Introduction
Customer service is considered the backbone of a successful company. Either it could be the difference between positive reviews and negative reviews that can lead to positive word of mouth, repeat customers or it can be bad customer experiences. With customers being the core foundation of any business, companies must look after the customers for a greater competitive advantage in the market.
As per the report published by Forrester, poor customer service abandons the customers from their buying intention, it gets translated to an average estimate of $62 billion loss of sales in the United States. With the advent of technology, it is very important to use them properly so that companies can get the desired result in terms of customer satisfaction.
Top 10 Customer Support Mistakes Companies Need to Avoid
Given the fact that customer service is so crucial, we have identified the most common customer service mistakes that companies make. Businesses must avoid these mistakes for meeting customer demands and solving their queries as early as possible to become successful.
1. Lack of Adequate Training to the Executives
Customer support executives are asked to use a certain set of user manuals or guides as training so that they can provide the right solution to the customer without a delay. Lack of proper training for the customer service team may lead to lesser customer satisfaction. They will not be able to ask the right set of questions, hence customers will not get the solution within time. As a result, the team will fail to understand customer’s needs that will lead to a poor customer experience.
2. Less Proactive to the Customers
Being reactive rather than proactive is one of the common customer service mistakes made by most customer support executives. As a result, the number of dissatisfied customers increases and customer churn happens. Every call is unique in its way, customer service executives should address their complaints and give a customized solution rather than adopting a generic approach.
Not getting a proper response from the company is the pain point of a customer when they need any help regarding any product or service. Customers must be able to reach out to the company at any point in time which is the essence of a successful business. A company’s reputation can take a hit when a customer loses trust in it. Implementing a chatbot or having an experienced customer support team is known to be a proven solution for handling customer queries.
4. Not Providing Adequate Follow-Up
Resolving customer queries is not the end of building a loyal customer base. A loyal customer base can be gained only when the company keeps on maintaining follow-up regarding feedback, queries, and product usage. Nowadays company executives do call their customers regarding their service and the product quality and as a result, the company gains customer delight.
5. Lack of Omnichannel Support
Customers can approach a company from various channels. It can be a voice call, live chat, social media, and so on. One cannot force them to use a specific channel. Organizations using omnichannel for customer support record a whopping 89% more customer retention compared to companies that don’t have omnichannel support i.e., they retain only 33% of customers. A knowledge base like FAQs and self-service forums can be created on the website that customers can refer to and solve issues on their own.
6. Lack of Listening Skills
Customer service executives usually receive a lot of complaints regarding their lack of listening to the customer’s queries. With the desire to solve customer’s problems quickly, executives are sometimes tempted to jump for solutions without listening to the customers fully. It can lead to the wrong solution or the customer can get pissed and finally dissatisfied with the company. Patiently listening to the customers and providing solutions accordingly is the only key to an increased rate of customer satisfaction.
7. Delay in Response
Customers will get frustrated easily if they don’t get a quicker response from the customer support executives. Hence, delay in response can lead to a bad customer experience that can escalate towards negative word of mouth. For instance, if one user faces any issues while buying from the company website, then he will reach for help through any of the channels. But if the customer doesn’t get a reply from the company’s end, then not only the company loses one customer and sales but also a bad reputation.
8. Relying on Scripts
Scripts are considered basic training material for customer service executives. They are trained for using the right words and questions for a certain set of problems. But they could not rely solely on the scripts while talking to the customers because it would sound very mechanical. Relying on their skills is more effective than scripts for handling customer queries.
9. Failing in Providing Consistent Customer Support
Inconsistent customer support is a sign of lesser customer satisfaction. If the customer service team delays a customer or gets a response from the IT team for a detailed answer it will result in a bad customer experience. Every consumer interaction should be handled consistently in every channel while providing the right solutions within the promising time.
10. Guessing Answers
Giving wrong answers or something that customers want to listen to is one of the greatest mistakes that customer support agents do that leads to more confusion to the customers. Customers will call again to resolve their queries, and a different person will attend to them providing different solutions. It will not only confuse the customers but also piss them a lot.
Final Thoughts
To summarize, it is recommended to avoid uninformed, inconsistent, and isolated customer service conversations. The team should work together by providing proper solutions to customers while leveraging data as required to proactively take the correspondence to the next level. Making the customer happy and delightful is the key to any successful business. And, by avoiding the above-mentioned common customer support mistakes, an organization can gain more loyal customers and positive word of mouth that leads to increased sales and brand image in the market.
