Author: graphdeveloper

Happy customers are key to a successful business. They are also your biggest marketing strategy and greatest promoter. But at the same time, if a dissatisfied customer vents about your company to other people, it will have a huge negative impact on your business.

With customer support constantly evolving, choosing the right type of customer service for your business might seem challenging. In this blog, you can find the answers to all your questions on how to choose the right type of customer service for your business.

Understanding your customer’s needs

Before diving into the different types of customer service, you should first understand the needs of your customers.

Customer needs can be categorized into product needs and service needs. Whether your customer is looking for a product or a service, there are certain criteria they consider.

Product Needs

The product must be a convenient solution to the customer’s functional needs.
The product should fit the unique budget and pricing needs of the customer.
The product should be compatible with the other products they use.
The design of the product should be intuitive and easy to use.
The product should be as reliable as advertised to be.

Service Needs

Customers are always on the lookout for information right from searching the product to months after purchase.
Your customer support and customer success teams should be easily accessible to the customer.
Understanding the customer’s issue and empathizing with them can increase customer satisfaction.
Customers love different options being offered to them in terms of purchase, payment, subscriptions, etc.
Customers love it when there is transparency in the company they are associating with.

What are the different types of customer service?

This is not going to be just another list of all the different types of customer service options available. Along with the common types of customer service, we have also added a bunch of newer options that you might not be familiar with.

Functional Support

All the basic and traditional support options which most businesses incorporate in their customer service strategies can be clubbed under the umbrella of functional support. Let’s dive into the details of each type of customer service that falls under functional support.

1. “Hello, How can I help you today?” – Phone Support

Phone support is still one of the popular support options that are available right now. What still makes phone support the most versatile option is that everyone knows how to use it and everyone has access to a phone. So, customers find it convenient to get their issues sorted via telephonic conversation.

The advantage of offering assistance over the phone is that you get to hear your customer’s voice and tone, and this helps you understand your customer’s emotions better and lets you assess the problem accordingly. Plus, it saves you the time spent on typing out the solution, unlike email or chat.

You can have a dedicated call center or hire a few customer service representatives for call support. We recommend a cloud-based phone support software that can be accessed from anywhere and also be set up with ease. All your conversations are backed up, which helps in streamlining your support workflow. You can also implement an Interactive Voice Response (IVR), and gather more information about the customer’s issue beforehand by asking the customers to enter a series of numbers and route the call to the right agent or team. These AI-powered IVRs are also capable of addressing common queries like order status, refund status, and more.

Industry experts also agree that cloud support options are the future especially for call centers or contact centers. Phone support is here to stay and cloud-based phone support is your ticket to the future of phone support.

2. “Thank you for reaching out to us” – Email Support

With over 269 billion emails being exchanged every day, email is still one of the most reliable modes of customer service. With email support, the customer can also reach out to you even after business hours and you can respond accordingly in your business hours. But always remember that you should send out a reply within 24 hours.

A good email reply creates a lasting impression. While it is important to maintain professionalism when it comes to sending customer emails, it is okay to occasionally sprinkle your message with some humor or wit as long as it is related to the issue at hand. But never fall into 62% of the companies which ignore or never bother responding to customer service emails.

3. “Please check your DM” – Social Media Support

Everybody is on social media and if you aren’t then it is about time that your business marks its presence on it. Anything that is extremely good or bad with customer support ends up on social media. If it is good, you might see an increase in your customer base. But what if it is bad? Your business is at the risk of losing one or more potential customers. Handling social media doesn’t mean just one channel but keeping track of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Linkedin accounts. Having a dedicated social media support team will help you handle all your social media interactions and tickets.

With the popularity of social media, many businesses are rising out of social media channels. One such popular medium is Instagram. If you are a small business, having an active Instagram handle and two or three agents for Instagram support will help you acquire more customers. Tiffany & Co, GoPro, Glossier are a few examples of brands that grew out of social media.

4. “Greetings. We’ll get that solved right away” – Live Chat

Did you know that 41% of the customers choose live chat over other support channels? And that the satisfaction rate achieved through live chat is a whopping 92%?

The reason why live chat is now evolving to be an important customer support channel is that it offers immediate support to customers. Embedding a chat widget on your website or mobile app can help your customers reach out to you easily.

With live chat, you can also proactively reach out to customers. You can set up a popup and send a warm greeting to your customers whenever they enter your website. You can also set up triggers that offer assistance with a simple message saying “Hi, I am [name]. If you are having trouble finding a product, I’ll be happy to help” when your customers are displaying signs of frustration such as rage-clicks or dead-clicks.

5. FAQs for the win – Customer Self Service

Having different self-service options will be beneficial for your agents and also your customers. Customers can easily find answers to the common queries without having to reach out to customer support every single time (67% of the customers prefer self-service than having to interact with a customer service agent). This, in turn, reduces the number of incoming support tickets. If there is a reduction in the number of common queries you receive, it means your knowledge base is doing a good job.

An exhaustive knowledge base also helps agents get the information they need from a single place rather than having to search everywhere for it. This will better inform the agents and help them deliver quality customer support.

Another way to provide self-service support is through community forums using which customers can easily search for an issue, find solutions based on the previous conversations, and interact with one another.

When you think of companies that offer great customer service, the best examples are not one-off moments of companies going out of the way to delight a customer. Instead, the best customer service examples are those that have carved a name for themselves by caring genuinely for their customers and consistently putting their customers first.

Sales and marketing efforts can help your company onboard customers. Still, to convert them into customers-for-life, you need a foolproof service culture that prioritizes your customers over every business metric.

1. Listen to customer feedback… REALLY listen to customer feedback!

– Starbucks mends its Pumpkin Spice Latte after hearing from customers
The Pumpkin Spice Latte (PSL) by Starbucks is one of the most popular F&B products with huge seasonal demand. PSL was a massive hit with Starbucks loyalists, thanks to the clever positioning of the drink as the harbinger of autumn vibes and seasonal flavors.

But in 2015, the pumpkin spice latte hit a roadblock when customers felt it stopped symbolizing the USA’s seasonal joy, as its ingredients were largely artificial. Questions were also raised about it being a poor indicator of the unhealthy food choices of Americans. Starbucks took this feedback seriously and relaunched PSL with actual pumpkins in the puree and more natural ingredients in the spiced foam topping. That’s how America’s favorite limited-edition drink got back on track, built more patronage, and remained as endearing as ever.

2. Connect with customers at an emotional level

– Trader Joe’s helps calm a toddler who was throwing a tantrum
While the world has embraced online retail with open arms, Trader Joe’s in-store experience still remains relevant owing to its unparalleled customer service. Its employees are known for memorable customer service examples that reflect their cheerful, friendly, and empathetic nature towards customers.

In one such story, a mom was having a tough time with her toddler in the Trader Joe’s outlet at Winter Park, Florida. The employees took it upon themselves to pacify the toddler by breaking into an impromptu song and dance performance. The video was shared by the mom on Facebook, which shows the toddler visibly starstruck by the gig.

3. Transform customer pain points into good customer service examples

– Virgin Atlantic turns negative feedback into a customer success story
Richard Branson’s England-based international airliner, Virgin Atlantic, is renowned for its exceptional customer service. It is one of the brands that epitomizes going above and beyond to delight customers and prioritize their satisfaction over business outcomes.

A frequent flyer of Virgin Atlantic wrote a tongue-in-cheek email to Richard Branson, complaining about the Indian food served (the famous curry story) on his flight to Heathrow from Mumbai. A templated “damage control” response would have only escalated a bad customer service example. But Branson actually sought the help of the passenger to improve the Virgin Atlantic’s food menu!

4. Ensure that customer support is technically competent

– Freshworks employee resolves a technical issue faced by a newly onboarded customer
One of Freshworks’ new clients faced multiple roadblocks before they could completely transition their customers onto the Freshdesk customer service software. The client company wanted to ensure that expectations were met in terms of customizing the helpdesk for their use-cases.

Utkarsh, then an Account Manager for Freshdesk, helped the customer by ensuring a seamless migration. Not only did Utkarsh help the client adapt to the new software, but he also went the extra mile to personalize the onboarding process in keeping with their specific and intricate requirements. This resulted in heartfelt appreciation from the client for the sense of shared urgency and technical acumen displayed by the Account Manager.

5. Make loyal customers feel special

– Taco Bell turns a hoax into customer delight
In 2012, the little-known city of Bethel, Alaska was primed to get its first Taco Bell. The people of Bethel were excited as they previously had to make the 300-mile trek to Anchorage – the nearest city with a Taco Bell outlet. However, it was later revealed to be part of a big hoax, and Taco Bell never had plans to add Bethel to their fast-food chain.

But instead of letting the rumor mills die down, Taco Bell decided to keep the buzz alive by planning a surprise for its loyal customers. They flew into Bethel on a helicopter, carrying a truck full of taco ingredients, fit to make about 10,000 tacos. This effort from Taco Bell was dubbed “operation Alaska” and was a huge sensation in the media.

6. Build a customer-first service culture from the grassroots

– Zappos’ inimitable culture of delighting customers at every turn
Zappos is a brand known as much for its customer service stories as its actual shoe business.

As a testament to their exceptional customer service, there have been many occasions where customers called Zappos for issues not concerning their products. On one such call, a customer requested a Zappos service rep to get directions to a retail store in Florida. Despite knowing that this was a call with no intent to shop Zappos product, the service rep helped the customer reach his destination–literally at every “turn”.

Among other significant customer service stories, Zappos is also known for the world-record 10+ hours call with a customer. This marathon customer service call was eventually bettered by another support agent from Zappos. No wonder the Zappos support team is christened the “Customer Loyalty Team”.

With its service culture, Zappos has built a customer experience that has created a loyal customer base. Zappos’ unending list of customer service examples only shows us that it will always remain a dizzying benchmark of greatest customer service stories.

7. Create policies around customer expectations

– Amazon’s hassle-free return and refund policy & Slack’s fair billing policy
Customers drown in pain points brought about by the fine-print at the pretext of brand policies. This greatly affects their perception about the brand, and worse, they start losing trust. Policies could be a dealbreaker right from hidden charges on products to post-sale support. But Amazon and Slack beg to differ.

Amazon ensures that customers have a wholesome experience even after their purchase by giving 30 days to return or replace their product. During the 30-day time window after purchase, customers can play around the products to return them if they dislike it or get it replaced if it’s faulty. An Amazon delivery executive collects within a week of the product getting listed for a refund or replacement. The refund for returns is also seamless as Amazon takes only 3 days for the refund process to unfold as soon as it receives the product back.

Social media is overflowing with more content than anyone can ever consume, and if you want people to pay attention to your content, you have to remember that it’s all about the engagement. Social feeds are less of a megaphone to drive traffic to your site and more about the one-on-one connections and trust that you build with your audience. To grab a customer’s attention and increase revenue from that customer, engagement is vital. Your social customer care strategy must include plans for building brand awareness, loyalty, and connection to increase engagement over time. By doing so, you’re sure to see increased revenue due to your social media efforts.

Social media algorithms prioritize engagement, conversation, and content drive engagement. Posts with few comments and interactions are assumed to be uninteresting or irrelevant and will be displayed to fewer people over time. However, social posts with higher engagement will be shown to more people, resulting in multiplied engagement.

Beyond resulting in more views, engagement is important to customers individually as well. When consumers feel listened to and appreciated, they’re more likely to recommend a brand or endorse it on social media. Superior customer experience also makes it more likely that they try additional products or services from your organization.

As you develop your social customer care strategy, consider these five key areas for increasing engagement and, therefore, increasing revenue.

Provide Excellent Support

High-quality customer support is essential for success, and it’s even more of a necessity when you’re providing that support via social media. The public nature of social customer care means everyone will see when you’re doing it right, and also when something goes wrong. A lousy interaction or using the wrong tone can impact your entire brand. Customer service agents who understand best practices for providing support on social media are a must-have. Beyond that, all your agents must know what they’re talking about regarding your product or service. Around 46% of consumers will give up on a brand if the employees aren’t knowledgeable. Support on social means providing the wrong answer won’t only be evident to one person. It’ll jump out at anyone following your feeds.

According to PwC’s Future of CX report, 32% of all customers will stop doing business with a brand they love after one bad experience. But what if that experience is shared in public view on social media where other people can see it too? It increases the chances of people indirectly being influenced by that negative experience. And what about customers who won’t ever reach out even when they have a problem? Lee Resources found that for every one customer who complains, another 26 leave quietly without saying anything at all. By providing excellent customer care on social media, your organization has a chance to help those asking, plus anyone who checks out your feed on their own time too.

Furthermore, organizations with top-notch social support see customers spending 20-40% more each year. Considering those numbers, it’s worth the effort to make sure your support stands out among your competitors.

Share Valuable Content on Your Social Feeds

To increase the chances of people paying attention to your social posts, remember to provide value. Your Twitter feed or Facebook page shouldn’t be full of teasing headlines with a link to click to find the good stuff. Instead, aim to provide value right on your feeds. Did you recently roll-out a new feature for your product? Share the details on social. Look for ways to post your top tips for the feature, along with examples of the various ways of using it. This will not only catch more eyes than a basic announcement linking to details elsewhere, but will also serve as a tiny support document for anyone following your feeds.

The key is to create social content that is useful, entertaining, and unique. Then, you just have to stick around to provide customer support to anyone who replies to your social posts with a question. Don’t just stop by, drop the information, and leave. Watch your replies and extend the value of the details you’re sharing by helping people figure things out. To determine what kind of content would provide the most value, check out the most common questions you receive on your social accounts. If you receive queries on the same topics over and over, be proactive and create social content to help people find their answers before they even ask. This will not only serve those who would ask, but can also help the people who would otherwise go on silently with the problem and never reach out for help.

Be Responsive

People who don’t hear back from you once they post a message of any kind, are less likely to spend their money on your product or service. The fact is, feeling ignored doesn’t inspire confidence, and no one wants to spend their hard earned money with a company that seems flaky and lazy. In fact, lack of response or slow response times leads to an increase in customer churn by 15%.

Furthermore, social messaging such as one-on-one conversations through Twitter direct messages, Facebook messenger, Instagram messages etc, is on the rise. People aren’t only interested in your public feed anymore, but are also more likely to reach out privately to your social channels as well. It’s important these messages don’t go unassisted. Provide the attention and help customers in need through DMs for increased happiness, customer loyalty, engagement, and finally – revenue!

Considering how vital customer engagement is on social media, it’s essential to look for ways to encourage responses and interaction on your social feeds. According to Sprout Social, “30% of people will go to a competitor if a brand doesn’t respond.” Be sure your social strategy encourages customers to reach out with questions and thoughts on your product anytime—whether on the public feed or in the private messages—and make sure to follow through by actively engaging with them.

Show Your Human Side

Social media is a space for human interactions, and customers still prefer a human over a bot when given a choice. In fact, 71% of Americans would rather interact with a human than go through an automated process. Knowing this and considering how people use social media, it’s essential to keep your social media interactions and customer care human. While you should find ways to streamline how you manage the support load on social media, be sure not to automate the human touch out of it. Creating a stockpile of prewritten responses to common queries will speed things up, but make sure you customize them enough to avoid sounding like a robot pasting the same message over and over.

Being human and friendly on social media when providing customer care lets people see how you treat customers. Timely responses with helpful information and a welcoming tone will inspire new people to become customers. With each new customer you earn by drawing them in with your skilled social media support, more revenue will follow.

Monitor Mentions of Your Brand

Watch for mentions of your brand or product on social media where your company’s username isn’t included. This will help you find the people who post questions randomly, without directing it at your organization’s account. By spotting these, you can reply and help them out even when they’re not expecting it. However, don’t reach out to them if it’s to argue about their thoughts on your product. The surprise assistance will delight the customer, as long as it’s done kindly. Beyond helping the customer solve the problem, according to Sprout Social, people are 70% more likely to use a brand’s product when that brand reaches out to them on social, and 25% less likely to post negatively about the brand.

Drive Increased Revenue with Top-Notch Social Customer Care

Customers prefer speed, convenience, helpful employees, and friendly service from their customer support interactions. Since social media also benefits from speed and convenience, it’s the perfect place to provide welcoming, high-quality customer care to your customers too. As you develop your strategy for social customer care with an aim to increase revenue, be sure to prioritize friendly and skilled support agents, timely interactions, ideas for increasing engagement, and providing value for your customers. The more you engage your customers, the more success you’ll see in sales too.

Customer service and marketing don’t typically get matched up. Different departments, different duties, right?

At least, that’s the old school way of slotting this unique relationship.

But as more brands continue sprucing up their digital presence, customer service and marketing are now more entwined than ever before.

When done correctly, pairing the two can help solve tough issues, and boost customer satisfaction and profitability in the long run.

So in this article, I want to share at least six different ways that customer service can help improve your marketing efforts.

With these methods in mind, you’ll be one step ahead of your competition when it comes to both, your marketing and your customer service.

6 ways your customer service will help your marketing

Marketing and customer service should always be working in tandem to make your brand better. Here are six ways to make that happen.

1. Customer Service Can Inform Your Content Creation

Just ask any marketer how difficult it can be to generate ideas for good content on a regular basis. Even in ideal situations, it can be hard to know what will truly resonate with your audience.

This ideation phase of content development is critical. It’s what directs your initial efforts, and ultimately decides the outcome and success of your marketing efforts.

Creating good content isn’t enough anymore1, so the idea creation phase is more critical than ever.

The solution is to try to base your content ideas on customer needs; and who knows that better than your support reps?

By working with marketing, your customer support team can help direct marketing and content to meet various needs across your sales funnel.

It also allows you to generate a robust library of support and help articles that will keep your customers happy after they complete their purchase.

But without these ideas, your marketing team will continue to struggle in their quest to find good ideas. It’s a simple and elegant solution to pair up with your customer service.

2. They Can Flesh out Your Buyer Personas

Understanding the thought process of your ideal customer is vital when you’re trying to convince them. In marketing, you usually accomplish this step by creating a buyer persona.

You base these personas on details about your ideal customers. Aspects like their age, income, and hobbies help create a clear picture as to where and how your marketing efforts should be directed.

But of course, these personas are subject to constant change and evolution, as your product and target audiences keep evolving.

Your marketing team needs to identify and understand the pulse of this change, which is where customer service again plays a crucial role.

Dedicated customer support teams will have worked more closely with your customers as their needs evolve. After all, they’re the ones who answer phone calls, send emails, and staff your live chat team.

That means they’ve heard direct feedback about the product from the customer. With that type of experience, they’re the most qualified group to help pose new solutions and flesh out your buyer personas.

3. They Will Help Establish Realistic Customer Expectations

These days, customer expectations are at an all-time high.

There’s no way to truly know what a customer really thinks when they buy. It’s one of the constant challenges faced by marketing teams across the globe.

And when issues arise, it’s often due to discrepancies between expectation and reality. That means your marketing team has made a promise that your product can’t keep.

But such complaints don’t go to marketing, they are sent to customer service.

In such a case if there’s a disconnect between your marketing team and your customer service team, then you’ll be in a constant feedback loop.

So by pairing up your customer service and marketing, you can control the expectations of your customers and monitor them better. Communicating these discrepancies will create honest marketing, that speaks directly to the customer.

With controlled expectations, you’ll get fewer complaints, less churn, and happier customers. That’s a powerful impact from an easy change.

4. Customer Service Unifies the Brand Message

On a similar note, miscommunication between customer service and marketing can lead to some rather embarrassing scenarios for your brand – like one department being unaware of what the other is doing.

According to a study3, more than half of your company is most likely missing out on that kind of vital information.

Just imagine a scenario where your customer service doesn’t know about a deal, a promotion, or a promise that marketing made to a customer.

How will they handle the initial calls or emails that will come in, if something goes wrong since they aren’t in the loop?

The only solution is to create better lines of communication between marketing and customer service. This unifies the message that your brand sends, and creates a much more positive experience in the event of any issues cropping up.

It’s simple math. By unifying your brand message, your marketing and your customer service will be much more effective.

5. Customer Service Finds the Best Customer Stories

Most marketing is about storytelling. Your audience wants to hear stories about your product, brand, and satisfied customers.

Studies have shown that as many as 92% of people4 focus primarily on storytelling when vetting a brand. That’s across all genres of marketing, too.

Great struggles produce great stories.

Consider this recent story shared by the Huffington Post, about a blanket named Joshie5. While on vacation at a Ritz-Carlton hotel, a young boy accidentally left his favorite blanket behind.

The family contacted the hotel, and instead of brushing them off, the customer service team stepped up to the challenge.

They found the blanket, and then decided to help the distressed child feel better by showing him that his blanket was just taking an extra long vacation before heading home:

The next time that family goes on vacation, you can bet they’ll be staying at a Ritz-Carlton.

And it’s all because the customer service went above and beyond when a customer ran into an issue. It generated a heartwarming story and prompted the family to share the experience with everyone they could.

6. Shared goals = shared successes

Sustainable growth is always purposeful, and marketing is usually a huge part of that effort. It’s one of the many reasons why marketing is so analytics-based.

According to one study, marketers who create goals are four times more likely to be successful than those that don’t.

But what makes for a good marketing goal? There are plenty of targets that you can aim for, but merely aiming is no guarantee of success.

You need to set the right goals, and customer service can help you do that.

Just think about it. When marketing and customer service share the goal of resolving issues before they arise, that’s better for your brand and your customer.

With happier customers, you’ll have all of the benefits listed above, plus a clear direction forward.

And when done well, it will improve revenue, help your overall customer experience, and cement your future as a customer-centric brand.

The entire reason you created a business in the first place was probably to help a customer meet a need or solve a problem.

Chances are, you designed your products and services for the same reason.

You should operate in the same way. But most brands have lost sight of what’s truly important: the customer.

If you don’t put your customer’s needs and issues above all else, you’ll have to deal with the consequences. And they’re not so sweet.

Gartner research shows1 that by 2020, poor customer experiences will ruin a whopping 30% of digital business projects.

Your company could be one of them. Unless you decide to become customer-centric.

But what exactly does it mean to be a customer-centric company? And why is it important?

Why is it Important to be Customer-centric?

A recent study asked what characteristics were important for companies to have when trying to develop a truly “digital native” culture.

The results of the research proved that 58% of respondents think that it’s most important to be customer-centric.

But becoming customer-centric doesn’t just happen instantly.

You have to understand what customer centricity truly is and build a solid strategy to transform your brand in a meaningful way.

Customer centricity isn’t just about offering excellent customer service.

It means offering a top-notch experience at every stage of the buying process, from awareness to purchase and even into post-purchase.

At its core, it means putting customers first above all else. To do this, you must first understand and offer a quality customer value.

What can customers gain from your product? Why should they care? And how much effort do they have to put so as to use or buy your products and services?

You can gain insight into these questions by collecting data (which you can later use to make improvements to the customer journey and overall customer experience).

By setting your focus on customer service values, the customer journey, and customer experience, you will naturally develop a customer-centric brand.

One of the quickest and effective ways to gather this data is through collecting customer feedback.

Do You Collect Customer Feedback?

To truly be a customer-centric company, you have to communicate with your customers often (and well).

The good news? There are tons of different platforms that you can use to collect feedback in today’s digital world.

You can even use some of the touchpoints you already have in place to communicate with customers to ask them their opinion about your industry and brand, such as:

– Phone calls
– Live chat
– Email
– In-app messaging
– SMS messaging
– Facebook messenger
– Community message boards on your website

Use these channels of communication to learn about your customers, their likes, and their dislikes. The value of the insight and data you can collect is huge.

You can even do qualitative research by collecting customer satisfaction (CSAT) ratings2 that can help you understand how your customers truly feel about your brand and the support you offer.

Collect these ratings by sending customers surveys after their agent-customer interactions have ended. These CSAT survey questions usually look something like this:

This feature is built into Freshdesk’s platform and can be sent out after each support ticket.

This data can help you keep track of your agent’s performance, the quality of your service, and what your customers think you need to improve on.

It also shows customers that you value their opinion and want their voices to be heard.

In Freshdesk, you can even customize the point scales and questions that you want to use when asking CSAT survey questions.

For example, you might want a seven-point scale survey instead of a five-point scale survey. Or maybe you want to ask additional custom questions at the end of the survey.

This is all possible in Freshdesk. One single account can create as many as ten different CSAT surveys. Only one survey can remain activated at a time.

Do You Give Your Team the Tools They Need to Provide Helpful Support?

Making sure that your customers have a positive experience is crucial to your success

Studies show that it takes as many as 12 positive customer experiences to make up for just one unresolved negative experience.

That’s why you have to take care of customers experiencing a negative issue as soon as possible.

This all boils down to fully understanding your customers and knowing the best ways to support them.

The best way to make sure that this happens is to empower your support team with the knowledge and tools they need to turn any negative experience around quickly.

That way, they can provide quick and comprehensive support that your customers want and need.

Helpdesk is the best way to empower your agents and put your customers at the center of your business.

A customer-centric helpdesk tries to reduce the agent effort that is required to satisfy each customer. That way, agents can help more customers without burnout.

Automated features in Freshdesk help agents to automatically handle tasks based on time and event-based triggers.

You can even create your own customized workflows so that each ticket ends up in the hands of the best available agent.

If you don’t keep track of your metrics, you’ll never know if your agents are truly working as effectively as possible.

Reporting and analytics features can help you and your team track whether you are truly performing and making customers happy.

Do You Share Customer Success Stories?

When you display customer success stories on your site, visitors browsing around will be able to see how much you truly care about buyers.

And when you collect customer success stories after a purchase, you’ll show clients that your relationship with them doesn’t end with a purchase.

This action can result into more trusting customers since 68% of consumers3 say that positive online reviews make them more likely to buy from a business.

When you’re concerned about the value you deliver to customers after they’ve already handed over their money, you can be sure that every customer is truly happy with your brand.

If they aren’t, you can immediately assign your support team to fix the issue.

If they are, you can celebrate your customer success by asking them if you can share their positive experience with others.

When you collect customer feedback, as we discussed earlier, share the stories of satisfied customers on your website or social media pages and celebrate each one of them.

Do You Measure the Effectiveness of Customer Centricity?

Every business will have different customers metrics that they use to measure customer centricity.

But there are two customer-centric metrics that every company should monitor:

– Churn rate
– Customer lifetime value (CLV)

Let’s go over churn rate first.

Churn rate is important because acquiring new customers is more difficult than ever before. It costs up to seven times more5 to gain one new customer than it does to retain one.

That’s why so many companies are focused on keeping current customers instead of finding new buyers.

Keeping track of your churn rate can help you understand how many customers are leaving and how many are loyal.

If your churn rates are high, you should implement some customer-centric strategies and monitor churn rates to see if it decreases. If it does, you’re onto something.

To calculate your churn rate, take the total number of your customers who left in the last year and divide it by your average number of total customers within the same 12 month period.

Customer lifetime value, also known as CLV, refers to the profits that your company makes from any given customer.

Calculating CLV helps you understand how much each customer is spending before moving on from your company.

Conclusion

Your products and services were created to help customers meet a need or solve a problem. Your entire brand should operate in the same manner, with the customer at the center of it all.

You can do this by being a customer-centric company and offering an excellent customer experience at every stage of the buying process.

Customer-centric companies collect customer feedback at every chance they get.

They value customer opinions and use the information to make improvements to their strategy and operations.

With Freshdesk, you can collect customer satisfaction ratings via customizable surveys. These surveys are sent out after each support ticket is closed.

Customer needs and expectations are ever changing. Identifying, analyzing, and meeting customer needs is the key to providing better customer service and growing your business.

In this blog, we cover the A-Z of customer needs to help you create a product or service that is in line with everything that your customers need.

What are customer needs?

Simply put, a customer need is a driving factor that pushes consumers to look for and purchase a product or service. These needs might solve a challenge they are facing, they might pertain to a service they require in order to accomplish a task, they might be solutions that make their lives easier or more comfortable – broadly, it is anything that pushes them towards a purchase decision. Unsurprisingly, most businesses are created to offer solutions for customer needs.

For instance, there’s a section of customers who do not have the time to go out and pick up groceries. To cater to the needs of these customers, online, on-demand grocery stores such as Walmart Grocery and Grofers were launched.

Customers can now get their daily, weekly, and monthly supplies delivered right from home. The fact that customers were looking for a more convenient solution can be easily derived here.

But is convenience the only reason why customer needs arise? Not really.

In addition to convenience, there are two other factors that drive customer needs. Let’s explore the three factors in detail.

Where do customer needs stem from?

Analyzing customer needs gives you the reason why customers purchase your product or service.

In a business context, customer needs stem from the desire to:

– Increase convenience: 97% of consumers say they have backed out of making a purchase because of inconvenience.1 In the previous example, by shopping for groceries online customers are optimizing for convenience. In fact, the more convenience a solution offers, the more likely are customers to purchase.

– Improve efficiency: Customers are constantly looking for better ways of doing something. For instance, creating to-do lists is a good way to be efficient. However, most people don’t stop with to-do lists alone. They also set up reminders that help them complete their task on time, and thereby further improve their efficiency. It’s this need that was served with the launch of apps such as Evernote.

– Reduce costs: In addition to increasing convenience and efficiency, customers need solutions that help them reduce costs. For instance, lean customer service teams turn to self-service and chatbots to cut down spending on other resources, such as a bigger workforce, on-premise teams, and round-the-clock staffing

Most businesses only take stock of customer needs at the time of the inception of the business. However, that might not be the wisest thing to do. Here’s why.

Why are customer needs important?

As a business, understanding the reason why your customers purchase from you, and staying on top of changing customer expectations helps you stay purpose-driven. This helps you:
– Create clear business goals and KPIs for employees
– Improve your product and service
– Keep your customers happy and increase customer loyalty
– Grow your business

Now that we’ve covered all the basics, let’s take a look at the different types of customer needs.

15 types of customer needs you should know about

Product
1. Intuitive design
When it comes to technology, usability is an extremely important customer need.

A well-designed user interface could raise your website’s conversion rate by up to 200%, and a better UX design could yield conversion rates up to 400%.2 This goes to show that customers want products that offer seamless user experiences.

In addition to good UI and UX, products also need to have good accessibility to cater to the needs of the specially-abled customers.

2. User-centered
Customers want products that are centered around their solving for their needs. To put this in perspective, the functionalities of your product should address and adapt to the user’s environment, tasks, goals, and in time, incorporate customer feedback into the product to make sure you’re delivering the most useful, impactful product.

Evernote, a note-taking app, increased user retention by 15% after launching intuitive, helpful features.3 This increase was the result of changes that were incorporated after listening to users narrate their experiences and monitoring how users interacted with the product.

3. Affordable
Cost tends to be a key factor while making a purchase. You need to come up with a pricing plan that is cognizant of this customer need in order to keep your business successful.

Especially with the advent of the pandemic, affordability has become all the more important. Globally, 54% of consumers say price is a more important purchasing criterion than it was just a month ago.4

4. Reliable
No matter how elegant the product looks, customers would still abandon the product if it fails to perform well.

While minor bugs are inevitable, the product should not crash often and hinder customers.

5. Compatible
When it comes to purchasing software, customers are increasingly basing their purchase decisions on how much effort is required in adding your solution to their existing tech stack. That’s why your product needs to be compatible with the other tools that they are using. This basic yet critical necessity enables customers to plan their workflows around their existing tech stack.

Customer Service

6. Omnichannel
9 out of 10 consumers want an omnichannel experience with seamless service between communication methods.5

Omnichannel customer service allows you to keep track of customer conversations across all channels from a single view and provide a uniform customer experience.

Omnichannel support removes the need for customers to repeat their issues and 57% of baby boomers and 45% of millennials get irritated at having to repeat themselves.6 This forces brands to offer an omnichannel service experience.

7. Transparency
Customers need brands to be transparent and share information upfront. So, it’s important to make it easy for customers to access the right information throughout the customer journey. This will help them make the right buying decision and also build trust in your brand.

8. Speed
When customers run into an issue with your product or service, the sooner they get a solution, the faster they can get back to their routine lives.

According to recent research, 42% of customers consider 1-3 minutes to be the acceptable wait time to speak to a customer service representative. Only 31% of customers are willing to wait no longer than 5 minutes to speak to someone.7

So, as a business, you need to offer fast and effective solutions.

9. 24/7 support
51% of customers today want businesses to be available 24/7.8 If your business is spread across different geographies, then it’s absolutely necessary that you provide 24/7 support.

Additionally, if your business is a part of the travel, healthcare, or finance industry, then it’s imperative for you to support your customers around the clock. Customers in these industries often tend to have critical and time-sensitive issues that need to be tended to immediately

10. Personalization
Customers today want experiences that are tailored to them. In fact, 63% of consumers expect personalization as a standard of service.9

Customers need to see tailored responses and solutions that address even the minor details of the issue reported. This helps them believe that the conversation was unique and personal.

Emotional

11. Validation
Costumes feel the need to be validated while using your product. For instance, while using a customer service software, agents look at response and resolution times or leaderboards for reassurance, while managers might look at reports and analytics.

12. Control
Customers like to be in control of things and your product or service should empower them to feel that way.

For instance, if you offer a B2B product, you need to enable your customers to easily customize your product, upgrade or downgrade plans, and generate thorough reports on their own.

If you offer a B2C product, then you need to give your customers multiple payment options and allow them to track and monitor delivery.

13. Empathy
When your customers come to you with a problem, they want to feel heard and understood.

Customers look for that human element when they interact with brands. They don’t want to be met with to-the-point or curt responses.

14. Trust
For customers to be able to trust you, they need to be treated like a friend, and not as a transaction.

For instance, at Freshworks, we treat each of our customers as friends and build relationships that are based on trust, and transparency.

15. Fairness
All customers expect to be treated equally. While you can offer perks for loyal customers, when it comes to customer service, all requests should be treated with the same importance and urgency.

In the words of Shep Hyken,

“All customers should all be treated with dignity, respect, and the attention any human deserves. They should all be treated in a way that is consistent with your brand promise and the reputation you wish to be known for.”

The 15 types of customer needs that have been listed here can be seen across all businesses. Let’s take a look at how you can identify customer needs that are unique to your business.

How to identify customer needs?

Conducting market research (a thorough study of your target markets and customers) helps you gather information about your customers and narrow down on their needs.

In this section, we’ll discuss different ways in which you can conduct market research.

Regardless of which method you choose, by the end of your research, you need to find answers to the following questions:

– What is the definition of your ideal customer? [average age, qualification, characteristics]

– What do they do? [what is their job and how is their environment]

– What were they trying to achieve by purchasing your product? [the reason why they bought your product]

– Is your solution meeting this goal? [reality check]

– Are they facing any pain-points? If yes, what are they? [your weakness]

– Do they have any product or feature requests?

– Is it their first time buying a solution in your space?

– If yes, which solution did they use before this?

– Why did they decide to look for another solution? [your strong points]

– Are they happy with your customer service?

How to meet customer needs?

Once you’ve analyzed your customer needs, you need to take the appropriate steps to solve them. Although your customer’s needs will be unique to your business, here are three key tips to increase customer happiness on the whole:

1. Develop a user-driven product
One way to get your customers’ needs solved is to keep them at the center of your design and development process. Here are a few tips that can help you create a user-driven product:
– Design for usability (don’t let aesthetics blind you)
– Offer an intuitive or self-service onboarding module
– Have a convenient pricing model
– Get feedback from customers on a continuous basis
– Incorporate valid feedback in your next cycle of product development
– Make it easy for customers to troubleshoot and report issues or bugs
– Educate your users by adding help guides/videos, or embedding FAQs or a chatbot

2. Offer better customer service
A good product alone is not enough to meet your customer’s needs. Customers are bound to run into bugs and other inconveniences with your product. Complementing your product with the best customer service possible is necessary to improve customer satisfaction.

3. Create a customer-focused culture
In a customer-centric or a customer-focused culture, every employee in your organization understands and prioritizes your customer’s needs first. So this mindset encourages each employee to do what’s best for the customer.

Customer-facing teams are the ones that benefit the most from thriving in a culture that puts the customer first. This empowers sales and support teams to engage in meaningful conversations and create memorable experiences that keep customers glued to your brand.

Parting words: Be proactive when it comes to customer needs

Once you’ve got the foundation of your business set, you need to start anticipating customer needs and look for creative ways to solve them in advance.

A customer service software like Freshdesk, you can meet and exceed customer needs and delight your customers by:
– offering omnichannel service
– collaborating with context
– collecting customer feedback with customized forms
– categorizing feedback and keeping relevant teams in the loop
– improving agent productivity
– increasing customer happiness.

Remember the time you lost something, and asked for help looking for it and heard the response, “Well, look in the place you last remember seeing it.” or something along those lines.

While that remarkably unhelpful (albeit, well-meaning) reply might meet your expectations, the same cavalier response won’t fly when it comes to customer service.

Simply put, customers expect more out of you when they need help.

What Customers Expect Out of the Service Experience

Your business makes a promise to your customers, but it’s not enough to deliver on that promise. To provide the best experience possible, you have to understand your customers’ expectations.

Luckily, meeting those expectations don’t have to be at a cost for your business. In fact, people are willing to pay more for a better experience.

How much more?

Companies that deliver top-notch experiences reap big revenue growths. Precisely 4-8% more1 than competitors in their market.

So it’s definitely worth it, but figuring out what those expectations are and how to meet them is another challenge unto itself.

While every customer base will be different and every business will have their own unique path to delivering the experience, there are some universal faux-pas that no customer service department should commit.

5 Things that Ruin the Service Experience When Customers Need Help

To help you capitalize on revenue growth and improve your customer experience, we’ve compiled a short list of things that your customers don’t want to run into when they’re trying to get help from your service team.

1. Repeating Themselves to Every Agent

If a customer can’t take care of their problem with a single agent and has to work across the team, they don’t want to repeat themselves. Every minute that they have to spend explaining their problem again, is another minute that their problem isn’t being fixed.

Similarly, they don’t want to be told to try solutions they’ve already found on their own.

If it didn’t work for them when they were reading the help documentation, it probably won’t work when the service agent is parroting the same instructions, either.

Luckily, if your helpdesk has journey mapping, you can mitigate this challenge by keeping your agents — and customer — on the same page with a unified system.

2. Playing the Waiting Game

Customer expectations are rising, and if you’re not resolving tickets fast enough, you may not be meeting those heightened expectations. 67% of customers2 expect your service to be faster in 2018.

Instant is best, but it’s not always viable over more asynchronous channels like social media and email.

In the case of email, 44% of your customers3 expect a response to their query within a few hours at the most.

Fortunately, that still leaves over half of them with the far more realistic expectation of a response within a business day or two, but it still puts the clock against your agents.

A clock which doesn’t let up with your synchronous channels like live chat and phone lines.

In fact, both present the same logistical hurdle for your business. If you don’t have the funds to staff up according to the demand, you’ll need to designate specific hours of service so customers know when they can reach instant help.

Which means they’ll still be playing the waiting game — it’s just one where they’ll know the parameters of the board.

Alternatively, you can avoid this faux pas altogether by getting a little more technologically advanced and using AI-powered support agents for your live chat. Chatbots don’t need rest, don’t collect a salary, and can be programmed to address the most common issues.

They can also help users find information in your knowledge base and get to their solution faster.

Don’t make your customers play the waiting game. The faster they can take care of their issues, the closer you are to meeting their expectations.

3. Going on an Archeological Dig for Your Support Team

If your helpdesk is buried in the wilds of your website, customers aren’t going to be happy about having to dig through it to find it.

They’ll be even less thrilled about having to work through automated channels before they can get to a real person.

That’s why websites like GetHuman exist, and rank well on the search engine results page.

Ranking in the top ten — behind only Target itself — sends a clear message that searchers want human-to-human communication as quickly as they can get it.

In fact, 73% of your customers4 would rather get help from a live person than anything else.

So while you should offer automated support, you should also make it simple for them to connect to your agents by putting your contact information front and center on your website.

It’s even better if it’s in multiple locations, such as in your top navigation and footer menu.

Testing the visibility of your support information is pretty easy.

Just squint your eyes. If you can’t identify where your support information is within a few seconds of squinting, it’s not visible enough.

And believe it or not, this is a bonafide design test5 that user experience experts use to ensure visual elements are clear and organized in the correct hierarchy.

So don’t make your users strap on a pith helmet to find your service department, and if you’re unsure if your contact information is clear, run the squint test.

It’s a small step, but for someone who needs help, it’s a big impact.

4. Training Your Customer Service Staff Themselves

Eventually, everyone has to exit the training seminar and start taking live calls. But if you’re not preparing your agents ahead of time with the resources and confidence they need, you put the onus to train your staff on the experience.

And for a customer with a problem to solve, that’s an additional frustration. While the may be willing to help a fledgling agent out when they have a sales call, their patience will be decidedly more strained if they need support.

It’s also more likely to burn out your staff and lead to a higher turnover rate in an already tumultuous industry. If you want to retain your staff longer, you need to put the extra time and expense into training them thoroughly.

Remember, customers are willing to pay more for a better experience, but they can’t get that experience if your newest agents are being thrust into the highest-escalation cases before they’re ready.

But like all of the previous faux pas, this is another thing that’s surprisingly easy to solve and avoid. Even just adding two extra days of orientation can put your staffers in a better position to provide service and enmesh them in the company culture.

And if they feel supported, they’ll be able to transfer that support to the people who matter most — your customers.

So give your newest agents time to stretch their legs and get into the groove of customer service.

Start by adding additional training time, then regularly check-in with your staffers to make sure they have everything they need before they work with high-stakes customers on a deadline.

5. Not Getting an Apology

Your agents first course of action when a customer populates a ticket is to solve the problem and resolve the ticket as quickly as possible.

But while expediency and a solutions-first focus is a definite boon for great customer experience, neglecting the small things can have surprisingly large impacts.

Like forgetting to add a sincere but brief apology for their experience.

Just make sure your apology is straightforward like Adweek’s and doesn’t take more time than it needs to or come with any caveats. If your customer service agents add an interjection, “We’re sorry about your experience, but…” it’s less likely to be warmly received.

Psychologist Harriet Lerner says7 that any apology that includes a rationalization negates the sincerity of the sentiment.

Your agents shouldn’t try to explain what went wrong or provide an excuse, even inadvertently. They should just apologize and move on to addressing the problem.

It’s what you’d want someone to do for you, isn’t it?

Ultimately, customer expectations are always going to keep growing, and meeting them is critical to keeping your business in best possible form, delivering the best experience to customers. Following the steps mentioned above, is definitely a sure-fire way to do just that.

What is customer service management?

At a conference in 1997, Steve Jobs famously said this in response to a provocative question from one of the audience members about the company’s strategy at the time:

You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work back toward the technology – not the other way around.

Today, many companies have forgotten that the essence of running a business starts with the customer. The idea behind being successful at customer service management is to build and execute a strategy that revolves around a clear philosophy, a plan of action, and choosing the right technology stack that supports those plans.

The 5-step customer service management plan for your business

1. Building a robust and scalable support team
The first step in your journey of establishing customer service management is putting together your very own A-team. There are two parts to this: hiring and training. Let’s take a look at both

Part 1: Hiring the right personnel for the job

People are your most important resource, especially when it comes to customer service. Here’s what you should look for when hiring service reps:

Social skills

Empathy: We start off with what’s probably the most important quality to look for when hiring a support associate. Empathy is crucial because it makes it easier for your agents to put themselves in the customer’s shoes and handle difficult conversations better.

Patience: Customer service reps are often in high-stress situations, with tight deadlines and high customer expectations. However, presenting a calm, helpful demeanor can diffuse even the hardest situations. Having the patience to listen and respond appropriately to situations is an important skill to possess.

Persuasiveness: A support rep needs to be an effective communicator. This is not limited to just getting a message across clearly but ensuring that message is persuasive and reassures customers who might not be in the right frame of mind.

Hard skills

Decision making: Customer service reps have to make important decisions in a short period of time when dealing with issues. It could be having to allow a concession or even taking a call on whether an issue needs external support.

Logical thinking: Keeping a calm head and making calculated decisions is necessary for support reps to analyze situations and solve problems efficiently.

Knowledge management: Customer support associates need to have the capacity to acquire and absorb essential information about company policy, support processes, etc., to provide customers with the best possible solutions.
Part 2: Defining roles and responsibilities

The next step in customer service management is creating well-defined roles for your team members. These roles will depend on the size and scale of your customer service team. But in general, these are the primary members you’ll need:

Customer service/support associate: The customer service associate or representative is the first line of offense and defense for your organization, making them the most important member of your team. They deal with day to day complaints, handle different channels, and reroute high priority issues to the right personnel.

Customer support engineer: The support engineer is usually a domain expert or a product specialist who can deal with complex or technical issues that require bug finding or troubleshooting.

Customer support lead/manager: The manager oversees the work being carried out by support engineers and service reps while also stepping in for critical issues as necessary.

Technical account manager: The technical account manager or TAM is a special role within the support team, where he or she is in charge of one or more large customer accounts that require special attention because of the size of the account.

Support operations analyst: The support operations analyst/ helpdesk analyst’s primary responsibility is to analyze performance and productivity data to help managers make hiring and operational decisions.

Head of support: The director of support heads the entire customer service department. Their responsibilities span from strategizing a plan of action, understanding resource management, and ensuring the quality of customer experience.

2. Training programs and shift management

Regardless of how big or small they are, all support teams need to be trained on how to interact with customers. Training programs will vary based on the company as well as the customer service philosophy but forms the crux of the quality of customer service management. But here are some aspects you’ll need to train new hires on:

Support process: What is the workflow your company follows when it comes to solving customer issues? What are the different levels of support? What queries are classified as low or high priority? Answers to these questions are what support reps need to know before starting their work every day.

Channel classification: Identifying the channels of communication most relevant to your business/target customer is critical to getting CX right. Once you have that in place, train your support reps on the tone of voice and communication etiquette for each of these channels. For example, chat & social media conversations will both have very different conversational tones, while phone and emails continue to have a more formal tone.

Crisis training: Situational awareness can only get you so far. Support associates need to know how to handle high priority issues where customer and business revenues are on the line. Crisis training is a great practice to prepare team members for such scenarios so as to minimize improvisation and maximize the effectiveness of problem-solving.
The second thing support teams need to figure out is shift timings. There are various shift schedules and customer service models you can use based on the volume of queries your team supports. Here are just a few examples:

Follow the sun model: Follow the sun model is based on the principle of spreading your customer service team across several locations around the world. This is effective when you have to provide 24/7 support but also have a global presence.

Traditional 24/7 model: The most commonly used support model where call centers are present in the same geographic region, and there is a handoff between different shifts.

Remote/distributed model: A fast emerging model of support because of both situational factors and the flexibility it offers in terms of team members being spread out and being able to work from any location.

3. KRAs and performance management

Keeping track of how well your team is doing helps identify the strengths and weaknesses in your customer service management process. Having certain KRAs and KPIs in place helps you continuously measure performance and ensures you keep improving your support processes. Here are a few parameters and metrics that can help set benchmarks and standards for your support team.

External/Customer facing metrics

Customer feedback is the most crucial tool in your arsenal. Without understanding what the customer thinks, you can’t move forward. Here are three important customer metrics you can measure:

CSAT: The most commonly used metric across industries and businesses to measure customer feedback. CSAT is a simple survey tool where customers can rate their experience on a scale of 1-10.

NPS: NPS or net promoter score is a great metric to measure and understand customer loyalty. The question “ How likely is it that you would recommend our company/product/service to a friend or colleague?” is presented to customers who have to respond on a scale of 1-10. Customers who respond with a rating between 9-10 are protractors or advocates of your company, 0-6 are detractors, and those who respond with 7 or 8 are passive or neutral.

CES: Customer effort score is a relatively new metric that takes into account how easy or difficult the experience was for the customer and how much time and effort they had to put in during the whole process. In the survey, customers are asked: “On a scale of ‘very easy’ to ‘very difficult’ how easy was your interaction with our company.”

Internal support metrics

Analyzing your team’s performance is as important to maintaining service quality as is gathering customer feedback. To understand who’s doing well and who needs help, here are some metrics you can measure:

First contact resolution: Measures the percentage of issues resolved by the agent on the first contact or conversation with the customer.

Ticket volume: Measures the number of tickets your team receives on a monthly or weekly basis and is one of the factors that go into demand forecasting and hiring

Average response time: A metric that tells you how long it takes on average for an agent to respond to a customer query.

Average resolution time: Measures the average time it takes an agent or support team to close out a customer issue.

4. The role of the customer service manager

The customer service manager has to play both a strategic and operational role while enabling the support team to achieve their goals. Lets breakdown what responsibilities that translate into:

Agent roles assignment: The manager is responsible for assessing the skills of agent hires and assigning them the right roles and the right channels to handle.

Shift Schedule management: A very critical role the customer service manager plays is that of deciding shift timings and schedules based on volumes, availability, and other factors.
Hiring & staffing: The customer service manager needs to have one eye on his team’s performance and support volumes so he can hire new employees beforehand.

Performance review: The manager needs to keep track of overall group performance as well as customer feedback and take the necessary steps to ensure consistency of customer service.
Incident/escalation management: When there is a major issue that junior members of the team cannot handle on their own, the manager needs to be able to step in and resolve the issue swiftly and efficiently.

Stakeholder review: Monthly or quarterly reviews will be conducted with the head of support and other important stakeholders where the manager needs to give his valuable input so the right strategic decisions can be made,

5. Choosing the right tech stack

We now come to the last piece of the puzzle — deciding on your support tech stack. Technology can make a lot of the operational and administrative work simple while giving organizations greater visibility into their support processes.

But the biggest reason the right tech stack cannot be overlooked is because agents who are on the frontlines are the biggest beneficiaries. With that, here are some of the features/functionalities you need to consider when choosing customer service software:

Self-service: Having self-service options such as a knowledge base or an FAQ can be extremely helpful for both customers and agents. For customers, it’s a way to find out information for themselves without having to contact an agent or wait in a call queue. You can also build an internal knowledge base for agents to refer to when looking for quick answers to repetitive questions.

Omnichannel: Email and phone might still be popular channels for support teams, but they’re not always the right support channel because your customers sometimes prefer modern channels like chat and social media. Therefore it’s important to have the right mix of channels that match your customer needs. A customer service software like Freshdesk lets you choose the channels you want your customers to engage on.

Chatbots & messaging: Millennial customers today want responses instantly, and the best way to achieve that speed is through messaging integrated with AI and chatbots. With chatbots, you can set up automated workflows to take care of status requests or help customers get refunds on orders. Freshworks’s Freddy AI-powered chatbot helps your team accomplish such tasks and more.

Reporting and analytics: The last feature that will complete the essentials of your support tech stack is a reporting and analytics tool. Having the ability to build customized dashboards and reports to generate actionable insights into your support performance is the most effective way to improve and scale your team. Freshdesk has an inbuilt analytics tool that makes it simple to measure and collate all the essential metrics for any support team.

How good customer service management can earn CS leaders a seat at the table

Customer service management has become a highly discussed topic of late because of how the world has changed dramatically, especially in 2020. CXOs across businesses are looking to their customer service teams to gain insights into customer behavior to modify their approach to selling products and services and build better relationships with customers.

In 2021 and beyond, we’ll see more organizations adding someone from the customer service department to the decision-making table because their input is now arguably one of the most important ones when making strategic decisions going forward.

There’s no lack of marketing channels available today. Whether a brand is looking to reach customers online or through more traditional methods, there are plenty of options to choose from. In fact, it seems like every week there’s a new channel being touted as the next big thing.

And while keeping up to speed with these developments is a wise choice, it’s important not to let them completely overshadow tried-and-true methods of acquiring and retaining customers. One of these is customer service. Excellent customer service is a necessity for every business, regardless of industry or business model.

And though it may not be a marketing channel in the traditional sense, it can play a significant role in whether potential customers choose to purchase from or work with your business.

How Does Customer Service Play a Role in Marketing?

Some marketers focus their efforts solely on acquiring new customers. That’s a mistake — both from a growth standpoint and from a financial one. Growth is a top goal for many businesses, but it’s impossible to achieve steady growth if you’re struggling to keep the customers you already have.

Plus, when you consider that it costs 6-7x more to attract a new customer than it does to retain an existing one, focusing on retention could help you achieve the same size customer base at a much lower cost. It simply doesn’t make sense not to prioritize converting your customers into loyal buyers.

And customer service plays a major role in this process. According to a survey from Temkin Group, 86% of customers who rate a company’s customer service as “excellent” will repurchase from that company.

That number drops to 13% for customers who have a “very poor” experience. That’s less than one-sixth of the repeat purchases generated by excellent service. It’s also worth noting that 77% of consumers who have an excellent customer service interaction say they’re likely to recommend the brand to others, while only 7% of those who have a poor experience will.

From an acquisition standpoint, this is huge. If your service is currently lacking, stepping it up could make a serious difference in how willing your customers are to spread the word about your company.

And considering that those recommendations have the potential to translate into sales, it’s clear that customer service can have a significant impact on your ability to reach your marketing goals.

4 Ways to Make Customer Service Part of Your Marketing Strategy

If you haven’t yet integrated your approaches to customer service and marketing, there’s no better time to start than now. But adapting your strategy means more than merely offering great customer service. With that in mind, here are 4 tips to help you get started.

1. Use Support as an Acquisition Channel

Many businesses believe that their support team’s sole purpose is to answer questions and address concerns from current customers and clients. And to be clear, these are important functions that aid in customer satisfaction and retention. But you can also take things a step further by utilizing support as an acquisition channel.

For example, e-commerce platform Kajabi offers live chat support for all of their site visitors. While current customers can log in and ask questions specific to their accounts, prospective customers see the following default message after clicking the live chat icon.

If they’re interested in learning more, they can instantly message the company’s support team with any questions. This gives the brand the opportunity to speak directly with a lead and provide a more tailored explanation of their product.

It also has the potential to turn a standard site visit into a conversation — and increases the chances that each visitor finds the information they need to take the next step in the company’s sales funnel.

2. Make it Easy for Customers to Get in Touch

Even the best service strategy can only be effective if your team has the opportunity to help current and prospective customers. And while you may think it’s entirely your customers’ responsibility to initiate conversation, it’s essential to make that process as easy as possible.

After all, the more convenient it is for customers to contact you, the more likely they’ll be to get in touch when they have a question or problem. With that in mind, it’s a good idea to make your contact page easily accessible from every other page on your site.

If you have the resources available, it’s also in your best interest to offer multiple support channels. At the very minimum, email and phone support are widely considered standard — but your options don’t end there.

The company offers phone, live chat, and email support, with separate channels for specific departments, like designer specialists, wedding stylists, and personal stylists.

And while offering this many options may not be feasible (or even necessary) for smaller businesses, it’s a prime example of the type of support today’s consumers have come to expect — making it all the more important to provide your customers with a seamless experience.

3. Highlight Your Customer Service as a Benefit

Top-notch customer service could be exactly what it takes to turn a customer into a loyal brand supporter. But you don’t need to wait for them to run into an issue to see that value. Today’s consumers know that customer service can make or break their experience with a company, so highlighting what sets your approach apart can be a major selling point.

Does your company offer 24/7 support? Do you guarantee a response within a specific amount of time? Does your customer support team have an exceptionally high CSAT score? These are all indicators of excellent customer service and can be precisely what you need to differentiate your brand from your competitors — making them potentially valuable additions to your marketing campaigns.

For example, hosting company Bluehost offers 24/7 support, which features prominently in their marketing campaigns. In fact, it appears twice on their homepage alone.

This is likely a compelling selling point to prospective customers who are concerned about server problems, downtime, maintenance, and other technical issues.

So if there’s anything that sets your service and supports apart from your competitors’, make sure prospective customers know that from the start — and it just might be the factor that tips the scale in your favor.

4. Use Customer Reviews as Marketing Materials

Telling your audience about the excellent level of service you provide is a great start. Letting them hear about that service from other customers is even better. Of course, featuring testimonials and reviews isn’t a revolutionary marketing strategy. In fact, there’s a good chance you’ve already incorporated them on your own site.

Still, if you want to illustrate the value of your customer service, few are more compelling than letting prospective customers hear from people who’ve experienced it firsthand. And your approach doesn’t need to be complicated to be effective.

Each one includes the user’s real Twitter handle, so there’s no question as to their authenticity. And if you’re looking for a straightforward way to incorporate your customer service into your marketing strategy, this could be the easiest approach.

First, start by asking your customers for honest feedback. If it’s positive, ask for permission to share it. And if not, view it as constructive criticism you can use to improve your customer service — and, as a result, your ability to acquire and maintain customers.

Customers are a group of people so diverse you shouldn’t be able to categorize them. And yet figuring out the types of customers is one of the first steps of a successful business strategy.

If you search for your brand name on review websites or social media, you’ll get several different reviews & reactions to your products and services from customers. Now combine that with the purchase history of a select few of those customers in the last 6 months, and you might see a few patterns emerging.

These patterns will help you answer the following questions.

• How often do customers buy from you?
• What are they saying about your product on public forums?
• Are they happy with your customer service?

By categorizing the above information, you’ll be able to list down a few customer types. While this is an approximation, it gives you a good starting point to understanding your customer base better

Why should you identify the different types of customers?

What are the advantages of understanding these customer types? Well, there are primarily two reasons to dive into the different types of customer you deal with daily:

Prioritization: Customers are not all equal, and that’s ok. While you owe every single customer a seamless experience and easy access to support, the truth is, there are bound to be customers who are loyal to you, have made higher-value purchases, and bring in more business through referrals. It’s good business to prioritize these customers and deliver an elevated experience.

Personalization: Every customer type is different. So the strategy you use either to serve them or when you are trying to win them over will be different. Understanding what kind of customer you are dealing with helps you personalize your strategy.

Types of customers, their personality traits, and creating a strategy

The three teams that usually have to directly or indirectly deal with customers are customer service, sales, and marketing. These teams interact with customers at different stages of the sales funnel, and the types of customer interaction changes based on what stage of the cycle it took place in. Since ‘Sales & Marketing” are usually the first team to interact with prospects/customers, we’ll begin with them, followed by Support’ customer types.

Sales & Marketing

A customer’s journey begins even before they become your customers. Their first touchpoint is with the marketing team, usually as prospects. Understanding different personas and then creating messaging to target them makes it necessary for the marketing team to understand the types of customers they are dealing with, identify potential challenges and draw them in with a convincing narrative. Then it’s the job of the sales team to decode every specific need of each persona and then pitch a compelling proposition to convert them into customers. Here are the types of customers that you’ll encounter during the purchase and pre-purchase stages

1.Free Customers:

These are the types of customers who are giving your product or service a trial run before deciding whether it’s worth the money. Some examples are users who sign up for free versions of a product or service or only use open-source software.

Personality traits

• Curious
• Cost-conscious

Winning them over: Free users consist of both potential customers as well as those that are merely looking around. Being able to distinguish between them is the first task for your marketing and sales teams to be able to personalize their offers.

Once you’ve accomplished that, use the right pricing and packaging of your paid plans to entice free users to upgrade to paid plans. Shifting a feature or two from the free program to the paid plan could also help convert more users to paying customers

2.New Customers:

These customers are buying from you for the first time. They’ve come to you either because of marketing efforts or peer recommendations. Making a good first impression is important because it validates the reason they chose your company.

Personality traits

• Expectant
• Uncertain

Winning them over

The key to making an excellent first impression is to explain the value of choosing your product or service offering and then following that up with delivering that value. This means convincing the customer that your product is the right choice to solve their most pressing problems. You should also have a smooth onboarding process so that the customer receives complete information consisting of company stories, product tutorials, etc.

3.Bargain Customers:

Bargain or discount customers are the most difficult to negotiate with. They are always looking for a cut-price deal. Most of their decision making during the consideration stage of their buying journey comes down to cost.

Personality traits

• Price hagglers
• Hard negotiators

Winning them over

There are a couple of ways to hook even the hardest bargainer. While this might seem like a problematic type of customer, bargain customers provide an excellent opportunity to flex your marketing and sales team’s creativity in converting these customers.

Entice them to buy a plan that ties them down to a more extended period if it’s a subscription model that you are using. Make them see more value in a lower yearly subscription plan as compared to a monthly one. This guarantees you a higher LTV and a revenue stream.

4.Informed Customers:

Informed buyers are comprehensive. They come prepared, armed with extensive knowledge built through research before even entering a store or talking to a sales representative. When negotiating or trying to pitch a sale to these types of customers, you’ll have to be as thorough as they are. If your product is not in their consideration, set its a herculean task to make them even glance your way.

Personality traits

• Detail-oriented
• Thorough and methodical

Winning them over

The best way to win over highly informed customers is to have subject matter experts to vouch for your product or service being offered. While they might be familiar with most of the essential details of what you have to offer, a deeper understanding of your domain shows them what you are talking about.

5.Impulse Customers:

mpulse buying both in the online and physical purchasing world is still an intriguing psychological concept that companies try to take advantage of through various techniques. The impulse buyer always makes unplanned purchases that are triggered through sudden, unpredictable urges or needs. But sometimes they may need a small push to trigger that impulse.

Personality traits

• Big spenders
• Consumerist mindset
• Easily swayed

Triggering the impulse

Marketing teams play a significant role in getting buyers to purchase items on a whim. Flash sales and limited-time offers are two prevalent and effective impulse triggers. Discounts are the most mainstream impulse buying triggers. A popular discount strategy is incentivizing a purchase by promising a discount on certain items during the customer’s next visit. You’ll come across these both in stores and online shopping.

Customer support

Once customers complete their purchase, customer service teams become the primary point of contact. The types of traits and personalities support teams deal with are different because customers have different expectations during post-sale stages. Adapting to which kind of customer you talk to is a necessary skill. Here are the different types of customers they will encounter and how you should handle them.

1.Loyal Customers:

This first type is a unique scenario where both sales and support play an equally important role. Loyal customers are the types you know and love. Your brand is the first name they think about when it comes to buying a product or service in your industry. You’ve achieved customer loyalty by providing great value through your offerings and your customer service.

Personality Traits

• Preference for Quality
• Consistency
• Repetitive & Habituated

Retention strategy

What’s important with loyal customers is how you handle them after they’ve become your customers. The number of choices consumers have today is the highest it’s ever been. This makes it even harder to retain them.

Keep them up to date with launches or new features about your product regularly. If the customer has a higher share of wallet, you can assign dedicated account managers and customer success managers to ensure they get the attention they are paying for. Eventually, you can ask them to be part of case studies, customer success stories, or testimonials to improve your brand image.

The entire customer experience matters, and therefore marketing sales and customer support have to work together to maintain the relationship.

2.Satisfied Customers:

These are your best customers because they are thrilled with your service. They rarely give negative reviews because your company has managed to satisfactorily exceed all their service expectations.

Personality Traits

• Friendly
• Polite
• Understanding

Your strategy

Do what you’re doing to keep them happy. Keep providing excellent customer service and always give them priority when required. These are your best customers and advocates, so you must do everything in your power to satisfy their requests.

Level of support

Personal Manager/ Senior support agents

3.Curious Customers:

These are customers who always have a lot of questions for your support team. Either because they are new to the product or because they just require a lot of assistance in general. You’ll see that most of their questions are basic or informational and can get repetitive.

Personality traits

• Need constant help
• Ask fundamental questions

Your strategy

When dealing with curious customers, patience is key. Train your agents to listen to customer queries and respond with elaborate answers that give them all the information they need. You can also take the opportunity to record some of the more frequently asked questions and build solution articles that customers can access on your website. This way, you can reduce the number of common complaints you get and also improve your Knowledge Base and Self-service capabilities.

Level of support

Junior agents / Chatbot/ Self-Service

4.Demanding Customers:

Not to be confused with unhappy customers, these people expect the best level of service every time they contact you. Your support team will always have to be on their toes when dealing with these types of customers. If your level of service falls below their expectations, they might not give you a second chance.

Personality traits

• Impatient
• High expectations

Your strategy

The best way to handle demanding customers is to work on a request to request basis. Provide the service they are looking for without any delays. It’s not possible to be perfect all the time but place them as high as possible on your priority list. Over time, by delivering a consistent experience, they’ll gain your trust and build a rapport with you.

Level of support

Senior support or associate Manager

5.Disgruntled Customers:

They are the most challenging customer type to have a conversation with. They might have had a bad experience in the past or weren’t satisfied with the product or service you are offering. Long wait times, or having to regularly phone customer service only to be put on hold are all examples of bad service experiences they could have encountered.

Personality traits

• Angry
• Unhappy
• Frustrated

Your strategy

You’ll have to tread carefully when faced with disgruntled customers because one misstep and they might churn or even worse, talk about their negative experience on social media, which is the last thing you want.

Here’s where customer empathy becomes essential. You have to put yourself in their shoes and really understand where they’re coming from. Once you’ve done that, craft a meaningful apology followed by the reassurance that their problem will be solved. Back this up by taking action swiftly and fixing the problem. Don’t forget to send a final follow up saying that such a scenario will not happen again.

Level of support

Senior support associate/Manager

6.Unknown:

There are certain types of customers who don’t fall into any category, as it’s difficult to interpret their interactions. They don’t really give away what they feel about your service or your products. Possible reasons for this could be that they don’t have the time, or they see it as a purely transactional conversation. Not being able to figure out what kind of customer they are can be a problem, especially when it comes to feedback. They might be customers who are actually unhappy but don’t really reflect it in customer surveys, giving only neutral responses.

Personality traits

Unknown

Your strategy

There really isn’t a specific way to identify this type of customer, but you can try different surveying techniques apart from measuring customer satisfaction. One such metric called Customer Effort Score or CES – measures how easy or difficult a service interaction is for the customer. Unlike the CSAT survey, this gives a more holistic picture of the experience and can lead to better responses for your surveys.

Level of support

Junior support agent

Understanding Customer Types is a Habit of Successful Companies

Gathering as much information as possible on your customers should be a daily exercise. Companies like Amazon, Zappos, JetBlue have been built on the concept of customer obsession. While it’s not easy to reach that level of perfection, creating these customer profiles and catering to their specific needs goes a long way in keeping customers happy. With a wealth of options for consumers, building a segment based strategy is the key to customer retention.