Customer service experience goes beyond call centers and emails. Learn how to leverage great customer service experiences to drive business growth.
Great customer service experiences drive growth as long as you know and follow these guiding principles:
Customer service experience goes way beyond the actual one-to-one interaction between agent and customer. Today, it moves past call centers and email correspondence, nudging its way into social networks, live messaging, and self-help databases.
At this point, there’s not much that isn’t covered by the term. Anything that serves the customer is a customer service experience. Understanding this concept is key.
When running customer support at a startup, I quickly learned that everything was our responsibility. That’s a good thing. You want your customer service team to feel this way. Come with me, I’ll explain further…
Providing an excellent customer service experience is crucial for business success in today’s highly competitive market. However, many companies still struggle to deliver consistent, high-quality service across all customer touchpoints.
In this comprehensive guide, we will demystify customer service experience and outline how you can optimize it for your business.
Here’s what we’ll cover:
- What is customer service experience?
- Why customer service experience matters
- Key elements of customer service experience
- Strategies for improving customer service experience
- Common mistakes to avoid
- Customer service experience best practices
- FAQs
Let’s get right into it!
What is Customer Service Experience?
Customer service experience refers to the entire journey and all interactions a customer has with your business. It encompasses every touchpoint across marketing, sales and service – from initial brand awareness to post-purchase support.
In simple terms it’s about how your customers feel when they engage with your company through any channel, at any time.
Customer service experience is shaped by factors like:
- Interactions with sales and service staff
- Ease of purchasing and using your product/service
- Responsiveness to queries and complaints
- Order fulfillment and delivery
- Self-service options e.g. FAQs, chatbots
- Overall brand experience
The goal is to provide quick, empathetic and effective support consistently, leading to happy, loyal customers
Why Customer Service Experience Matters
Delivering exceptional customer service experience provides many benefits:
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Increases customer satisfaction – 91% of customers are more likely to shop with brands who offer excellent customer service. Happy customers become repeat buyers.
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Boosts customer retention – By one estimate, good customer service experience increases customer retention by up to 60%. Loyal customers also spend more over time.
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Generates referrals – A positive experience makes customers more likely to recommend your brand to others. Such word-of-mouth marketing is highly effective.
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Improves brand reputation – Providing great service shapes positive brand perception and goodwill. This attracts new customers and makes existing ones proud to be associated with your company.
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Creates competitive differentiation – In an overcrowded market, customer experience is a key differentiator that sets you apart. Be known for your unmatched service levels.
Clearly, optimizing customer service pays tremendous dividends long-term and is a prudent business investment. Let’s look at key elements that shape the experience.
Key Elements of Customer Service Experience
There are several crucial components that determine customer service experience during interactions:
1. Communication
How you communicate with customers defines their satisfaction levels. Some key aspects:
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Active listening – Let customers explain issues fully without interruption. Paying close attention shows you care.
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Clear explanations – Use simple, easily understood language when resolving queries. Avoid complex jargon.
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Friendly tone – Be warm, personable and helpful in all exchanges, however the customer behaves.
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Prompt responses – Reply to messages, emails, chat quickly per your service standards. Delayed replies frustrate customers.
2. Problem-Solving
How effectively you troubleshoot and resolve customer issues also shapes their experience:
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Empathy – Understand the customer’s perspective and Validate their feelings before solving the problem.
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Ownership – Take complete responsibility for issues. Never blame the customer.
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Follow-ups – After resolving a case, follow up to ensure the customer is satisfied with the outcome.
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Continuous improvement – Learn from frequent issues to improve products, services and processes.
3. Convenience
Providing quick, seamless service also enhances customer experience:
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Omnichannel – Make it easy for customers to engage via phone, email, chat, social media, whichever they prefer.
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Self-service – Have extensive online resources like FAQs, support portals for quick DIY help.
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Accessibility – Be available when customers need you, with extended service hours if required.
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Personalization – Use CRM data to provide tailored recommendations and communications.
Get these elements right, and you are well on your way to building memorable customer experiences. But how exactly can you optimize these?
Strategies to Improve Customer Service Experience
Here are proven techniques and best practices you can adopt to enhance service quality:
Gather Customer Feedback
Continuously collect first-hand customer opinions through surveys, interviews, reviews and social media monitoring. Feedback provides insights into pain points and improvement areas.
Invest in Staff Training
Conduct regular customer service training to polish staff communication etiquette, problem-solving abilities and product/service knowledge. Expert agents deliver better experiences.
Leverage Technology
Use tools like chatbots, help desks, CRMs to streamline processes and enable quick, seamless customer support across channels. Technology supplements human agents.
Reward Good Service
Recognize and reward employees who go above-and-beyond in delivering exceptional service. This motivates staff and creates healthy competition.
Monitor Performance
Track service metrics like first-call resolution, wait times, CSAT, NPS regularly. Review them to address shortcomings. This ensures consistent quality.
Be Proactive
Actively inform customers about solutions, new offerings, deals through emails, notifications. Don’t always wait for them to reach out.
Common Customer Service Experience Mistakes to Avoid
While improving experience, beware of these common missteps:
- Only prioritizing speed over individualized service
- Using rigid scripts instead of conversations
- Minimizing feedback and not listening to customers
- Having convoluted IVRs and confusing menus
- Being unavailable outside working hours
- Not educating staff on new products/services
- Failing to set and track customer service KPIs
- Not thanking customers for their business
Avoiding these pitfalls will further optimize the customer journey.
Best Practices for Excellent Customer Service Experience
To recap, here are some proven best practices:
- Set clear service standards and KPIs e.g. first response time
- Hire friendly staff with problem-solving aptitude
- Train staff to have product mastery and soft skills
- Monitor social media for complaints and feedback
- Resolve issues on first contact when possible
- Follow-up with customers after solving cases
- Make it easy to get support through various channels
- Personalize service using CRM and analytics
- Use tools like help desks and chatbots for quick assistance
- Continuously gather and act on customer feedback
Adopting these approaches will help you gain repute for a standout customer service experience.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you measure customer service experience?
Key metrics include customer satisfaction (CSAT), Net Promoter Score (NPS), first contact resolution rate, churn rate, number of repeat purchases and social media sentiment.
How much does poor customer service cost a company?
Poor customer experiences cost companies 16% of revenue due to customer churn. Each lost customer also negatively influences around 10 others through negative word-of-mouth.
How long does it take to recover from a bad customer experience?
Studies indicate it takes 12 positive customer experiences to make up for one unresolved negative experience. Recovery is difficult.
What do customers want from customer service?
Customers want quick resolution of issues, personalized and convenient service, staff empathy, good communication, self-service options and follow-ups after case closure.
Key Takeaways
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Customer service experience encompasses all interactions a customer has with your brand across their journey.
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Optimizing it increases loyalty, referrals, brand reputation and revenue.
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Key elements are communication, problem-solving, convenience and personalization.
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Adopt strategies like gathering feedback, training staff, using technology and setting service KPIs.
Providing an exceptional customer experience in today’s competitive climate is challenging but highly rewarding. Follow the guidelines outlined here to stand out from the crowd and build lasting customer relationships.
What is customer service experience?
Customer service experience is the sentiment associated with a company’s ability to provide positive experiences to their customers. Services range from one-on-one interactions over helpdesk software where a support agent resolves a customer issue, to exchanges with the brand on a more public scale.
The definition of customer service experience must go above the archaic understanding of siloed support. What is considered customer service experience today is much more comprehensive than it was years ago. We now know that 55% of customers sight a reputation for great customer service as a reason why they chose one company over another.
This reputation doesn’t live solely within the inbox or on a phone call. People experience customer service more publicly than ever. A good business strategy capitalizes on this free publicity and ensures the sentiment is positive.
Build a great customer service experience mentality at your company
Whether you’re a founder, CEO, or customer service manager, building a great customer service experience comes down to people. Hire the right team and prioritizing customer service comes easy.
Let’s break down those “people” into three distinct groups:
Getting the best people on your customer service team requires a nuanced hiring process. But the “best” people aren’t necessarily the obvious choice.
Customer service skills come from far and wide. Don’t pigeon-hold yourself by only hiring those with specific customer service experience on their resumes.
When I applied to my first job as a customer service rep, my resume didn’t include a single iota of customer service experience. It did, however, boast a prolific amount of writing experience, a ton of inter-departmental communication examples, and a boatload of problem-solving abilities.
To really stay ahead of the game, bring in some fresh blood to think outside the inbox. A team of non-traditional agents can bring a unique perspective to your overall business strategy.
A customer-centric company expands the service mentality beyond the support team. Each department abides by the customer mindset. The simplest way to encourage company-wide customer care is to respect your customer service team.
Invite customer service agents to all relevant meetings, include customer service metrics in high-level presentations, and encourage other departments to go the extra mile for customers whenever possible.
This starts at the top. When a founder cares about the customer service experience, the entire company follows. If you’re in a leadership position, take the initiative to create systematic check-ins to empower employees to prioritize customer feedback.
Depending on the content, customer service in the public sphere is either a blessing or a curse. For good customer service experiences, it’s the kind of free publicity a business would kill for. Bad experiences, though, amplify the space just as loudly (if not louder).
Taking a birds-eye view, customer service provides another value proposition in competitive industries. The stats back it up: By 2020, customer experience will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator.
If you’ve got happy customers, shout it from the rooftops! Tell everyone on social media, release it to the press, and add it to your website. Promise good customer service for all potential customers to see. It may be the differentiating factor in getting them to go with your company over another.
