Today’s article is from guest author Heather Johnson.
Beyond advertising, the way you treat your customers will define your company. The best advertising in the world can’t compensate for a lack in customer service. The word-of-mouth that is generated about your company travels much more swiftly than a great advertising campaign. The best way you can avoid negativity is to treat your customers with respect. Here are some tips to follow when you are dealing with your customer base:
- Make it easy for customers. It seems these days that a customer never knows who to speak with regardless of the nature of their inquiry. It’s imperative that you make it simple for the customer to speak with the proper party depending on their concern. Often it seems that the customer has to speak with different departments in a company to find the answer they want. Eliminate the need for the customer to travel through the cross section of your company to receive proper attention.
- Limit who attends to a given customer. It’s unprofessional to pass a customer off to another representative if you’ve already been dealing with them. This makes the customer feel unwanted or that they’re not dealing with the best company. Whoever starts the process with a customer should be the one who finishes it.
- Chop down the phone tree. There’s nothing more frustrating for a customer then going to a company’s website and seeing a litany of phone numbers. Invariably the one the customer chooses isn’t going to bring them to the proper department. It can be difficult to figure out how you can narrow down all the different numbers your company may have, but it’s necessary that you make it easier for the customer to contact the right person.
- Own up to your mistakes. There is nothing more frustrating for a customer than when you’re just looking for someone to admit they were wrong. If you make a mistake then it’s crucial that you correct the error and admit that you were wrong. This will leave the customer with a good feeling about his or her experience and won’t turn them away from doing business with you in the future.
- Humanize your call center. There is often pressure on the people you have answering phones to handle a call in a certain amount of time and to handle a minimum number of calls in a given day. Let your representatives be real human beings and let them attend to a customer’s complaint or issue in a manner that leaves the customer feeling good. Ultimately, this is more important than statistics.
About the Author:
Heather Johnson is a freelance business, finance and economics writer, as well as a regular contributor at Business Credit Cards, a site for business credit card and best business credit card offers. Heather welcomes comments and freelancing job inquiries at her email address
heatherjohnson2323@gmail.com.