Why Your Business Needs Customer Service Management For Survival Now More Than Ever

When was the last time you were wowed by the kind of customer service or support you received from a brand you interacted with? And why is customer service management so important for businesses today? The importance of customer service management cannot be understated, whether for small or big enterprises. It has remained the pillar that helps businesses grow and have a good rapport with their customers. With the increase in digital adoption and customer expectations, building resilient customer service management is probably the only way to survive in this fierce competition of this age. Only businesses that will evolve to meet new customer expectations will stand the test of time and beat the competition at any stage. Good customer service management should not only prioritize agility but also consider new technology and integrations as well as the adoption of resilient strategies. Today’s customer is extremely digital savvy and would not compromise customer service for anything. They are likely to click away to a competitor and it was before because they understand the benchmarks of exceptional customer service. In this article, we are going to explore the importance of customer service management and how to build a solid strategy that can help prepare the business for the future.

Customer service management for solid future success

Today’s business landscape is digitally driven and so should customer service management. Good customer service management should aim to shift towards contactless engagement, multi-channel experiences, upskilling employees, and decentralized workforces. Going into the future, service teams are essentially going to have a lot more to deal with than it has been before. This is the reason why businesses need to have good customer service management. Good customer service management needs to be proactive and implement changes in the workplace that lead to success and at the same time support teams emotionally. In short, good customer service management should be agile, empathetic and resilient.

How to create a good customer service management strategy?

With the COVID pandemic disruptions, service teams need to understand that they are not competing against their former levels of customer service. But now, they’re competing against all other organizations that are trying to make it in the post-pandemic era. According to a Salesforce research released last year, 73% of customers report that if they experience one extraordinary experience with one company, the same experience is expected for all companies that they will interact with. One of the importance of customer service management that this reveals is that it helps you keep up with the competition. Besides good customer service management helps you build better relationships, provide long-term value and create brand advocates. Good customer service management, which is effective, is created based on the following five key considerations that must be focused on.

Increasing customer satisfaction and retention

The priority of good customer service management is to make sure that they can increase their customer satisfaction and retention rates. No business can survive with unhappy customers and high churn rates. So, it is important to prioritize increasing customer satisfaction. To start with, examine where customer expectations are being met and which areas need to be improved so that customer satisfaction and retention can be achieved. There are many tools that can be used to measure customer satisfaction, some of which include the Customer Satisfaction Survey, Customer Engagement Score, and Net Promoter Score. Use these tools to understand the areas you are doing well and which areas need improvement.

Supporting customer service agents to bring out their best in everything

The only way to promote and support your agents is to provide them with the tools that they need to succeed in the field. This could include mobile devices to help them provide contact-free service and good PPE in a place where COVID is rampant, and having a good CRM like Salesforce which provides a single view for the customer. Supporting your agents also means that you give them proper training and help them to have the best knowledge of the product. Customer service managers should help their agents understand the increased expectations that customers.

Highlighting the importance of product/service knowledge

You can’t be able to provide the best service customer service experience if you have little knowledge of the product or service that your company offers. Good customer service by your teams in the field can also turn out to be a good sales channel that you never had thought of before. You can help your teams understand things like upselling but this can only happen if they have the best product knowledge. For organizations that have implemented Salesforce, connecting your customer service with the Commerce cloud or sales cloud will help your agents have visibility into customer carts and help them apply discounts and recommend products that can be bought with what is in their shopping carts.

Driving performance improvement

A good customer service management strategy should focus on driving performance improvement. As already mentioned, customer expectations are continually rising. That means your teams must be well equipped to understand and meet these rising high standards by the customers. There are many tools that can be used by customer service managers to help equip their agents. For example, using training sessions, mentoring programs, and deploying self-guided learning journeys are a great place to start. A tactic for customer service managers to remember when they are implementing training sessions for their teams is that they should at all times employ empathy as none of their members want to hear that they’re not doing their job well. You need to keep your agent’s morale up and empathetic communication is paramount to achieve this.

Improving resolution times/efficiency

If you are to enjoy the benefits of good customer management, then your strategy must focus on improving resolution times or efficiency. It is with no doubt that one of the easiest ways to improve your customer service experience is to make sure that the average time to resolution is as minimal as possible. To achieve this, the business can implement self-service portals and provide a way for customers to seek help should they need it. Customer service management should always keep an eye on resolution times and ensure that they fall in line with the customers’ expectations.

The future of customer service management

Internally, customer service management should always aim to provide the service team with the support it needs to ensure that all the business’s customers are as happy as possible. With technology, this role is becoming more and more exciting and proving even more critical than before. In a challenging world where 9-5 office hours have been replaced by 24/7 engagements, customer service management is proving pivotal to stay on top of the competition. Combine good customer service management with a proper omnichannel experience that delivers new ways to connect with your customers and you are good to go. If you are looking for ways to transform your business digitally and take advantage of available technology, talk to Plumlogix for help. We will help you realize the importance of customer service management to your overall business strategy and help you grow and evolve.