4 Tips on Building Quick Friendly Support
If you are running some business, which is aimed at provision of different services and involves direct communication between you or your staff and your customers, you need to do all your best in order to look the most polite, the most friendly and the most professional service provider in the niche.
Some things described there may sound familiar to you, but I believe that many will find this article and the tips below useful. Here they are:
Separate the Departments
I bet you would be confused if a serious company had only one mailbox in order to sort out all the queries. Believe me they would be confused as well. Thus, instead of providing just a common info@yourdomain.com mailbox, it is always advisable to share several email addresses of different departments, let’s say sales@ billing@ and support@yourdomain.com. This will let you filter all support requests, while your customers will feel confident about the staff they are addressing to.
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If you also provide online support – via chats or phone, you should distinguish the departments, too. Of course, the customers can be put through some live coordinator, which may resolve some issues personally or transfer the call/chat to the correspondent representative, but I don’t think that “Thank you for you call (Welcome to our chat support), please hold” is the right start of the conversation. Especially when the customer is experiencing an urgent issue. Many people do find it irritating, when their conversations are being constantly transferred or put on hold. Thus, it is recommended to create several extensions under your VOIP server and configure your online chatting software with department selection option.
Limit the Support Options
The company representative should know all the rules and regulations of support terms, they provide. Especially if there are a lot of staff members with different training level. This is very important since some may help with a wider range of issues which are not actually supported, while some fail, causing the customers’ frustration like “Wait, I remember a different guy helping me out the other day! How come you don’t support it?” Such situations should be escaped. Thus, the first rule about this is “Nothing personal – just business.” This may be your favorite customer and it’s alright, but if your company doesn’t support let’s say step-by-step phone co-ordination of router installation and adjustment – then you should politely ask this customer to consult the manual supplied along with the device.
Keep Your Emotions
When talking about customers’ frustration, we can’t hide the fact we may get irritated, too. We are all human and it is natural. However, you should never let your emotions go. First of all, you are the professional, who should stay calm in any situation. Secondly, you are a representative of the company and your attitude does not have anything to do with the others and shouldn’t spoil the good name of the company. Finally, when the customer blames you or the company – do not ever take anything personally – and do not forget that you have a right to quit the conversation in case the customer uses bad language. This is very important since communication policies are required to be introduced. Such policies do not only save your nerves, but also protect the company in case illegal charges from the customer’s end emerge.
Drive Your Support to Social Media
Good customer service is the service which can be exposed to the public with no blushing. Apart from using social media on promotion purposes, the company can also use its social network profiles to discuss the quality of support and the peculiarities of service. Testimonials, suggestion boxes and polls are the very points to address to when escalating some conflicts that may grow from chat conversation or correspondence with management to flaming on forums and in social networks.
Thus, using social media you will get active support. If the fault was not on the company’s end. Such manner works well for both services improvement and promotion. On one hand your current customers will be able to share their views and ideas, while on the other hand those of your followers, who do not yet have any service with you will get a more complete clear picture of what is happening behind the screens.
To Summarize
Being competitive is not only providing the best service or product, it is also providing the best support. Many think that when the client meets the seller their relations begin and end as soon as the purchase is made. Well, if it is not a square market – it is wrong. The business-to-client relations start only when the product or service is purchased, since once a person becomes someone’s customer, the vendor takes the responsibility for the offered product or service. Thus, those relations need to exist in a friendly non-conflict way. Sure, all this requires mutual understanding, which may sometimes lack on any side, but if we take a few steps to get ourselves better organized – we will see that we can be faster and avoid many unpleasant phenomena.
Author’s Bio: Arkadij “Archie” Shkolnik, PR Manager of SiteValley.com web hosting company, the provider of affordable and reliable Linux hosting for personal and small business web sites. Current administrator and author of the corporate blog – svhostingblog.com. Follow Archie on Twitter: @archiescol
Photo Credit: Tim Green aka atoach
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That’s a good point about confident emails – it does seem necessary to have emails for seperate departments. I think the idea that you can be emotionless is true – but it’s necessary to sound human. So whilst, avoid getting angry (obviously) it’s good to sound human. Ex: Innocent drinks. Treading a good like between human and polite.
you have a great point: “Being competitive is not only providing the best service or product, it is also providing the best support.”
bikram´s last blog ..1200 Calorie Diet and Meal Plan for Weight Loss
It is very important if you have a chat support, to actually use it. I have seen some sites in which almost always when you try to use the chat support, it does not let you. One solution is to just have some time intervals in which the chat will work. The chat can be online, and offline. This way I can actually know when to use it. Because if you are not answering in the chat, of if it is not working, then people are having hard time trusting you. The impression in the user is starting to form, and it is not good.
The social media support is a good idea by the way.
Frank´s last blog ..Organic Blueberry-Mint Limeade
Efficient customer support is essential for small businesses if they wish to survive in the tough economy. Even solopreneurs can now offer professional support and call handling services through virtual receptionists. I feel all small business owners must explore this option to save time/money and operate like big businesses:Should You Opt For Virtual Receptionist Services For Handling Your Important Customer Calls? http://mybusinessassistantblogs.com/?p=138
Gourab Nanda´s last blog ..The Secret Ingredients For Building A Profitable Virtual Workforce
Very true. No longer is it enough to compete by having a unique item to sell. Today, there was no many unique items to be had anyway. Price alone couldn’t distinguish you in the marketplace either. Only better support to the public could do that.
And here is the real great idea: the idea that the public is really running the show. The consumer is the boss. The customer is the real employer – they are the only ones who can pay our bills. Nice article. Alex Papa
Hi, Everyone!
Thank you for your comments.
Frank, I do agree with you on the chat availability. If the company provides part-time chat support, they should announce the working hours and put a widget or some tracking script on their site, which would let know, whether chat operators are online or offline. Actually, when I worked as a chat operator at other hosting company, we provided 24/7 chat assistance, so we did not experience such problems.
@Gourab Nanda
> Efficient customer support is essential for small businesses if they wish to survive in the tough economy.
Totally agree with you on that point. However, I have to admit that efficient customer support ain’t cheap as well, therefore tough economy is not the way out. Perhaps unless entrepreneurs start involving outsourced support representatives.
Arkadij Shkolnik´s last blog ..When Your Site Goes Down- 3 Tips To Minimize Negative Effects