Few businesses will dispute the importance of good customer service. Yet what often isn’t mentioned is how context dependent customer service is. We all expect less than stellar customer service at the DMV, and adjust our expectations accordingly. This means that a license clerk who is simply polite and competent might come across as delivering… Read more »
Category: Customer Service
How a Speedy Response Answering Service Can Win Over Unhappy Customers
Business owners know that two things are truly inevitable: taxes, and the occasional unhappy customer. Even if your product is great and your customer service is spotless, it’s simply impossible to please everyone all of the time. While we can’t necessarily control outcomes, we can control the process used to resolve customer complaints — and speed is a major component of any… Read more »
How to Highlight Your Customer Service in Your Marketing
For decades customer service and marketing have been entirely different balls of wax. What recently changed is the connectivity between technology, online, and consumers. People no longer have to write a strongly worded letter to the customer service department when something is not right. Today, they can simply log onto yelp.com and leave their reply for… Read more »
The Ultimate Guide to Improving Customer Satisfaction and Retention
Customer satisfaction should always be a priority. Regardless of your industry, it’s important to ensure your customers are receiving products and services that are in line with their expectations. Fail to deliver on these expectations and you put your company’s reputation at risk. Of course, you can’t please everyone all the time. Even with the… Read more »
Maintaining Relationships After Closing a Sale
Closing an important sale is cause for reflecting on a job well done. Yet it’s important to realize that the first sale is often merely a prelude to something far more valuable — an ongoing, profitable, long-term business relationship. So how do business owners get from here to there? What’s the best way to maintain relationships after closing… Read more »
Four Creative Ways to Say “No” to Your Customers
It’s one of the most well-worn clichés in the client relations business: “The customer is always right.” Yet even if you swear by the wisdom of this philosophy, the fact remains that it’s not always possible to give a customer what she wants. Sometimes, whether we like it or not, customers must hear the word “no.” The trick is… Read more »
Tips for Responding to Complaints on Social Media
The world of social media can be a wonderful place to build community and customer loyalty, but all that positive buzz can come with a price. The easy accessibility of social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter means that upset customers can issue their complaints to the whole world in a matter of seconds. So,… Read more »
5 Ways to Put a Positive Spin on Negative Feedback
Social media is a powerful tool for connecting with customers and fans of your brand, but what happens when your “likes” get soured with negative complaints? With so many opportunities to send negative feedback via social media and review sites, there seem to be countless ways to ignore the age old advice about keeping quiet… Read more »
Anticipating Your Customer Needs
When you are running your business, you want to create the most exceptional experience for your customers so they will purchase more products and services over and over again. Yet how do you anticipate and recognize their needs? Conducting surveys and talking to them in person can open the doors of communication, yet you still… Read more »
Creative Ways to Say Thank You to Your Customers
If it wasn’t for your wonderful customers, you wouldn’t have made it through your first unsteady year of business operations or gotten through the turbulent sales periods as you grew your company. They were there for the good and the bad times. Your business has, time and time again, benefited from the customers’ orders and… Read more »