Excellent customer service is an asset worth gold in today’s world that is highly influenced by advanced technology. For that reason, if you know and are aware of customer service mistakes you can help improve your business and its reputation. That being stated, here are ten customer service mistakes to avoid.
1. Ignoring the fundamentals. Using simple phrases like “please” “thank you” and apologizing about any inconveniences mean a lot to the customer and should be a priority to use.
2. Abusing customer’s patience. When customers call for support, their expectations are that they will speak to a representative. Nobody likes being moved around on the phone from one person to another or from one department to another until they run out of patience. If you do that you are moving your customer to your competition.
3. Inexperienced staff. The number of employees you have is irrelevant for good customer service. Instructing employees to provide excellent customer service should be top priority. Customers have the right not to deal with discourtesy, false information, or lack of interest from your employees. Having untrained employees only hurt your customer service.
4. Arguing. We should keep in mind that it takes a lot more effort to persuade a new customer than it does to retain a current customer. For that reason, trying to win an argument is not worth losing a stable customer, you are hurting your business.
5. Not keeping promises. Customers do not want to hear excuses from you, if you promise to have a product ready by Monday, then it should be ready by Monday. If not then you should make an effort to apologize to the customer and make the situation right.
6. Difficulty of contact. In order to see consistent business, your customers or clients need to have access to you. The process of contacting customer service or to speaking to a manager should not be complex, you want your customers to experience convenience so they keep returning.
7. Being strict about policy. To build better customer relationships, customer service representatives and supervisors should be able to bend the company policies when necessary but not break them.
8. Bad record keeping. Be sure that the records you keep of the customers are correct, while taking information from customers go over it again and make sure you pronounce and spell their name correctly. Although any business can make a mistake at some point, constant errors will not keep customers coming back.
9. Email excuses. Some companies will send programmed emails that contain 20 frequently asked questions (FAQ), but there is a big chance that what the customer needs help on is not mentioned in the email at all. Some companies also ignore customer complaints or issues in hope of them forgetting about it. Those are excuses not to provide satisfactory customer service. It is important that a representative respond to each customer request or concern within a short timeline.
10. Lack of concentration. Poor concentration or attention with a customer is asking for trouble, which can lead to irrelevant and vague answers to the customer that will also lead to frustration. Employees should be trained to listen carefully to the customer with full attention and awareness and always prepared i.e. taking notes on the call.