Customer service: relationship management

Customer service relationship 

For better or for worse... Customer relationship management is all about working together, not imposing what suits one party or the other. Irrespective of the initial engagement, companies which can demonstrate flexibility, and wish for the relationship to succeed, will stimulate their customers to adopt the same behaviour. And, long after the wedding day all will live in harmony in the long term....

Picture courtesy of CocoonPhotography with our thanks -

Customer service examples

Customer service examples: Here are a few quotes by @Thoughtbuddy giving us his take on good customer service:

"For me, an example of @verygoodservice is when the shop assistant walks around from behind the counter/till to hand over your purchase(s)."

"Also think it's @verygoodservice when assistant refers to you by name using details on your payment / loyalty card."

"It's better to take the customer to where the product they're after is on the shelf/rail rather than just give directions."

"A basic: staff engaging in friendly banter with the customer rather than talking to their colleagues/pals."

Thank you Simon

Customer service: giving up is not an option

Customer service options

In a harsh climate, companies' leadership teams may decide that investment in customer service is a low priority. Whilst the motivation is easy to understand and often driven by cost management measures, it is not sustainable. After all, when the winter is over, clients will remember where their bad customer experience and this will clearly influence their decision for future purchases. So even when it is tough out there, good customer service remains a critical tool to outshine the competition.

Customer service: the social media wave

Social media customer service

Social media, and Twitter in particular, is being used more and more as a customer service channel. It is attractive for customers as it brings immediacy of contact and from the companies' perspective, if handled carefully, it is a fantastic marketing opportunity: the social networks can provide spectacular word of mouth responses, help considerably with brand awareness and can be a very strong source of recommendations. Will the emerging wave turn into something bigger or simply fade away?

Challenges for social in the long run are multiple: a network like Twitter has a narrow bandwidth for a given company and can only handle a relatively small number of customer interactions at a time. Also it provides very little triage capabilities at the moment and all queries are channelled in one place, it is like having only one email account in the old days. But more concerning is that, as time goes by and the novelty factor fades, the bad practices which we see in real life (bad response time, no response etc) are starting to creep in the social media customer service sphere and this may encourage the general public to go away and try something else.

Picture by verygoodservice.com

Customer service skills: simplicity is key

What customer service skills do you really need? Good service, delivered well, will always win the day. The rule book should establish the basic customer service definition: for a restaurant, this can be as simple as a bottle of (cold) water and a couple of glasses on every table. Much of the perception about the quality of service, however, will be determined by the service skills, factors such as the human interaction between the customer and staff... Assuming that the quality of the product is beyond reproach and not over priced, if the staff attitude is good, the overall service assessment will be positive, irrespective of its level of sophistication.

Picture by verygoodservice.com

Update customer service skills 2013

We have prepared a list of customer service skills which we consider to be essential when implementing an effective customer service strategy. They can be found by reading this blog post: list of customer service skills

Bridging the gap in customer service

Customer service gaps

A major challenge for service companies is to bridge the gap between customer expectations and service provision. This is actually extremely difficult to achieve as there is little reward for over delivery when the expectation is low but potential for a massive back-clash when the service levels are judged to be insufficient in the eyes of customers. This may result in a dramatic misallocation of resources which can cost companies much in terms of lost sales. The solution has to be to think hard about the service design, to relax rigid procedures and to introduce flexibility in the customer service provision by placing more reliance on employees.

Picture courtesy of Matt Rhodes with our thanks - http://twitter.com/#!/mattrhodes