Entry Software Corporation

Entry

Customer Tracking

Everything You Need To Know About Customer Service

by


“Hello! Welcome to our company, what can I do for you?” These few words of introduction, depending on how they are spoken, will either make a great first impression or a worst on the customer. Customer service is crucial if you want any business to thrive. It does not matter whether you are located online or in a store, the way you deal with customers will greatly impact your business. The only difference is for online, you’ll find yourself dealing with customers virtually, through email, or calling; as to the store where you’ll be face to face with a customer. No matter how you run your business, the same tactics for great customer service will apply!

In order to have solid customer service, you will need to acquire a few skills. Firstly, patience. There is nothing worse than talking to customers and not giving them the time and patience they deserve. There will always be the customers that are not always kind when dealing with employees. In some cases, customers may talk for a long period of time complaining or explaining their issue, which may become irritating to the employee. Now, taking the time to think about how to analyze the problem, can not only give the customer the feeling of being valued but also allows the employee to respond in a way that is beneficial to the business.

Another quality of good customer service is knowing your business. When a customer asks about a product or service that your company offers, there should not be any “I’m not sure” or clueless looks or silent air time. When talking about a big company that has multiple departments, transferring the customer to someone with the extensive knowledge will assure the customer is informed.

One of the most important skills is communication and positivity. A customer service team that shows great communication skills such as eye contact, gestures, good tone of voice and confidence, shows that you care about what the customer has and want to help. When speaking face to face, 55% of what you mean is in your body posture, 38% of what you mean is in your tone of voice and only 7% of what you mean is contained in words. Talking on the phone or in person; no matter which one it is, using different tones of voice shows you are interested in the conversation and shows value to the customer. Staying positive, even in tough situations, can relax the customer and settle them down. If you are in a situation where a customer is yelling or upset, keeping the conversation positive will help bring the issue down.

These skills come naturally to some people! Although, there is always room for improvement especially with customer service, which is why training and workshops can help boost your customer service at your company. Training sessions can help your employees learn what to do in difficult situations. As well teach/refresh them on the skills required to keep a high customer service. Workshops can set up real-life scenarios and help the employees feel and learn what it is like to be in very different situations. Investing in customer service training allows for better success in the future!

Lastly, companies can be overwhelmed by the number of customers. In these cases it usually takes more time to respond to customers, making them unhappy. Using customer service software can help dramatically organize the wave of customers. There are many software products now created to help companies manage customer service. Ticketing systems are one way that this software helps, by highlighting the key issues in an easily organized list. This helps employees and managers categorize issues and their significance for the business. These software applications can also provide calendars showing assigned tasks, and tasks needed to be completed; helping managers see who is dealing with what, and what other issues need to taken care of. Customers do not like to be kept waiting. Using ticketing software can help your employees stay on top of issues, and get to all their customers in an organized and quick manner.

Customer service is crucial from a business standpoint. Employees need to know how to engage properly and solve issues that may arise with customers. Training programs and workshops can help achieve this! Software apps are also offered that can assist the company with staying on top of issues, with an organized and less chaotic way. Treating your customers like gold will help keep your existing customers, but also bring in new ones. If a customer is satisfied with the way they were treated, they will talk about it and spread the word. Although, it can go the other way too as well. Let the word get around positively…and that can be done with the help of the assets mentioned throughout this article!

Inexpensive Acts Your Customers Will Appreciate

by


Customers come in all shapes and sizes, and that includes different personalities. Despite some of the hassles they may cause, they are a reason your business has become what it is. Many companies show appreciation to their customers, by offering free gifts on their next purchase. From a customer perspective, this is amazing! However, there are also inexpensive acts that make your customer feel special, without draining your budget.

Solid, Consistent, Customer Service

Customers want to feel appreciated and valued while doing business with you, and this can start with just having great customer service. Simple things like having the right people answering the phone, positively acting as the face of your company can boost your customer service dramatically. Training your employees to comprise the needed customer service skills will show a huge difference in your customer relationships. Positive and attentive attitudes are very important and will show that your employees care about your customers. Perfecting this area of service can quickly show positive relationships with customers, costing you little to nothing extra.

Start a VIP or Affiliate Club

VIP or affiliate clubs can not only give the customer exclusive deals or discounts, but it also motivates them to continue to purchase or direct new business to your company. They can be designed however you see fit; although they usually include a points system, depending on how much customers have purchased, or how long they have been a customer. Customers can gain points they can redeem on items such as purchase discounts. This way the customer has to be invested in your company before they begin to get discounts.

Personal Emails

The little things people do sometimes have the biggest impact on someone’s perception. Sending emails designed uniquely to customers let them know how much their service means to the company. Other email subjects such as wishing them a happy holiday can add a personal relationship with your customer. Allowing this, makes the customer feel special because it’s not just a spam email that’s sent to everyone. It shows that the company took time to that specific customer and show you care.

Social Media Callouts or “Shoutouts”

Social media has grown over the past decade and is now the main way the world communicates to one another. Some including Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, or Instagram. Companies take to these social media to advertise their product or service and connect with their customers. Another inexpensive way to appreciate a customer is to directly communicate with them on a social media page. This can be done by writing a sincere tweet, Instagram or Facebook post including a little about them, a picture and why they are valued.

The little things that are done can sometimes be the most impactful. Customers are very important to your company and should be shown appreciation for their time invested. Beginning with overall customer service, having the trained employees deal with customers with the correct skills such as respect, listening, and patience can display extreme value towards the customer. Once the company has customer service down, they can start reaching out to new ways to appreciate their customers. Maintaining good relationships with customers, by making them feel valued, will get your company name noticed in a positive way, benefiting the company dramatically.

Three Ways to Effectively get Customer Feedback

by


Imagine this, you’re providing a service to customers, but you aren’t receiving any feedback. It can be a difficult position to be put in. As humans, one of the hardest things to deal with is the unknown. No one likes being left in the dark, especially from a business standpoint. We all want to know what our customers are thinking. Whether it be satisfied or dissatisfied. Customer feedback is one of the most important things when it comes to running a business. It lets you know honest opinions about your customer’s opinions so you can improve overall customer satisfaction. Being successful in a business means knowing what people want to see from you. So, you want customer feedback but you just don’t know how to obtain it. Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered.

1. Requested Feedback

This type of feedback is seen everywhere. It’s very straightforward, which is why it’s so effective. Simply asking a customer for their feedback can lead you in the right direction for getting answers. You can do this by asking them to fill out a survey, questionnaire or simply rate your business online, over the phone or even sending out a text message. When you request feedback you need to be prepared to answer any question the customer has. This may sound nerve-racking, especially if a customer wants a direct in-person or over-the-phone response, however, you’re getting the feedback you requested, which was the original goal.

2. Observed Feedback

Another way to gather feedback from customers involves watching how your customers use your product or service. This will tell you what purpose it’s serving for the public. Often times, you can track how much they use it and in what areas of the world it’s being used. You can also see how they navigate through it and the types of documentation they read. You can do this by watching your product engagement for example, with analytics, you can see what days of the week are most popular for your business and even what times of day your product is used. This is extremely helpful because it’s not only giving you a sense of customer satisfaction, you’re understanding how and why they use it.

3. Unsolicited Feedback

Unsolicited feedback is the complete opposite of requested feedback. Customers or clients are giving you feedback without being asked. For example, a customer tells you how they think you could improve your business or gives suggestions about what they would like to see in the future. Although this form of feedback can occasionally be difficult to deal with, it will give you a sense of what you need to improve. Although not all given feedback is negative, it can be just to tell you how great your product or service is. In the end, you’re getting the feedback you wanted.

Conclusion

Engaging with your customers in a way that benefits you and them is a great way to maintain a business with satisfied customers. Through feedback, you can determine what customers love, like and dislike about your product or service. In the end, customer feedback is key to having open communication with your customers and which greatly benefit your business.

Visit www.entry.com for more information.

5 Reasons Why Your Small Business Needs Customer Tracking Software

by

It’s time you retired your old paper system of managing your customer information or manually inputting everything on a spreadsheet. Perhaps the hesitation to transition to customer tracking software has to do with the fear of it costing too much. However, when you consider the benefits, you will recognize why utilizing customer tracking software will not only save you money in the long run but also help you nurture customer relationships and increase sales. With customer tracking software, you’ll be able to collect valuable customer feedback, prioritize the most important requests, track your team’s productivity, and gain a better understanding of your business. Here are five reasons why your small business would benefit from customer tracking software:

1.    Centralization of Your Customer Support Requests & Questions

Customer tracking software keeps you and your team well-organized by having a centralized location for all your customer information. With customer tracking software, everything your team needs to know to respond to a customer’s inquiry is in one place. You no longer have to CC anyone on an email or search through threads looking for answers. This will save you and your team a great deal of time, particularly if answering customer questions takes up a good portion of your day. This also ensures that nothing falls through the cracks.

2.    Customers Can Track Open Issues

The last thing you want to do is make an already frustrated customer even angrier by making them wait for a response. What will only worsen the situation is if the people on your team don’t know whether or not the message has even been read or responded to. Because customer tracking software lets you update the status of a case, your clients don’t have to wait in the dark or worse, feel ignored. Solutions like TeamHeadquarters have an integrated Customer Self-Service Portal enables customers to create tickets, attach documents and prepare updates as they also maintain a tight line of communications with the service staff. If you have a large staff that is dedicated to handling customer inquiries and issues, you’ll want to track their progress to ensure their productivity. While there are several methods to do so, customer tracking software has a productivity tracking feature that allows team members to enter notes about their progress on specific issues.

4.    Prioritize the Most Important Requests

Frustrated employees who may feel overwhelmed by too many issues will inevitably drop the ball which could lead to tickets getting lost, ignored or forgotten. With customer tracking software, you can prioritize your workflow so that the most time-sensitive cases are handled first, and cases that can wait will have a lower priority assigned. Employees will avoid getting inundated because they will know which ones to prioritize.

5.    Improved Collaboration

Collaboration can be challenging when email is the primary channel used for communication. The right customer tracking software will allow your staff to work with one another more harmoniously, resulting in a stronger team that is quicker to respond to your customers’ inquiries and concerns. To test which customer tracking software is right for you, try an all-in-one solution like TeamHeadquarters which is all about managing All Work in a unified simple-to-use application. Click here for a free demo.