Your new purchase has arrived! At first glance, the design and the features of your new mobile phone make you fall in love.
A first call to test it! Oh, it seems that you hardly hear anything even if you turn up the volume to the maximum.
You look up the customer service number, and here we go. “Please hold while you are connected to the next available agent.” After 17 agonising minutes, someone answers.
The agent asks about your problem, collects the information and realises he can’t solve your issue. But not to worry, he forwards your call to another agent, please hold. Some minutes later, having retold the same questions, the agent finally responds, coldly: “Have you removed the plastic screen protector?”
Come on! All this for that.
But deep down inside you feel relief not having to deal with that unsympathetic customer service anymore.
Have you ever felt supported and appreciated? Have you felt a real connection to your product brand? We bet not.
Customer service can reach the emotional centres of the brain, which affect the decisions that customers make. It’s a double-edged sword, leading to decisions that can either prove beneficial or detrimental to your company. It is up to you to determine which way the balance tips.
A good customer service, the best defence
Customer service as a whole plays a crucial role whether a customer will stay with your brand in the long run. Other factors are also hugely important. But even when everything is against you, customer service puts an armour around your business and the products you offer.
You know product features are easily imitated.
Price wars exist and are the order of the day.
But if you protect products and pricing behind a solid armour of good customer service with a brand that is all your own, you’ll be safer from competitors’ attacks which will inevitably rear their head.
Customers have more options and information than ever before, and they are more sceptical. This combination creates a delicate situation in which, at the first sign of a bad experience, they are willing to jump to a different ship.
Keeping customers as long as possible has always been a critical ingredient for the most successful companies. Plus, customer retention is cheaper than customer acquisition. In the long term, customer service is a profitable investment.
How to build a good customer service armour
Customer service can be as diverse as the products and characteristics of the organisations that provide it and as the clients who receive it. Still, there are two keys for all of them:
• Carefully listening and fulfilling your customers’ needs and desires.
• Ensuring all customer teams have the essential skill set.
Understanding your customers
It should be common sense that we cannot assume that our customers’ needs and opinions are our own. And yet, many companies do just that. To prevent this bias from impacting our success, it is necessary to conduct research to explore the customers’ perspective and solicit feedback. To point to an example, the first reason why startups fail is that they don’t meet their customer’s needs. Surprising?
So, to shape the best strategy for your business, stop guessing and base your actions on data. With Symanto Insights Platform, you will be able to answer questions such as: how does a specific service aspect influence your consumer’s satisfaction? Or what are the main issues of your customer service?
Once you have figured out what your customers expect and value from you, you are ready to propel your customer service in the right direction.
One skill to dominate them all
If we must choose just one skill that is at the heart of all customer service, it would be empathy.
Empathy involves relating to another person in a way that allows you to see the world as they see it. It goes beyond niceness and politeness.
From empathy flow those other invaluable attributes of excellent customer service: patience, resolution, and even a sense of humour.
To empathise with your customers, you must first understand the situation they are in — their challenges and their wishes. Today, this process can be simplified through automation and the use of AI technology, which has become affordable for any type of business in recent years.
Though empathy takes effort and requires constant practice, the rewards are well worth it.
Cocooning and the growth of Amazon
If you still have doubts about the importance of understanding your customers, Amazon is a good example.
Cocooning and staying at home have been on the rise since the mid-1980s, and the technology trend seems to be in the direction of avoiding contact with people even more.
Looking back, it’s easy to predict the e-commerce boom, but the point is that Amazon identified an essential customer need and then developed a way to meet it. However, even though the information was available, most of the biggest retailers didn’t adapt.
Surely you would like to know what your customers think in greater detail. Fortunately, today there are tools like our Psychology AI, where you can use a free trial to discover how the results generated can help you satisfy your customers.
Pleasing customers is not the only goal here
In summary, here are just a few of the reasons why you should invest in your customer service team:
• For the same product or type of work, customers prefer to pay more to companies who offer better customer service.
• Finding and convincing new customers to buy a product is not only less likely, but also far more arduous than selling it to your existing customers.
• Customers will remain more loyal to the brand that makes them feel heard and caters to their needs.
• Customer satisfaction is impacted not only by the product but also by the experience of buying it.
• Happy customers will recommend your business to others. Going the extra mile for customers is rewarded.
The future is now
In an economy increasingly focused on services, the customer experience has become a fundamental piece for companies seeking to add a differentiating value to their proposal.
The support and care areas have evolved to become areas of expertise. These are no longer considered a cost centre but instead have become strategic areas that generate value and help companies gain space in such a competitive market.
Your client nowadays makes his decisions according to what he lives and feels, and not only by what he pays. At Symanto, we can help you to be part of this new paradigm and strengthen your customer service for optimal results. Do not get left behind!
