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Archive for August, 2009

Having worked in the customer service industry before, I know firsthand that this is not an easy job to do. Jobs that focus specifically on customer care and providing the highest quality service to each person require staff to undergo regular customer service training. This is to ensure that staffs are up-to-date when communicating with customers and continue work in keeping your existing customers.

Part of the customer service training is to experience customer interaction when at work. When thrown into the deep end of the service industry, you very quickly learn that people are approaching you for information or looking to buy a specific product. At which point you should be looking to deliver a good service and acting quickly upon their request. There are ways of going wrong in this simple exercise and below are a few pointers to customer service.

One of the key elements of customer service training is making good eye contact with the customer. Imagine if you were to walk into a shop with the intention of buying a product that does not appear to be on the shelves, the first thing you would do is approach a shop assistant for help in locating the item. Once you have approached the shop assistant you notice they immediately look away, even when you have asked them for help. At which point you feel that they are not listening to you.

This would anger me if I felt at any point I was seen to be a bother to someone who is quite clearly there to serve me as part of his or her job. How you portray yourself to a customer is important and works on the same principal as the saying ‘first impressions count’. The first impression you give to the customer must be welcoming, helpful, friendly and above all with eye contact. Making eye contact will ensure the customer that you are listening to them and acknowledging what they say.

Always greet the customer or make yourself approachable in a professional manner. Obviously, try not to overwhelm them and scare them away, but a warming smile and a decent response to their queries is a good starting point. During your customer service training, you will learn that communication, body language and tone of your voice are essential to good customer service. Bad customer service will mean the customer will not return and they in turn will tell others not to use your services.

The other most important thing to remember with good customer service is to maintain the customer’s attention and keep them informed of your actions. Think of your own experiences whereby you may have ordered something from the shop, taken the time to travel into the shop to collect the item and have found that it has not yet arrived. When you enquire about the item, you are told that it will arrive next week; when next week arrives, the item has still not turned up and again you are told the same thing.

The whole scenario leaves you feeling frustrated and confused. You should always inform the customer of exactly what is happening from the moment they have made their inquiry about their item; otherwise, you could potentially lose their custom. If at any point, a customer feels neglected or misinformed, they will cancel any procedures or transactions they have with you and move to a rival business. Always be apologetic, explaining why they have not received what they have been waiting for and if needed, offer an incentive or discount.

Part of the customer service training is to learn how to keep the customer satisfied, even in situations that is beyond your control. The worst thing you could do is to blame someone else or ‘pass the buck’ as then that will portray a lack in customer care. Trying to rush and resolve through the issue will only make the customer lose confidence in your service.

It is always a good idea to maintain a professional manner at all times and keep in mind the saying (no matter how much you disagree with this statement) ‘the customer is always right’. They are after all, keeping your business running and paying your wages. However, if the customer is getting abusive and you feel threatened by them, only then are you able to take the matter into the management’s hands or ask them to leave the premise.

With customer service training, you will learn the techniques of approaching a customer for potential sales, maintaining their interest and the right way of thanking them for their service with a view for them to return soon. Another key point to good customer service is to retain the number of customers and attract new customers. Once you have gained a reputation of being a business that provides good customer service, your existing customers will recommend your business to others.

By continuing, the training and maintaining the reputation will then become an easier effort for your team.

When you actively connect with your customers, they remember you longer and are more likely to reward you with increased sales. When it comes to connecting with customers, many companies are turning to Twitter. But why?

Increasingly, companies are finding that they can tune in to consumer buzz about their brands through Twitter. Twitter’s ever-convenient Twitter Search allows anyone to monitor keywords and key phrases, including company name, to read what people are tweeting about, much like what Google Blog Search does in the blogosphere.

Companies like Comcast and Zappos have already delegated customer service representatives, or digital detectives, to hunt for and resolve customer complaints via Twitter. Ultimately, Twitter as a customer service platform has proven to be a success!

Of course, you can take advantage of this unique customer service angle as well…it’s not just for corporations! Follow these simple steps to bring your customer service into web 2.0!

Get on Twitter!

Of course, you’ll want to open your free Twitter account! (It will probably be the quickest account creation you’ve ever experienced!)

After that, your first stop in Twitterland is the very useful Twitter Search page. All day long, Twitter users tweet their experiences, interactions, and thoughts. Plenty of those users may be your customers!

Go to Twitter Search, run a search for your company’s name, products or services, and see what your customers are saying!

http://search.twitter.com

If you come across any complaints, or even positive comments, now is the time to make a connection with your consumers!

Create A Connection!

Twitter avails you a proactive opportunity to thank happy customers, and to help unhappy customers-it’s viral! Take your customers seriously, especially if they’re enraged and dissatisfied with your company…those are the customers you really want to listen to!

Take a lesson from Comcast, one of the major communications companies. A team of Comcast employees joined Twitter, and has 10,000+ followers that they keep up with! They listen to what customers have to say and respond with tweets to their solutions.

Their Director of Digital Care makes sure that each customer is satisfied. That’s the kind of customer care you want to make synonymous with your brand!

Establish a Twitter Strategy!

Once you’re on Twitter and are following customers, you’ll want to come up with a strategy for customer service. For instance, look at Zappos’ Twitter for inspiration…

Zappos displays a great example of Twitter conduct, with over 450 Zappos employees involved, and they retain plenty of repeat customers because of their stellar consumer relations.

Many people also follow Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh because he pays attention to his followers’ tweets and acknowledges their tweets through his own, which makes them feel more personally connected. Do you see the pattern?

Your strategy should not only include addressing concerns about your products or services, or resolving the issue at hand, but also should entail paying attention to your customers. Reply to an unrelated tweet once in awhile, or tweet a little something (nice) about them on your Twitter!

Is Twitter a Customer Service Breakthrough?

In short, Twitter is one of the biggest names in social networking, and can be used quite successfully as a customer service platform. Is it a customer service breakthrough? Not really, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t advantageous. In fact, it’s a great way to keep your finger on the pulse of your customers. Also, it’s not just for corporations…your online business can benefit from it too!

While companies focus thousands of dollars on external customer service in hopes of wooing and retaining customers, little attention is being paid to the effect poor internal customer service has on customer satisfaction. It all starts within your organization! Sooner or later the ripple effect reaches your customers. To really walk your service talk, make sure your commitment to internal customer service matches your company’s external focus on customer care.

When we think of customer service we think of staff serving customers over a counter or over the phone. But customer service occurs within your organization as well. How well is your staff serving its internal customers: other departments, its management, vendors and consultants? Believe it or not, it all counts. Internal customer service refers to service directed to others within your organization. It refers to your level of responsiveness, quality, communication, teamwork and morale.

I define Internal Customer Service as effectively serving other departments within your organization. How well are you providing other departments with service, products or information to help them do their jobs? How well are you listening to and understanding their concerns? How well are you solving problems for each other to help your organization succeed?

Teaming with Success

How well do you work with other departments? Does your Marketing department communicate well with the Legal department? Does Fulfillment relate well with Shipping and Receiving? Do Catering and Facilities work well together? When it’s time to communicate with others from different departments do you take a deep breath, or smile and relish a chance to renew contact with colleagues from elsewhere in the company?

As a manager I once joined a publishing company and found myself in the midst of a war between departments. Production resented Editorial for the way they missed deadlines and delivered shoddy copy. Conversely, Editorial had little respect for the resulting manuscripts they received back from Production, full of errors and oversights. Poor teamwork, poor communication and myopic thinking had led to a hardening of positions over time. They each cared about the finished product but were putting pressure on each other without realizing it. It took time, but eventually both groups came to appreciate each other and how to best work together to achieve win-wins for the greater good of their customers.

Do you relish or dread committee work with other departments? Does it seem their aims are contrary to your department’s? When other departments contact you for help do you regard it as a nuisance, a distraction and a drain of your valuable time? Can you see the greater good that comes from helping them solve their problems or fulfill their needs?

You can take pride in opportunities to help other departments look good. Obviously, you don’t want their success to come at your expense. Usually helping others doesn’t mean you lose a zero-sum game, where only one of you can win and helping others hurts you. In most instances helping other departments leads to a win-win situation. And what goes around usually comes around. Helping other departments succeed can help yours too when the roles are reversed.

Up with People

Good internal customer service starts with good morale within your group. Are your people happy? Do they feel good about themselves and their contributions to the goals of the department and to the company at large? They should, and effort should be made to help them do so. Happy employees are productive, and customers take note. Happy employees are also better team players. Will you fly the airline whose employees are striking with management, or the airline whose employees are management? Employees invested in employee stock purchasing plans with matching contributions see themselves as much more a part of the company. Thus, as the company goes, so do they go.

When I fly out of Oakland Airport I use an outlying parking lot and shuttle van. This shuttle is shared by employees from Southwest Airlines, coming to work or returning to their cars after their shifts. I’ve found them as happy and upbeat when they’re starting their shifts as when they’re finishing their shifts. That’s great morale, and tells me they like their jobs. It’s contagious! Sometimes I’m envious on that shuttle when I know I’ll be checking in at a competitor’s ticket counter.

Who’s On Top?

Many organizational charts employ an inverted pyramid with customers at top. Some companies instead put their employees at the top. In many senses, the employees are management’s customers. Corporate values that emphasize treating employees well translate to good customer care too. Does your organization value its people? Invariably, companies that care about their people can better ask their people to care about their customers.

Catering to Customer Service Needs

Here are five tips for your organization to help strengthen its internal customer service orientation.

Employees should never complain within earshot of customers. It gives them the impression your company isn’t well run, shaking their confidence in you.

Employees should never complain to customers about other department’s employees. Who wants to patronize a company whose people don’t get along with each other.

Employees at every level should strive to build bridges between departments. This can be done through cross training, joint picnics, parties or offsites, or creative gatherings, as well as day-to-day niceties.

Utilize post mortems after joint projects so everyone can learn from the experience. Fences can be mended and new understandings gleaned when everyone reviews what went right…or wrong. By doing do after the project the immediate pressure is off, yet stronger bonds can be forged while the experience is fresh in peoples’ minds. Not doing so can result in lingering animosities that will exacerbate future collaborations.

Consider letting your employees become “Customer for a Day”; to experience firsthand what your customers experience when doing business with you.

Congratulations on turning customer service inside out! By improving internal customer service you have just enhanced the customer service your external customers receive. You’re walking your talk regarding customer service. Touché.

Now once you know you want a website done, you have listed down a number of web consulting firms.  Next step is to design a RFQ.  This is important step since this will allow the consulting company to correctly perceive your requirements and help in sending you an appropriate quotation.  There are some business owners who just send a website and ask for a clone.  If the website is of basic nature, idea is right.  Web consultant knows what type of thing you are looking for.  However, its not the end of it.  Still you have got to tell the specifics since the website represents you own business.

Summary

The first part of the RFQ should include a brief summary about the project.  This will include the following:

Background of the company:
Provide details about the business & what it does.

Objectives of website:
Why you want the business website?  What are the aims & objectives of getting the website done.  This could range from a corporate identity building to more complex e-business model.  It is very important to discuss in detail the need for website.

Audience:
Who are the audience of the website?

Project Scope
Project scope should be clearly stated out in terms of the outcome expected and the requirements.

Requirements

Identify your requirements in detail.  These requirements should include:

Functional requirements
This includes the features your website should offer, for example user registration, product listing etc.  Different techniques like Use Case Design can be used for this purpose.

Usage Requirements
This will include:

Navigational requirements, eg. easy to naviagate, use of menus, buttons etc
Website speed: Ease of load

Design/Interface Requirements

Preferred Color combinations
Preferred layouts
Theme to follow

Technical Requirements

Browser Support
Platform to support
Approximate number of users Daily/weekly

Budget Considerations
State clearly the approximate budget you are willing to allocate for the project.  This will help the consultant estimate the limit of project and will suggest you the most appropriate solution

Time Requirements
If there are any limits related to time, state them clearly that you want the project to be completed within a certain time line.

Miscellaneous:

How much support is sought after the deployment of project
Details regarding the documentation & training
Issues related to software licensing (if apply)
Source code ownership and usage issues

What is Required from Consulting Firms for Prequalification?

State clearly what is expected from the consultant firm in the quotation.  This could include the following:

Consulting firm’s corporate profile
Previous Portfolio/References to the completed projects
Quoted amount with cost breakdown
Project Methodology
Project Calendar
Tools/Technologies Deployed

Who says service is serious? Customer service can be silly too. Take this fun quiz to test your customer service knowledge. You may be a service ace if you both pick the correct answer to each of these ten questions, and understand why these answers are correct.

1. A complaining customer is:

A. Always right

B. Almost right

C. Often lying

D. Always the customer

2. Customers who complain:

A. Had unhappy childhoods

B. Are genetically predisposed to be sourpusses

C. Have trouble in their primary relationships

D. Are doing you a service in identifying what isn’t working in your business or organization

3. The best reward for your customer service representatives is:

A. Earplugs and punching bags

B. Valium or other mind-numbing drugs

C. Recognition and appreciation on your part

D. Anger management seminars

4. CRM stands for:

A. Customers Rarely Matter

B. Can’t Remember Much

C. Communicating Random Meaning

D. Customers Rudimentarily Managed

E. Customer Relationship Management

5. Customers who complain want . . .

A. Something for nothing

B. To be heard and have their experience validated

C. To vent for the sport of it

D. To be made majority shareholders in the company

6. Customer Service departments:

A. Are the afterthought that cleans up messes other departments cause

B. Build customer loyalty

C. Are leaders in understanding customer behavior patterns and market research

7. For a company to be considered service-oriented:

A. It must mention customer service in its mission statement

B. At least 18.3% of its employees must work in the customer service department

C. Its managers must at one time have been CSRs

D. Customer service must be addressed by all departments

8. A Call Center is defined as:

A. The midpoint in duration of a telephone call

B. A revenue sink hole

C. A place where middle-of-the-road calls coexist with liberal and arch-conservative calls

D. A location where complaints and problems are converted into successful saves for your customers and your company

9. Customer Care is:

A. A managed care medical program for customers

B. A nifty alliterative phrase that looks good in company brochures

C. A new program where customers care for themselves

D. A philosophy wherein the customer is wrapped in service even before a problem arises

10. Customer Service Culture is

A. A new form of yogurt where the lid removes itself for you

B. Behavior being analyzed in a Petrie dish for contagions

C. A mythical civilization in which everyone smiles and welcomes you when they meet

D. An environment where customer service permeates the thinking of the entire company

KEY

1. D. Customers are often wrong but they never stop being the customer. Right or wrong they are to be accorded respect and cared for. Focus on the insights their complaint offers.

2. D. Complaining customers alert you to systemic problems before they drive off more customers. Their complaints represent many more customers who may not spend the time to tell you about problems, instead just leaving you for your competitors.

3. C. Your staff deserves and thrive on recognition and appreciation. Take the time to celebrate them collectively and individually. Whether through cards, gifts, surprises, outings and acknowledgements at company functions, let them know how important, valued and appreciated they are to you and the company.

4. E. CRM refers to systems designed to track and cater to each customer’s whims and preferences over a lifetime. CRM is about managing customer relationships over the long haul by attending to their individual needs.

5. B. Complaining customers have several needs. Implicit in their actual complaint is also a need to be heard and their unhappiness acknowledged. Fixing the problem is important. So is letting them know you understand their displeasure and feel for them. One without the other is an incomplete remedy for customer complaints. Don’t forget the emotional component in complaints.

6. B and C. When you solve a problem for a customer you actually build confidence and allegiance. You’ve proven you stand behind your products or service, giving customers a warm and fuzzy feeling of safety and protection. As well, you tap the pulse of the customers. Their complaints and feedback give valuable insight into how well your products are assembled, documented, sold and hold up. Listening to customers tells you a great deal about your company’s products and services (and your competitors’ too) from real life customers. That’s invaluable!

7. D. A Customer Service orientation must transcend the service department. All departments must understand and model good customer service for the company to be considered strong in service. Many problems can be avoided outright by attending to customer service. Why should the customer service department carry the weight of service for the entire company. Don’t operate under the adage “never enough time to do it right but always enough time to do it over.” Get it right at the source, in all departments.

8. D. Make your call center is a shining example of your company’s commitment to its customers. Your center is a visible symbol of your company’s commitment to customer success.

9. D. Customer Care is a philosophy wherein customers are cared for by a company – the entire time they’re customers. Care isn’t just to be administered as a salve for problems. Demonstrate care from the start and your customers will flock to your products and services.

10. D. Customer Service Culture is the infusion of service ideals into every department, from sales, shipping and receiving to legal, human resources and beyond.