The consumer is king and in this day and age, your business cannot survive without being on the customer’s good side. For this reason, good customer service is a must as establishing customer loyalty can be the make or break factor in deciding whether your business will succeed or not. Even if you have a ton of sales or lower prices, if your customers aren’t satisfied with the service you provide, they will never come back to your business. This article deals with some simple rules that you should follow to ensure the best customer service and thereby ensuring the success of your business.
1. Answer Their Calls
There is nothing worse than an angry customer trying to get through to you without any success. Their problem will not be solved and they won’t return to get another problem on their hands. This may be a simple sounding rule, but it is one that can make the difference. Get an answering service or hire someone to take your calls if need be. Moreover, make sure that whether it is you or some employee who takes the call, they have proper phone etiquette. You won’t get any customers coming back if you’ve been rude to them on the phone.
2. No False Promises
It may seem like trust is not a big deal with people who only come to shop at your store, but if a customer trusts you, he will ignore the fancy new mall opened next to his house to come back to your store. So make promises you can keep. If you can’t deliver goods before Tuesday, don’t tell your customer that he’ll find the goods at his doorstep Monday morning. Sure, it will keep him happy in the short run, but you always need to think on a long-term basis.
3. Listen
Good listening skills are necessary for life in general and when you’re running a business. If your customer is complaining, even if the last thing you want is to listen, make sure you exhibit the correct listening behavior. Give appropriate responses both physical and verbal. If you can make a customer feel that their needs are important, they will definitely return.
4. Dealing With Complaints
This is possibly the most negative aspect of running a business. No one wants to answer a phone and be exposed to a stream of negativity, but your job is to make sure that you turn complaints in a positive direction and end with the customer feeling satisfied. After that, don’t just hang up and forget about the problem. Make sure you deal with it and take steps to prevent such problems from occurring in the future. Also, if you can, get back to your client and tell them how you’ve fixed the problem.
5. Extra Efforts
If a customer ever comes to you for help, assist them as much as possible. If someone comes up to you in your store and asks you where the sauces are, don’t simply point them in the direction. If you can, lead them to the appropriate place, give your recommendations of which sauce brands are the most reliable. This small action may have no immediate profit, but the next that particular customer wants to buy something at the end of a tiring workday, he’s going to return to the place where he was treated so well.
