When Does Good Customer Service Begin?

 

When we talk about customer service, most people think about specific situations and dealing with specific people. They think of talking to a customer service representative on the phone when there’s a problem, or possibly dealing with the person at the front desk in an office or the checkout counter at a retail store. However, if you run a business, it is important to remember that customer service starts before your customers ever talk to anyone ?#147; or even walk in the door.
Imagine for a moment that you’re a customer, out there somewhere, who is looking for a product or service offered by your company. From a customer’s perspective, how easy is it to find you and do business with you? Try walking through the customer’s experience from start to finish, and you may find that some things need to be improved.

How Do They Find You?

In the old days, all you had to do to make sure customers could find you was put a sign in front of your location and pay for a nice ad in the phone book. Those days are in the past. A sign and a phone book listing are still good ideas, but most customers these days look online when they need to buy something. If you don’t have some kind of presence on the Internet, they will never even know you exist.
A website is a good and obvious place to start. However, there are many things to consider besides just throwing up a homepage. Make sure your website is easy to navigate and has contact information featured prominently. Use a pleasant, easy-to-read color combination and font size. Black on white is fine! Add borders and images for color and interest, but don’t clutter the page up with a distracting background or things that flash and move around.
If you feature products on your website, make sure customers can navigate through them intuitively. Set up categories for different types of products, and feature thumbnails that link to pages with detailed information. Don’t put too many things on a page. Customers shouldn’t have to page through hundreds of things to find what they want, or wait for ten minutes for all the images to download.
Remember, anything you can do to make your customer’s experience easier and more pleasant is customer service. A well-designed website is a great way to make a positive first impression and get your customer relationships off to a good start.

They Found You! Now What?

If you sell online, make sure the ordering process is simple, speedy, and above all, secure. A confusing order form or lengthy process will lose you customers in mid-order. Don’t ask too many personal questions, and let customers know what you’re doing to make sure all their information is kept safe.
When customers call on the phone, do they get an immediate response? Many companies try to keep their costs down by making customers navigate through a touch-tone quiz. The truth is that customers want to talk to a person when they call, not push buttons on their phone. Make people punch through too many menus, and they’ll just hang up. Cutting costs also cuts customers! Have a real live person answer the call. If you must use touch-tone menus, always offer the option to talk to a representative. Keep your wait times down to a few minutes at most. Nobody wants to sit and listen to hold music for half an hour ?#147; and they won’t.

If you have a physical location, look at it from a customer’s perspective. Is the business clearly marked? Is the sign visible from the street? How easy is it to find parking? Is the entrance easy to locate and access? Are the grounds and entryway clean and well-kept? Believe it or not, this is all part of customer service as well. It helps customers get to you more easily and demonstrates that you care about their experience. A poorly-marked building with peeling paint or a cramped parking area full of trash and potholes is not going to inspire confidence in your customers, or make them want to return.
Once the customer makes their way into your place of business, think about how they will find what they’re looking for. Depending on whether you’re a service provider or a retail store, and whether you have your own building or an office within a larger complex, this could involve a number of issues. Is there someone in the entry area to greet and direct customers? Are signs clear and easy to follow? Are products organized in a way that makes sense, and are the departments marked? How easy is it to find a salesperson or a service representative?

Look around inside your place of business. As with the exterior, the way your location looks on the inside says something about your regard for your customers. They won’t appreciate it if the floors are dirty, trashcans are overflowing, and the light bulb is burned out in the restroom. Keep the reading material in the waiting area up to date, and the hallways clean and clear. Make sure shelves are well-stocked, neat and organized. The more you do to keep your customers comfortable, the more likely they are to return.

Customer Service Begins Before You Ever See The Customer

Amazingly, these are all things you can do for customers before they actually interact with any of your customer service people! However, this is only the beginning. Follow up on these tips by ensuring you have well-trained, helpful staff with exceptional customer service skills. Your customers will come away thinking highly of you and your company. Not only that, but they will be back again ?#147; and that is a true customer service victory.

 

 

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