I dial a customer service number. Then I follow the many phone steps and finally, I get through, only to hear a voice that says “all customer service reps are busy right now. Please try your call later; or stay on the line.” After a long wait, eventually a customer rep gets on the line, I share my concerns and only to be told that a) “Sorry ma’am, we don’t know what the problem is but there is no problem on our side; or b) “Sorry ma’am, that is not allowed by the company; we do not allow exceptions even if I understand your concern”; or c) “Sorry ma’am, our technicians will only be available next week. Please call us again”; or d)”Sorry ma’am, our office hours are only from 8 am to 5 pm; please call us again tomorrow.” Sounds frustratingly familiar?
Wikipedia defines customer service as “the provision of service to customers before, during and after a purchase.”
Customer service has long evolved from just a help provided at a desk at the back of the store. In today’s hyper connected world, customer service goes beyond the agent who answers your call for help. It has grown to include every interaction that a customer has with a product or service. It comprises of phone, email, chat, web forms, and social communications, including self-service support sites. And it happens before, during and after a sale.
In our day-to-day interaction with various products and services, how many of these really deliver great service to us? Per my personal experience, very few.
Destructive to business
Bad customer service is destructive to the business. According to Micah Solomon, customer service consultant and author of High Tech, High-Touch Customer Service, “it can kill your reputation and devastate your bottom line.” Based on US statistics, 75 percent of customers believe it takes too long to reach a live person, 78 percent of customers ended a business relationship due to bad service, 61 percent of customers went to a competitor due to bad service, and 50 percent of customer service agents failed to answer customer questions.
According to American Express, customers are two times more likely to talk about a bad experience to their friends than they are to talk about a good one! And in the US, this bad customer service costs the companies $84 billion per year!
Creates opportunities
On the flip side, a positive customer service experience creates a great opportunity for the business. This can be the key to differentiate them from the competition, as 69 percent of customers would recommend a great company to others. Nine out of 10 customers say that they would pay more just to ensure a good customer experience. And 70 percent of customers will do business with a company if they resolve a complaint.
So to ensure sustained customer loyalty, consider the following in serving your customers:
1. Provide high-quality products and services. This is the best way to reduce customer complaints.
2. Give exceptional service. No one will care how good your products or services are if you do a poor job of delivering them. Customers value care and attention and they tend to resent it if this is not in evidence.
3. Remember every second counts because customers hate to wait! In this digital age, expectations of what is timely are really changing. If a company cannot deliver what customers want when they want it, they will move on rather than waste their time.
4. Hire friendly and helpful people at all levels of the organization and continually train them. Hiring people with the right personalities – and not just the right skills – is the first key step in ensuring customers are happy and well-served. Once the right person is hired, he needs to be continually trained on the product or service knowledge so he can effectively answer questions about those products and services; and also be trained on how to effectively deal with real-life situations, such as an angry customer or someone who wants to return a defective product they purchased.
5. Create a customer-centric company. As revealed by Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos, who is the reigning and undisputed leader in overall customer satisfaction, “we don’t focus on the optics of the next quarter; we focus on what is going to be good for customers. I think this aspect of our culture is rare”. All of his departments throughout Amazon are designed to work together to deliver the best customer experience.
Provide amazing service
Customers consider good service as being responsive, competent, convenient and personalized. Providing an amazing customer service is the only option if we want our business to thrive for the long term. We need to “walk the talk” when we say that our customers are our # 1 priority. Going the extra mile for our customer wins a customer for life. And that makes good business sense.
Christine C. Dominado teaches Management of Organizations at the Management and Organization Department of the Ramon V. Del Rosario College of Business of De La Salle University. She can be reached at christinedominado@gmail.com.
The views expressed above are her own and does not necessarily reflect the official position of De La Salle University, its administration, and faculty.