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Your staff and customer service
We all know front-line staff who have direct contact with customers have the
greatest effect on the company's reputation. These people should be trained
to be aware of the impact of service on your customers. The ideal customer
focussed staff member is one who;
- Has an eye for detail to ensure your business presents well at all
times.
- Has a can do attitude, that says 'either I can do it for you, or I can
direct you to someone who can do it for you, in a way that makes
you feel okay about it'.
- Is empowered to take appropriate action to please the customer
now.
- Is empathetic to the customers wants and needs.
- Shows they care about the customers, no matter who they are.
So how would you ensure your staff do this? How would you get their input
into expanding the scope of the points already raised? Just remember that
without customers your business will fail.
Behind the scenes.
Also remember that staff behind the scenes, play a crucial a role. The back
room staff are usually the ones who create the product, maintain the ordering
and delivery systems, keep track of records, and do the number crunching all
of which offers support to front line staff.
It's worth remembering then, that poor customer awareness by backroom
staff can quickly erode any hard-won customer service image resulting in a
deterioration of customer numbers, and therefore profits.
This is often seen when they are asked to answer phones when front-line
staff are on a break, how will they do it? Do they care? What does it matter?
It will matter a great deal if they are put off and go to your opposition.
Moments of truth.
Every time a customer deals with your organisation they are experiencing a
Moment of Truth. The truth is either you will engage them into believing that
what you have is of value, or garbage. Is the moment of truth an
exceptionally positive one or a moment that lacks lustre and excitement?
How would you like it to be, imagine if you are the customer, would you want
to return?
Winning back a customer that has received the bad end of your service can
be a very difficult task, so ensure that every person that has some contact
with customers or will be seen by customers can look and act according to
the guidelines you set up for brilliant customer service.
The two basic types of customers.
Remember there are only two kinds of customers that are of direct value to
your business, those content with the service telling others about the
business in a positive way and those that complain. Good news travels just
as fast as bad news. If someone has a complaint ensure your staff have a
way of handling the complaint in a way that avoids making the customer feel
awkward about it, after all they have probably gone out on a limb to let you
know.
There is also another way of stating the two customer types, Internal and
External. The internal are the staff, the external are the paying customers.
Both groups need to be served, how you go about serving the internal ones
is a matter for another article, but if you want your service levels to pick up,
work with them to get there.
Service is vital, so avoid ending up in the bad news section of a newspaper
for poor service, because there is really no excuse.
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Contact
Take the next step! Call me on 0414 522 128 or email info@stevegray.biz.
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