Talking about what you need to do to uplift the experience of customers when they come to you, there are countless tactics and strategies you should follow. And the rapidly changing e-market has been showing us that many of those tactics and strategies can go wrong and not suitable for the nowadays world, for example, “customers are always right”.
However, these 5 rules will always be the principles for any eCommerce business to win over their customers. Take these golden rules for your customer service and go ahead to make it awesome.
1. Always track and record e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g
Why do you need to keep record of conversations between your customer service agents and your customers? It’s for when you need it.
I ran to cases like these. A customer clicked live chat request button to explain their problem with installing the file they just bought and after checking everything, I helped them overcome the problem easily. Then one morning he showed up again asking me to re-assist him with the same problem which he forgot how to troubleshoot. Instead of having to write again all the steps which is time-consuming for both, I simply sent him the chat transcript from the previous time and he’s ready to make it again.
Is it a better customer experience? Yes.
Live chat script recording is just one of the ways – any live chat software you should use must have this feature, for example, Subiz live chat. Be it a phone call, be it an email, live chat or be it a support ticket, make sure you save things down and keep track of the customer’s problem as well as the level of satisfaction they got. That’s the best way to deal with recurring requests and save time.
That’s not all. From the conversation saved in your customer service tools, make up some support metrics like how many requests your agents receive each day, what the questions are mostly about, time spent in each request, etc. So when looking back, you’ll see what you’re doing great and what you are suck at. Recording data means you are learning to improve. Never get loose of it!
2. Manners make it unforgettable
If you watch “Kingsman: The Secret Service”, you will probably remember the epic fight begun with a famous saying by Harry Hart: “Manners maketh man”. Well, it applies to customer service too. Manners make customer service and make it unforgettable.
People won’t remember ordinary things. People only remember things that strike their mind. Things that are unexpected. It’s very important to a well-mannered customer support team to be able to help customers solve the problem in time and politely. Plus, make your customer service available anytime for anyone, even when your team is not available. That’s why you need to help customers help themselves too via the public FAQs, forum or answers on social media channels.
You might want to read more about the 5 ingredients to make an unforgettable customer service here.
3. Treat customers the way you wanted to be remembered
Anyone working in customer service will sometimes have a tough time dealing with demanding or grumpy customers. Of course support agents are just normal people – they also have unhappy issues in life as well as have an awful day too. However, it’s suicide if your agents fight fire with fire.
An experienced support team will know how to kick off the conversation with any types of customers to make a good start – like asking how their beloved customers are and talk to them a little bit before jumping into the real matter. They have one job to do – is to make customers feel pleasant when using the service.
You won’t want your business to be reminded as a sales machine which only takes money from people and treats them like rubbish, do you? Train your staff and hire qualified customer service agents who are capable of making customers leave your site with sunshine on their face.
4. Put serious care about the time
Being timing and delivering quick response are always the must-have traits for any customer service of any business in any era. When it comes to customer’s satisfaction, timing is the most important factor.
There are many things you can do to minimize the waiting time of customers, by using saved answers (they must be prepared beforehand with a very positive and natural tone of voice), or hiring more support agents during the peak hours, automating the support progress, etc.
Furthermore, your support agents can move faster with support inquiries by avoiding sales pitches when assisting customers. Obviously your customers are smart enough to sniff it out when you’re trying to sell something to them and they will turn your back on you.
Why? You’re not helping. You only care about what will make them put their money out. Make sure your support team won’t waste customer’s time with sales and leave a bad taste in their mouths. Sales and marketing can be done later via more efficient tactics.
Those who can give what their customers want the quickest, win the game.
Be human and utilize automated tools as you go
Balancing the use of customer service tools with acting human while supporting customers is the perfect way to leverage your customer service’s power (looking for how you can balance personalized and automated customer service? Read more here).
Don’t use computer-generated sentences like “Your support inquiry is #2345, you will be contacted in the next 12 hours”. Instead, use a natural tone of voice in the conversation with customers – talk the way they talk to you, for example “Hey John, thank you for letting us know about your problem. We got your question and we will get back to you shortly”.
Besides, don’t forget to put some strategic automated tools to collect data in order to increase the opportunity to wow customers, understand them better as well as evaluate the performance of your customer service staff. Effectively use automation will help you have an effective customer service.
Wrapping up
You will not want to be just another-shop-to-buy-from. You want to be remembered. Let your customer service shine through and do the job for you. Follow these 5 customer service rules spontaneously and put some creativity in them. I have no doubt that you will get what you deserve.
Now, it’s your turn. Why not share this article around, among your team and work on it? You think there are more important things to add up in the list here? Or anything else? Feel free to express your thoughts here and discuss with me!
