Don't miss out on this COVID19 customer opportunity
Take off your employee/employer hat and answer this question as a customer:
When you receive poor customer service, what do you do?
Do you brush it off and carry on with your day?
Does it matter in the moment but you once you’ve left, you forget?
Does it matter how much money you were spending as to if you would complain?
Do you avoid the business in the future?
Do you ask to speak with “the Manager’ then and there?
Do you write a strongly worded email or survey response after the event?
I’ve been asking that question to customer service training attendees for over 10 years which means I have asked over 1,000 people and the responses were overwhelming this:
“I will share my frustration/s with friends/family but rarely direct to the business”
To give you an example of why many of us don’t tell the business when their customer service staff have let us down, I recently had a negative on-site, face to face (with masks on) experience at an essential service. I was in the business for a total of 1 hr 45 mins so lots of time for me to watch and listen.
The event involved 7 staff in total; 3 staff interacted directly with me and 4 staff were having a conversation beside me which was easily heard. I won’t go into details of what was so annoying but suffice to say, it was more than 1 thing. At the time I didn’t confirm my annoyance about the level of service. Why? Because I felt very sure that if I had suggested that the service was poor, I would simply have been added to the ‘just another annoying customer’ list…which was the topic of the conversation I had overheard beside me.
4 staff were having a good old complain to each other about an earlier customer who had sought clarification on a product and then asked to return the product. Apparently the customer was very rude and confirmed it was their mistake because they didn’t listen to his needs. All in all, the staff agreed that it was all his fault because he didn’t listen to them and that he probably couldn’t afford it anyway. This was all done in the customer area of the business where 1 customer was waiting to pay and 2 other customers were browsing.
You can probably imagine me sitting there with steam coming out of my ears but still, I said nothing as my feedback would fall on deaf ears. I would have asked to speak to the Manager, but I knew the Manager wasn’t there as I had also overheard staff say to another customer that the Manager was at another store. I left with a bucket load of things to tell the Manager at a later date.
The business sent me a survey via email that evening. The survey asked the usual questions; layout of store, suitability of products, wait time, level of service. I had to tick boxes, choose ratings between 0 and 10 and write my story and by the time I got to the 75% completed mark (10 minutes), I escaped.....more annoyed than straight after the on-site interaction. I rang to speak to the Manager and was told I would get a call back. I didn’t.
So here is the opportunity this business missed and you should be grabbing!
If you've got customers now, then NOW is your opportunity to turn them into customers for life or at the very least, don’t give them a reason to join the noisey majority who complain to everyone but your business. Right NOW, customers of EVERY business are experiencing the pain of isolation and uncertainty and that pain can be relieved with empathy and excellent communication skills.
Frontline customer service staff have never had a greater opportunity to delight customers because the desire for genuine human connection is high.
Below are examples of how to meet and exceed the needs of customers:
Remind staff to put down the pen, look up from the computer screen and give eye contact to customers in the first 3 seconds of them entering the business
Pick up the phone, call your customers and say hello - with no other agenda than to let them know your business values them before, during and after sales and is thinking of them during COVID19
A mask removes smiles so remind staff that eye contact and tone of voice is how you confirm they are professional and ready to help
Customer service is a business term for people helping people - present that statement to your team and at the end of every day, ask them how many people they helped today.
Do I have empathy for frontline customer service staff during COVID19? Absolutely! It's a tough gig when customers are also feeling levels of stress and may not be communicating in their usual polite and friendly way. Remind your team that the customer is not the enemy, they are an opportunity. An opportunity to put empathy into action and help ease isolation pain.
And in case you’re wondering, I didn’t make any purchases with that essential service. My hard earned went to the opposition who offered more than products.....it started with smiling eyes and a tone of voice that confirmed I was valued. It continued as I interacted with 3 different staff who all displayed excellent communication skills and ended with a follow up phone call from a Team Leader 2 days later to thank me for my business and ask if there was any way they could improve. That was the only question they asked - how could we do better?
1 question in a 3 min phone call that left me feeling like telling everyone I know that this is a business worth spending time and money with.
If you want to create a culture of service excellence in your business and be proud of a team who don’t need you there to watch over them, then you need us. Contact us today or have a look at our online resource center now.
By Cate Schreck - Author of The A - Z of Service Excellence