Customer Service Basics

Photo by Kate Townsend

Strong customer service is a critical part of retaining customers, and growing your business. Studies show that if you can successfully retain just 5 percent more customers, you can increase your profits by over 25 percent¹. As you launch or expand your business, ensure that you are executing on these customer service basics:

Research Your Customers

• Analyze Data — Gather customer data on a regular basis to identify problems sooner, and respond quickly. Monitor the customer journey to ensure there are no missed services, operational delays, or points where they get stuck. Use your findings to adjust your customer service focus and offering (e.g., Use Mixpanel for analytics).
• Survey Experiences — Take stock of your performance with customers. Consider tallying a customer satisfaction score to flag and quickly address problems if this number dips (e.g., Collect your Net Promoter Score).
• Assess Standards — Research industry standards and best practices. Use business insights to improve your own organizational processes (e.g., Use Gartner or GLG for research).

Show Customers They Are Valued

• Empower VIPs/Form a Customer Advisory Board — Create a customer list of VIPs who can continuously give honest feedback to help you build and improve your offering, while showing them they are valued (e.g., Perform monthly outreach to VIP customers to obtain their feedback ahead of building new features).
• Give Guarantees — Give assurances that your offering is a premium product that will work as promised. This persuades customers to return to your business instead of competitors (e.g., Nordstrom’s lifetime money back guarantee).
• Provide Rewards — Acknowledge customer loyalty with rewards or bonuses. This creates a vital link between your offering and your customers, which increases their satisfaction (e.g., An airline’s “frequent-flyer” status grants the customer early boarding).

Respond to Customers Proactively, Quickly, and Often

• Deliver Support — Allow customers to contact you in a simple way for after-sales support. Remember to be clear about your response times upfront and confirm that the issue is closed (e.g. Use Zendesk for outsourced 24/7 support).
• Build Community — Create a community forum where customers can communicate with each other. This often resolves customer issues in a speedy manner (e.g., Square’s community forum allows customers to learn tips from one another).
• Use Scripts — Make scripts, steps-of-service, or guidelines so your customer service reps AR consistent and prepared when handling customers. Catalog how you interact with customers and use your findings to streamline servicing them; allowing you to respond in a repeatable proactive way (e.g., Save sales scripts in a cloud-shared platform like GoogleDocs).
• Track Inventory — Ensure customers do not run out of your offering early, causing frustration. Track their consumption and warn them as they approach limits (Use QuickBooks or an inventory management system).

Educate Customers

• Streamline Onboarding — Create a standardized workflow to explain how your offering works to new customers. Call attention to important elements, and show them where they are in the process (e.g., Use Pendo for customer onboarding).
• Give Demos — Build a demo video or presentation for customers, to allow easy use of your offering. This is especially helpful during the onboarding process (e.g., Use QuickTime for screen recording)
• Have FAQs — Create a page of common questions and answers to help customers use your offering. This helps reduce customer friction, as you can constantly add to the database in response to customer needs (e.g., YouTube’s page for “How Can We Help You?”).

Don’t let selling to a customer be the only time you are in contact with them. Strong customer service builds a crucial connection between your business and your customers, leading to retention and growth over the long-term.

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¹ Harvard Business Review, 2014

Kaego Ogbechie Rust is CEO at Foresight Advisors — working with foundations, investment firms, non-profits, and for-profit ventures — offering comprehensive support across vision & strategy, investing & financing, and operational planning during critical periods of your growth.
If you’re looking for help, contact kaego@foresightadvisors.com or visit www.foresightadvisors.com.

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