In any business, customer service and marketing should have a harmonious relationship. Think of these aspects of your company as going hand in hand, like peanut butter and jelly. The ultimate goal of customer service is to improve the customer experience, and a marketing strategy focused on customer retention may spark more sales. According to OutboundEngine, increasing customer retention by just 5% can lead to a 25% to 95% increase in profits.
That’s why it’s vital to align customer service with your marketing and sales teams to accomplish customer support goals. By encouraging collaboration across these departments, you can increase revenue while decreasing overall marketing and customer acquisition costs – and help ensure the longevity of your business too.
Customer service and marketing departments often operate in silos, focusing solely on their own goals and metrics. But smart companies realize the massive opportunity in getting these two critical functions to collaborate.
Aligning customer service and marketing creates a seamless, positive brand experience. It also provides a feedback loop that informs better products, messaging, and experiences.
In this article, I’ll explain why marrying marketing and customer service is key to business growth. I’ll also share 15+ actionable tips for how these teams can work together to create customer delight.
Why Collaboration Between Customer Service and Marketing Matters
Let’s look at a few of the top reasons it pays dividends when customer service and marketing join forces:
1. Improves brand consistency
Marketing sets brand expectations through ads websites and campaigns. Customer service brings the brand to life through every interaction. Close collaboration ensures brand promises are fulfilled.
2. Creates better customer experiences
Customer service handles questions and complaints. Marketing focuses on acquisition and engagement. Together, they can map the complete customer journey and optimize each touchpoint.
3. Allows for more personalized engagement
Customer service agents develop personal relationships through ongoing interactions. Marketers have the tools and data to personalize at scale. Sharing insights allows both teams to engage customers in more tailored ways.
4. Drives customer advocacy and loyalty
Great service earns customer trust and loyalty. Loyal customers are your best advocates through referrals, reviews, and repurchases.
5. Enhances effectiveness of marketing campaigns
Customer feedback provides unique insights into pain points, objections, and delights. Marketing campaigns can use this intel to create more relevant and compelling messaging.
6. Improves product development
Customer service is on the front lines hearing what customers love (or hate!) about products. Looping in marketing allows them to guide development of offerings that better meet customer needs.
Clearly, customer service and marketing have much to gain by joining forces. But what does this look like in practice? Here are 15+ ways these teams can work together to drive growth.
15+ Ways Customer Service Can Collaborate with Marketing
1. Set service standards aligned to brand values
Brand values should shape customer interactions, not just external communications. Provide training and guidance to ensure agents embody the brand values during every interaction.
2. Share key messaging and campaign info
Make sure agents are looped in on marketing initiatives, product rollouts, promotions, and campaigns. Equip them with relevant messaging and FAQs to support customers.
3. Seek feedback on campaign performance
Agents often hear directly from customers about their perception of campaigns. Solicit their feedback so marketing can optimize messaging and channels.
4. Notify each other of trends and crises
If agents notice a concerning trend, loop in marketing immediately. Whether it’s an emerging fraud tactic or influx of complaints, combine efforts to address issues quickly.
5. Have service agents report product feedback
Agents build personal relationships and gain unique insights on the customer experience. Reporting product likes, dislikes and recommendations allows marketing to guide enhancements.
6. Share voice of the customer data
Marketing relies on market research and feedback surveys. Customer service interacts with customers daily. Centralizing all VoC insights provides a richer understanding of customers.
7. Collaborate on customer win-back campaigns
Losing customers hurts both teams. Jointly develop campaigns to re-engage at-risk customers and win back defectors.
8. Work together on onboarding campaigns
First impressions matter. Help new customers get off to a great start through coordinated onboarding campaigns with helpful tips and product guidance.
9. Develop joint customer re-engagement triggers
A missed payment or inactive account could signal lost interest. Proactively collaborate to re-engage customers with helpful tips and promotions when triggers occur.
10. Build customer loyalty programs
Loyalty programs reward brand devotion. Develop programs that make customers feel special based on tenure, referrals, or activity levels.
11. Create customer case studies and stories
Satisfied customers provide powerful marketing content. Develop customer success stories that can be used across channels.
12. Conduct joint quarterly business reviews
Hold regular meetings to set joint goals, review progress, and plan future initiatives. Frequent collaboration fosters an integrated, customer-centric approach.
13. Develop shared customer experience metrics
Traditional CSAT or NPS only tell part of the story. Create shared CX metrics and dashboards to stay aligned on customer experience goals.
14. Have service leaders approve campaigns
Before launch, have customer service leaders review campaigns. They can help spot potential objections and identify needs for additional support assets.
15. Build a knowledge base together
Great self-service cuts contacts while solving problems faster. Maintain one unified knowledge base combining expertise from both teams.
16. Collaborate on support documentation
Create help content that speaks to prospects and customers. Marketing provides use cases and messaging. Customer service supplies troubleshooting advice.
Make the Commitment to Aligning CS and Marketing
Siloed teams produce fractured customer experiences. Companies who align customer service and marketing set themselves apart.
Use the tactics provided above to kickstart greater collaboration at your company. Take the first step by getting leaders from both groups in a room to define shared goals and commitment to working together.
While change may take time, the payoff is immense. Not only will you drive growth through better experiences – you’ll build brand devotees who can’t stop raving about your company.
Benefits of implementing customer service objectives into your marketing strategy
When your business focuses on customer service as part of its marketing strategy, it positively affects your bottom line, reducing business costs and increasing profits. In fact, Salesforce reports that 89% of customers say a good customer service experience makes them more likely to make another purchase. [See our Salesforce CRM review to learn how the platform can enhance your customer relationships.]
There are many other benefits your company stands to reap by aligning customer service and marketing efforts.
Great customer service gives you a competitive edge because it keeps consumers spending their money with you and referring others to do the same. Nelson James, co-founder of Signs.com, has experienced this firsthand.
“Customer service is a critical part of our marketing efforts at Signs.com,” he said. “We work hard to make sure we have incredible customer service that sets us apart from our competitors. In addition to our excellent products, our customer service is why people choose us in the first place and the main reason people keep coming back.”
Delightful customer service could motivate someone to leave an online review, and a wealth of positive reviews builds a business’s credibility.
“The majority of our customer reviews are based on how our customers are treated by our customer service team, and we pay close attention to what people say,” James said. “Good reviews help us establish trust and confidence with our customers. A positive experience with customer service creates loyal, happy customers that spread the word about our service, driving referrals.”
Some businesses experience conflict between their sales and marketing teams. But if everyone has a unified goal of prioritizing customer service, collaboration will be easier. Your overall marketing strategy should encourage cross-departmental cooperation, and that’s precisely what you get when you integrate customer service as a marketing strategy.
“Making sure we have top-of-the-line customer service is one of our most important marketing efforts, and it yields serious results,” James said. “Good customer service gives us a unique selling proposition, repeat business, increased trust, branding and word of mouth. That sounds like excellent marketing to me.”
Harness the power of motivation.
When your customer service and marketing teams are correctly aligned, the positive outcomes are likely to boost employee morale and keep your staff motivated. Behind-the-scenes cooperation can have an external effect on your business that impacts the company internally, a cyclical relationship that keeps on giving. Hard work leads to happy customers, which leads to happy staffers who keep working hard.
Use that motivation to encourage employees to keep delivering at a high level and continue working together to accomplish company goals. Among the great byproducts, besides higher profits, are a positive sales culture and reduced turnover.
Customer service in marketing
How do marketing and customer service work together?
Customer service and marketing are two fundamental departments in a successful business operation. Combining their efforts can benefit both a business and its customers. If you’re interested in providing customers with an optimal experience, learning how to combine the efforts of marketing and customer service teams can be helpful.
How can customer service be used in marketing?
One way is by using data from customer service to inform marketing strategies. For example, if customers regularly ask for a particular product or service, then marketing should focus on promoting that product or service. Another way is by using customer feedback to improve the customer experience.
Can customer service be a marketing tool?
Organisations who leverage customer service as a marketing tool understand that by sharing data and feedback, they’re able to offer an optimal customer experience. These businesses can: According to the Salesforce State of the Connected Consumer report, 78% of customers expect consistent interactions across departments.
Why do you need a marketing & customer services team?
Aligning the operations of both the marketing and customer services teams allows you to identify and track optimal prospects for brand advocates, which can lead to saving time and resources and creating reliable, high-quality content for future marketing campaigns.
