As a business owner, you must ensure that your clients keep returning to your products and services. Apart from providing exceptional products and services, you must also be concerned about customer service. In a competitive market, a customer has a lot of options. You must be careful and provide better customer support than your competitors. In this article, we will look at a few tips that will help improve your customer service.
Ask For Feedback
If you wish to know your customers’ needs, the easiest way is to ask them. You must encourage your customers to share their feedback and learn to accept it gracefully, even if it is negative. Customer feedback will not only give you insights into their shopping experience but also reveal areas that need improvement. Additionally, if you ask your customers for their opinions, they feel valued, and this simple exercise establishes their trust in your brand. There are several ways a customer can provide feedback, from survey forms to social media reviews. You must provide your contact details for those who wish to convey their opinions directly. You must also develop the habit of acknowledging the feedback. If it is a positive one, you should thank them and if it is negative, then let them know how you are going to resolve it.
Hire Appropriate People
Despite the emergence of AI and chatbots, skilled professionals remain irreplaceable. Hence, if you want to improve your customer support, you must employ the right people. You must keep in mind that customer support needs to handle large volumes of clients each day. Hence you must hire individuals who can not only handle pressure but also have patience and the ability to deal with any situation in a professional manner. Good communication skills are another fundamental requirement for any customer service representative. They must also be good listeners. Once you have found a suitable person, you must train them efficiently so that they can be well-versed with your products and services.
Be Approachable
Earlier customer service operations were restricted to call centers, but in the digital era, customer services have spread across several channels. From tweets to emails to discussion forums, every digital platform can be utilized for customer support. According to research conducted by Microsoft, more than half of the consumers prefer online customer support interaction. These days social media is an excellent platform for providing customer support. Social media is not only instantaneous but also location-independent. You can give support to your customers while sitting at home. The most significant advantage of providing customer support on social media is that it acts as social proof. Whatever the manner of help that you provide, it becomes visible to everyone and can impact the brand’s reputation in a positive manner. Therefore, if you want to provide better customer solutions than your competitors, you must use the opportunities provided by social media.
Use Personalized Message
Instead of attaching the usual templates, you must make an effort to try sending personalized messages to your customers. It makes them feel that you genuinely care for them and makes them more loyal to you and your services. Simple gestures like remembering their names or their birthdays can also make a massive difference in improving overall customer service. This same strategy is employed by Starbucks when they handwrite the names of their clients on their orders. Such small habits can make the customers feel special, and if they are happy, the customer experience improves.
Reward Your Clients
The best way to keep your clients happy is to reward them with incentives and discounts. Once your clients are happy, not only the customer experience improves, but there will be an increase in the overall sales as well.
Simplify Returns
On many occasions, a customer may not be happy with the products or services you have provided and would like to return them. In that scenario, you must ensure that the return process is smooth and hassle-free. The customer always opts for the brand which has a flexible return policy. You can also provide a free pick-up service if you have the necessary resources. Also, get some form of feedback from your clients to know the reason behind returning the product. You may have failed as a seller, but by providing a hassle-free return policy, you stand a chance to correct yourself and even retain your customer.
Allow Pre-Buying Testing
Depending on the kind of products that you deal in, you can also allow your customers to test the products before they buy them. This policy would boost sales and save you the time spent on returns. This is because customers would be much more confident about the product if they tried it first. This is a major reason why apparel stores allow trials before buying. Once the product has been purchased, you can give your clients a short period within which they can return their products and get their money back. Big names like Netflix provide this service where if a customer is not happy, they can cancel their subscription after a fixed period.
These are some steps that will ensure an overall improved customer experience. It will make your old customers keep coming back to you and attract new ones.
