Customer service is the driving force behind any successful business. It starts with understanding customer needs, being responsive to their concerns, and showing empathy through personalized interactions. That way, customers feel like individuals rather than numbers in your business stats. Good treatment can turn random buyers into loyal brand advocates who will return over and over, even in the face of competition or rising prices.
Strategic customer service goes beyond a friendly conversation based on the rules of etiquette. Sure thing your agents must use positive language, stay calm, and respond to queries before a customer starts feeling sleepy. But while the art of communication matters, it’s just the starting point. Like any other business strategy, customer service should generate more revenue. Customer retention, higher order volumes, and gaining referrals are the main goals to pursue in the support department.
Wondering what can help you improve customer service and grow the bottom line along the way? Read on to find the answers.
Analyze customer feedback to improve your services
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Customer feedback is a valuable asset to improve both your product quality and customer experience. By examining conversations from support tickets, you can identify recurring issues that have a negative impact on customer satisfaction and figure out potential areas for improvement.
Let’s say your customers ask about your return policy over and over. It’s a clear signal that you need to update the policy with more details. If they often complain about delayed response times, it makes sense to use real-time support options like a live chat. Employing automation and templated responses can also minimize wait times for customers seeking immediate solutions.
Support agents aren’t the only employees who can benefit from customer feedback. The other departments of your company can step in and review these insights too to make their own contribution. Frequent complaints about your product quality can prompt revisions in manufacturing, whereas comments on shipping challenges will help your team adjust the fulfillment process.
Automate replies to common customer queries
Automating replies to common queries like “what is” and “how to” has a couple of perks. First, it speeds up response times by giving quick, accurate answers to FAQs, which will make the buying journey as effortless as possible for customers.
Automation can also improve the overall quality of your customer service. Instead of processing repetitive tickets manually, your team can focus on complicated inquiries that require human intervention. In practice, it means less time spent on generic stuff and more hours available for personalized assistance or troubleshooting, which is exactly what you hired your support agents for!
Note that canned responses can let you down without personalization. Make sure you address each customer by name and adjust the message to their specific case. Even with minor details, your interactions will feel personal, while you won’t have to start from scratch every single time.
Add customer self-service channels
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A lot of customers like to figure things out on their own whenever they can. That’s why the first places they check for assistance are your knowledge base, FAQ section, and chatbot. These self-service channels let them tackle their problems, without the need to involve customer service agents. Here’s what each self-service solution is meant for:
- FAQ sections give short and clear answers to common queries about product features, delivery, returns management, etc.
- Knowledge bases provide more detailed guides on how to use products and fix issues on your own.
- AI chatbots generate fast replies that assist customers with typical concerns, simulating an “in-person” interaction while reducing the workload for your support team.
Set up live chat at the checkout
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According to the recent stats, over 70% of shopping carts were abandoned worldwide in 2024. Although many factors contribute to such a high percentage, customers’ concerns and problems they face at the checkout are among the most prevalent. By implementing a live chat option on your checkout page, you can let customers get help right away, which will prevent cart abandonment in most cases.
Live chat is also an efficient tool to reach out to customers proactively while they're checking out. You can inform them about discounts, free delivery, or any other perks you have. This tactic will increase your average order value through strategic cross-selling, upselling, and personalized product recommendations.
Measure how customer service impacts your revenue
Many companies are obsessive about sales volumes but they often overlook the importance of measuring customer support performance, mainly because they can’t figure out how it’s tied to revenue generation. While you may be already tracking how fast your agents deal with tickets, which is definitely a good idea, customer support metrics aren’t limited to response times only.
For example, the number of support tickets converted into sales indicates your team’s real impact on your revenue. You can consider a ticket converted if customers make a purchase within a specified number of days, usually from five to ten, after reaching out for help. Positive pre-sales interactions should also inspire customers’ loyalty and encourage them for a repeat purchase, which is something you can track too.
Through analysis of support tickets, you’ll easily spot common sales trends to sort effective practices out of those that bring little to no income. This data will help you work out a customer service strategy with a specific focus on revenue generation.
Use customer service software to improve your efficiency
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The cornerstone of successful interactions between buyers and support agents is customer service software. It will help you organize your workflow, automate routine tasks, gain insights, and make sure none of your customers’ issues remains unsolved. The results? You’ll see an increase in revenue with lower operational costs at the same time.
You’ve probably heard about the tools like Zendesk and Intercom or even used some of them. No wonder - these giants have received so much promotion lately! But the truth is the choice of customer service tools is much wider on the market. There are also less known solutions that don't yield to heavily promoted software, neither in functionality nor in pricing policy.
If you’re open to switching to a new customer service platform with its own innovative features and flexible pricing, check out decent choices to try:
Besides customer service software, there are additional tools like Visme that can come in handy for customer success teams. With its help, you can create content that will improve customer relationships - whiteboards, presentations, infographics, and many other types of data visualizations. Visme's online form builder will let you set up interactive forms to collect customer feedback and inquiries. Not only will these insights help you improve your products but also provide personalized customer service.
To Sum It Up
Each time buyers reach out to your customer service team, it’s a make-or-break moment for your business. Every contact deserves personalized assistance and a swift resolution of their problem. Depending on your support, you’ll either gain a loyal customer or lose them to one of your competitors. That’s why customer satisfaction should be at the top of your priority list.
But the truth is you can benefit much more from customer service than just pleasing customers. Through analysis of support tickets, you can identify areas for product improvement. Automation and self-service channels will minimize your operational costs, while live chat will help you reduce abandoned carts. By measuring your team’s performance, you’ll see what leads to conversions and what doesn’t, which will let you develop a revenue-oriented customer service strategy.
To make things work, you definitely need customer service software. The tools listed above are decent options to try, as they meet all the major criteria - powerful functionality, user-friendly interface even for first-timers, and affordable pricing, all proved by positive user reviews. Feel free to sign up for a trial or arrange a demo to figure it out yourself.
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