When a customer has an interaction with your business, are you confident that they had a top notch experience? If they did, they will share it with one or two people. If they did not, according to the White House Office of Consumer Affairs, they may tell 9-15 of their friends and family (1). Excellent customer service doesn’t just happen. You have to train for it, and you have to work for it daily. The good news is, you can be proactive and train for it from the beginning.
Here are 5 Ways to Train for Excellent Customer Service:
1. The Golden Rule. If you want your employees to give your customers excellent service, the first, and most important step, is to give your employees that same level of service. If they need your attention, you give it to them. If they have a suggestion, you listen. If they drop the ball, you help them pick it up. When you have a reasonable opportunity, bring in coffees for the office, or bring breakfast in on a Friday. Your employees will be more inspired to serve those around them when they are served well.
2. Provide scenario training. Good customer service training content will give service scenarios to help your employee implement excellent service. For example, in your training documents, list a few service issues that could go wrong (someone waiting to long at the service desk without acknowledgement of their presence), and list the best ways to handle the situation.
3. Enable implementation. Review your customer service policies to ensure they support your ideal culture of excellent service. If your return policy is overly strict, your employees will feel trapped between the customer’s needs and the company’s policies.
4. Publish it. Publish an official mission statement, or a credo with excellent customer service as a top priority. At Modern HR, excellent customer service is a part of our 12 Values that’s kept our business operations top notch for decades.
5. Give feedback. If a customer has a negative experience and cares enough to tell you about it, first thank them for their feedback, and then pass on the feedback to your employee. This helps them learn from their mistakes. You can also let them tell you what they could have done differently to have a better outcome.
Training for excellent customer service takes time and money, but is critical to create top notch experiences for your clients. It is well worth the resources, and will give you a great return on investment. Better customer service means happier customers, which results in happier employees. Your bottom line may benefit from it as well, since better service increases client retention. A 5% reduction in customer defection can increase profits from 5-95%. Not bad for a few days worth of training, right?
If you want to implement a more thorough training program, but aren’t sure the best way to go about it, let the experts at CPE HR/Modern HR help. Contact us today to see how we can help.
