“What do you want?” is one of the most popular questions people all around the world ask one another. Dinner plans, the choice of profession, what book to read for the future month, and so on. As useful as it is in our everyday life, it may be even more important in business because without understanding what colleagues, clients, and customers want, it is impossible to give them what they expect and need.
Being a drive for any business, customers’ desires and needs have to be understood and respected by any business. And understanding them is a strenuous task. How can a business pull it off?
- By conducting regular feedback surveys
- By talking to focus groups
- By gathering website analytics
- By combining feedback gathering with company updates and news
- By reading their comments on social media, etc.
So, what do customers want from us?
Consistency in communication
More than 75 percent of customers get frustrated when support teams provide them with incorrect information and answers. With 98 percent of American users switching between devices and, most likely, communication channels, it is important for a support team to constantly provide the same information of the same quality.
How can a business ensure that?
- Compile an extensive knowledge base and make sure the entire team has access to it.
- Train a support team regularly and check the level of their knowledge with the help of quizzes and tests.
- Conduct the QA process as often as needed to spot and eliminate any service discrepancies on the go.
- Implement a smooth omnichannel communication system.
Taking these simple steps will help any business provide answers of consistently high quality.
Simplicity in answers
Providing simple answers to difficult matters — this is where ChatGPT has us. By receiving a request like ‘Give a simple answer to this question’ or ‘Rephrase this response with simple words’, it can turn a sentence of any difficulty into a statement for a person of any level of tech-savviness.
But, ChatGPT raises a lot of questions about cybersecurity and not all businesses can afford to use it, especially if they deal with sensitive or private information. That means that not all businesses can use it, and have to adopt their communication style themselves.
There is one huge BUT here. Simple doesn’t mean a support team should talk to customers as if they are kindergarteners.
Simple means without big words and overly complicated tech lingo, but still professional and to-the-point.
The simpler the answer, the more likely a customer to understand everything and leave satisfied.
Responsible attitude
Responsibility in relationships with customers, communication, answers, and maintaining a consistent brand image is something that lies on a support team’s shoulders. Hefty burden? Yes. A rewarding task? No doubt.
Customers are one of the top three main components (clients and teams being the other two) of and for any business. Treating every user responsibly is the best way to demonstrate that a company has their values straight and understands the importance of two-way loyalty.
What are the best ways for a support team to show a responsible attitude towards customers?
- Set a First Response Time KPI. Customers do not like to wait, so keep it as short as possible. And keep in mind that it varies for different communication channels.
- Develop and maintain a consistent communication style.
- Have clear answers and an escalation system.
- Maintain ticket hygiene to always know every little detail of every ticket.
Self-service
81 percent of users try to resolve their issues themselves before contacting a support team, which means most users do not like the process of communicating with customer service. Why? Because it may be a tedious and time- and effort-consuming task that may not even yield any results.
Delivering an up-to-date self-service option will not only help a business satisfy more customers by allowing them to resolve their tickets themselves. It will also take a lot of pressure off of its support team’s shoulders as they will be able to focus on more complicated tickets and customers who require more attention. If that is what customers really would like to have — why not give it to them?
Customer support, if efficient, has a potential to become a surprising and pleasant experience. All a support team needs to do is display a responsible attitude, provide consistent answers, and adapt the style of communication for each customer. After all, this is what customers want and expect from us.
