The Importance of Customer Service
by Jo Escotal on May 12th, 2010The importance of Customer service
Objectives
- Understanding the importance of customer service
- Avoid common customer service pitfalls
Why is customer service important?
Good customer service leads to satisfied customers. Striving to keep customers satisfied is extremely important; organizations lose 7 out of 10 customers when the customer service representative demonstrates a lack of concern for the customer needs.
If a customer feels they have not been served well, it takes an average of twelve positive interactions to make up for the one negative interaction they experience. Ordinarily, a customer will not give that many additional opportunities, so you must serve them well the first time.
Customers do not distinguish between you and the organization your work for. To the customer, you are the company. Customers’ positive and negative feelings about the organization relate directly to their experience with you.
Why is it important to keep improving customer service?
Customers expect top quality service, so you must continually improve service to meet their needs. To deliver improved services externally, you must work better internally to enhance your operations.
You must immediately solve any internal problems that prevent you from providing good service, and then monitor the service your organization is providing to make sure it is exceptional.
What is good customer service?
Good customer service is a process that requires several efforts, including:
- Building relationships with customer to establish rapport
- Representing your organization in a courteous and polite manner
- Completing transactions successfully
- Providing Customers with necessary information
- Processing the authority to meet customers’ needs
- Fulfilling other customer requests
What are some pitfalls to avoid when providing customer service?
Saying you do not know – Saying “I do not know” to a customer conveys the idea that you are not willing to go out of your way to get information they need. Always offer to find answer to a customer’s questions, even if it takes time.
Getting Defensive – You will solve the problems faster if you resist the urge to defend yourself when you feel a customer is attacking you. Reacting defensively will simply escalate the customer’s anger.
Conclusion
The bottom line is treat customers with respect and they will keep coming back
The main objective of a business is to make a profit and usually that involves repeat business and in the end you will have the most important commodity of them all which are loyal customers.