We believe that nurturing the relationship with our customers is a crucial part of growing a successful business. Reputation and customer service are a must in the age of technology. An unhappy customer can share their opinion through social media and negatively affect your business. It is important to create an excellent experience for your customers to help develop your company’s relationship with them into love. Customer service isn’t a focus for a lot of businesses. This is your opportunity to stand out. Win them over and make them fall head of heels in love with your business. Here are the 10 steps to get you there.
1. Treat your Customers Right
Happy customers who get their issue resolved are the ones who tell their friends. Make sure you genuinely talk with your customers as a person representing the business. You are not a robot. Make sure you introduce yourself at the beginning of the interaction, ask their name, and make sure to address them by it.
2. Don’t Come on Too Strong
Consumers say they experience rude customer service at least once a month, and more than half of them tell their friends. This is exactly how word of mouth can work against you. Make sure everyone on your team understands this. Treat them with respect and adapt to their mood to make problem solving easier. The more comfortable the customer is the more likely they’ll share feedback that can help prevent the same issues from occurring again in the future.
3. Always Listen
Don’t just hear them. Listen to them. When you are having an interaction with them take into account what changes your organization should make from their feedback, and then follow through. Always take the time to deal with a customer request and make sure they leave the conversation with a smile of satisfaction.
4. Continue to Satisfy
Make sure to provide excellent service to your customers on an ongoing basis. Respond quickly and enthusiastically, and never let an upselling opportunity pass you by. 81% of companies with strong capabilities for delivering customer experience excellence are outperforming their competition. Take note, customer satisfaction is a key to standing out in a crowd of businesses. Customers gravitate towards being treated well so you might as well make it a possibility for them when they walk through your door, visit your website, send you an email, or call you in the middle of the day.
5. Treat them Like a Valued Partner
Always take your customer’s feedback seriously and act upon reasonable requests. What’s the point of listening if you’re not going to act on it? Walk the walk and talk the talk. Make sure it’s clear that your business truly values them as a partner.
6. Build Trust With Them
Keep your customers in the loop when it comes to positive and negatives changes to your products and services that affect them. This creates a sense of trust and lets them know you value them and how they use your product or service. Remember for every 12 good steps you take with them, it only takes one bad experience to back track. Take 12 steps forward with them.
7. Keep No Secrets
Being transparent in the digital age is imperative. Transparency means that you are not afraid of feedback whether it’s good or bad. It means that you have nothing to hide. It means you enjoy having conversations with your customers. This makes you credible.
8. Follow Through
Your word is the cement in the relationship. It keeps the house together. If you tell them it will get done today then it must. If it cannot be done you owe them an explanation. Don’t bite off more than you can chew. Ensure realistic goals are set and can be met. This way everyone involved knows what to expect and you avoid conflict and miscommunication with your customer.
9. Take Responsibility
It doesn’t matter what the circumstance is, the customer is always right. This will help guide your business through growth, customer service, user experience, and product development. Create a customer service policy to that states clearly that your customers they are always right. If you mess something up, apologize, and fix it for them. It’s about them. Keep them in mind.
10. Remember Your Manners
Always say thank you! Kindness and gratitude for a customer’s business is a way to further enchant them for the long term. Make sure you are person and craft every thank you sent out from your company to be specific to the customer. Gratitude and kindness can move people beyond interpretation. Be polite. They appreciate it every time.
We hope these tips will help you to create a long lasting relationship. If you treat them right, they will fall head over heels in love with you.
