I am glad that this was gone well given that there are some improvements that you can look at with the customer service that we can check out. It is nice to think about this given that there are more ways that we can have fun with. I hope that there are some sales that you can keep making here and I am glad that you have done a great job that you have seen with the customer service. It’s nice to see it working out and I hope that it will only see the customer service’s quality with the ways you can think about.