9 essential tips for excellent customer service

If there is one thing you can do to boost your brand image, boost revenue, and retain customers, it’s by improving your customer experience.

It doesn’t matter if you are selling the best products, or your care team received proper training, what matters is your customers and what they will recall about your company, and the whole experience they had while interacting with your care team.

In this article, we are going to tackle some of the most valuable tips to improve your company’s customer service. 

1. Be patient and empathetic

You have to keep in mind that you’ll be dealing with different kinds of customers, some have a lot of questions, some are talkative, and some are just really angry. Your care team must be able to handle all of these different types of customers. They need to be patient enough with all customers and empathize with whichever issues that they are facing.

2. Always remember that customer care is an on-going learning process

Your care team needs to always keep on learning and finding out more about the customers, their needs and challenges, and look for better ways to be able to provide them with the best support.

3. Make sure your customers understand 

The last thing you want to do is confuse your customers, so you need to ask them if they understand what you are saying or not. Always offer your help to explain things simply and never end the conversation until your customers are satisfied.

4. It’s okay if you don’t know 

Your customers expect you to know the ins and outs of your product so your responsibility lies in being informed enough to be able to answer customers’ questions. But if you don’t know the answer to – let’s say – a technical question, you need at least to know where to turn to to find the answer. And it’s completely fine to say “I don’t know, let me find out the answer, and I will get back to you as soon as possible”. Your honesty, care and effort to solve the problem will be highly appreciated by your customers.

5. Be willing to accept negative feedback

You need to be able to handle customers’ bad reviews and remember that the customer is always right. Your main goal is your customer satisfaction, no matter what. Even if your customer sounds difficult, unreasonable and tiresome, just be patient with them and show them that you’re doing the best you can to solve their issue.

6. Keep an eye on your customer experience

You need to follow your customer through their entire experience. Have a full view of each customer experience and be quick to fix any issues customers face during every step of the whole experience otherwise your customers’ negative experience can jeopardize your relationship with them and destroy your brand image and reputation.

7. Be an active listener

Your customers need to feel heard, and you can offer that by simply rephrasing what they say to use to make sure that you understand them. Empathize with your customers and use phrases like “I understand that that is a problem. I apologize for your inconvenience. I see why this can be frustrating and upsetting.”

8. Own up to your mistakes

If you find out that you made a mistake even if your customer doesn’t, own it, and this will build trust between your business and your customers. They will be more confident in the services you provide. Moreover, it’ll give control over the situation to fix the issue.

9. Always follow up with your customers even after the issue is fixed

You might think that by fixing a customer’s issue, you are done. On the contrary, you need to make sure that they are satisfied with your service. Call them, send them an email, or ask them for their feedback, show them that you really care to retain them.

Remember that your customers are the pillars of whichever business you run, their happiness is your priority and responsibility. So never miss a moment during their journey, keep an eye on them, and keep learning to provide them with the best customer experience possible to retain them and attract new ones to boost your business revenue growth.