6 Ways To Instantly Improve Your Customer Service Skills

Good customer service is vital for word-of-mouth referrals and to keep your customers returning. Whether you’re communicating via email, phone or Social Media, you must be able to demonstrate outstanding customer service skills to keep you ahead of the game. 78% of consumers have bailed on a transaction or not made an intended purchase because of a poor service experience – don’t let your customers be one of them!

Listen To Your Customers

If a potential client contacts you with a problem or query, listen to the customer and gain as much information about the problem as you can. Not does this help you do with the issue properly, by listening to your customers they know that you do value them and what they have to say. Nobody likes being ignored.

Tip: Search your brands name on Social Media to see what your customers are saying even if they don’t tag you.

Know Your Business

Whoever is representing your company as a customer service executive must know your company like the back of their hand. This not only includes pricing and policies but also the history of the company and details on competitors. If you ever get asked a question that you don’t know the answer to, find out the answer or transfer them to the person who does know the answer. You should never lie or make things up on the spot – make sure you always have the correct information.

Personalise Their Experience

Nobody likes speaking to a robot, so don’t act like one. Refer to your customer by their name and don’t use generic responses, you must make your clients feel valued and important. 67% of customers have hung up the phone out of frustration they could not talk to a real person according to an American Express Survey in 2011 (a while ago, but you get my point!)

Let your customers refer to you by name and don’t make them feel like they are another support ticket. Buffer have an amazing customer experiences if you ever have any issues, and they are always speedy with their replies. Check out this example of amazing customer experience below.

Make Your Customers Remember You

We remember outstanding experiences and negative experiences best, so you cannot fall anywhere inbetween (and I assume you don’t want to give a negative experience do you?). Every interaction with your customers should be outstanding and leave your customers feeling pleased that their problem is solved or is on the way to being solved. Always try to give a little extra – whether that’s an ebook you can offer them to read while the problem gets solved, some advice or maybe you just brighten up their day by adding an element of humour, this is what will get your customers talking and keep you in their mind.

Always Use Positive Language

Instead of replying to your customer with “I can’t fix that/get you that particular product until next month”, use more positive language like “That product will be available/will be fixed next month and I will make sure it’s on your way to you as soon as it reaches our depot”. If you are using negative language, you come across as a negative person – and we wan the opposite of that! Positive language should suggest alternatives or choices that are available as well as sounding helpful and encouraging. Instead of focusing on the negative (ie a product out of stock) you should show that there is a positive outcome. You must focus on the solution and not the problem itself.

Tip: Avoid using words like can’t, won’t, unable.. or phrases like “if you read the manual” or “like I said before..”. Don’t focus on what you can’t do and don’t try to push the blame on your customer!

Reply Quickly

The average B2B company takes a whopping 42-hours when responding to a potential lead! If you’re one of them you are severely impacting your customer experience, with the necessary technology readily available (on your phone!) there is not a valid excuse for taking this long.

I know this is not always possible, especially when you get an agitated client tweeting you at 1am with a problem they’re having.. But try to keep an eye on your email and Social Media mentions so you can reply in a timely manner. 72% of prospects who tweet a query or complaint expect a reply within an hour on Twitter. 38% of the those who did not receive a timely reply would think of this as a negative customer experience. If you do take a little longer to reply then apologise for the delay in response.