How customer service can differentiate your business

With businesses all vying to be different and separate their offering from the competition, one of the key ways that a business can differentiate itself is through its customer service. The term customer service is synonymous with resolving customer complaints/problems, often dealing with customers that are dissatisfied with a business’s products or services.
However, customer service is not all about “firefighting” and dealing with irate/angry customers. Customer service can also be a vital tool in understanding your business, your products/services and how they are viewed by your customers. Management reports and statistics are great for dissecting information but nothing beats having real time feedback (good or bad) on your offerings.
With this being the case, the focus of today’s blog is to highlight how effective customer service can differentiate your business:
• Positive impression – no matter how great an organisation is, there will eventually come a time when something goes wrong and the customers contacts the business. Whether it is a faulty component of a product or an inadequate level of service, there will be times when something goes wrong. At this point, the way in which a business deals with the problem will leave a lasting impression on the customers mind. If it is dealt with quickly with an effective resolution, it will leave a positive impression with the customer. However, denying liability and failing to take ownership of the problem will lead to an unsatisfied customer who will be willing to share his/her displeasure with your business to all friends and family.
• Product/Service development – customer service and feedback can boost the development and refinements a business makes to its products/services. Having regular contact with customers will allow a business to understand the positive way that their offering affects their loyal customers. However, more importantly it will allow a business to identify the limitations in their product/service and how best to evolve their offering to mitigate the negatives.
• Staff motivation – when most people think of customer service representatives, they imagine a low paid worker in a call centre dealing with abusive and disgruntled customers. However, a business can change the ethos and motivation levels of staff by delivering training to customer service personnel as well as empowering them to go the extra mile to resolve customer complaints. Another initiative a business may choose to implement includes giving all staff within the business the opportunity to be on the front line of customer service. As a result, all members of the organisation can appreciate the contribution that customer service staff makes to the customer experience.
As the above points illustrate, a business’s approach to customer service can play a big role in how it differentiates itself from the competition. To find out how Eazi-Apps can help you offer mobile apps and mobile websites to businesses in order to aid the customer experience, please contact us today.