Good service is critical to attracting and retaining customers. And to really make a difference, excellent service is needed. Exactly what that means varies by industry, by product or service and by customer. However, these 4 things every customer wants:
1. Good accessibility and being helped quickly
Reachability is a must. When you call, you want to speak to someone. No endless menus or endless transfers. When you send an e-mail, you want a response. And when you visit a business, you want to be spoken to. Although this seems obvious, many companies can improve their accessibility many times over. What can help here is setting guidelines or KPIs for employee reachability and response time. But even better is creating a work environment where employees are encouraged to help customers quickly, not because they have to, but because they want to provide the best service.
2. A personal, empathetic approach
Customer service is always about people. Even in Business 2 Business. Questions, problems and requests always come from individuals, not companies. And so a personal touch is important. No one wants to be treated like a number. People want to be understood and approached personally. So empathy is very important. Listening carefully to the customer, understanding his or her issue and providing an appropriate solution. The objective should be to not only provide a solution that conforms to your internal guidelines, but to provide a solution that puts a smile on the customer's face.
3. Adequate help for complaints and problems
Providing good service when everything is running smoothly is not that difficult. Especially when a customer has a serious complaint, is dissatisfied or even angry, it becomes important to provide proper service. Make sure the customer only has to tell his or her story once. Take responsibility and initiative as a person, so don't hide behind colleagues, rules or circumstances. And most importantly, provide an appropriate solution. Research shows that by fixing a complaint or solving a problem in a great way, the customer can become even more satisfied than if the complaint or problem had not occurred.
4. Honest, transparent communication
Being honest and open is important not only in providing service, but in any contact between people. It is the basis for trust. When you act honestly and communicate openly with customers, they will also be more understanding of you, more likely to accept a mistake and more confident in the quality of your service. And that trust in each other is necessary to build a relationship.
Teun Arts is Service Manager at Dysel and ensures that customers make optimal use of the software's capabilities, now and in the future.
