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Blocks to Customer Focus
Despite all the proclamations, catchy advertising slogans, and
customer service publicity, service levels have improved only
marginally in the last few years. As Harvard Business School
professor, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, puts it "Despite the...
Can You Really Make Money While You Sleep?
If you’ve been utilizing the Internet for any length of time it’s likely you have been bombarded with junk mail claiming you can make money “while you sleep.” Most sensible people are bound to ignore such claims of easy money. But is it true?...
Customer Service For Huge Profits
Customer service is the most vital asset for a Business, whether it is online or offline. It's the critical factor which determines if your business has a future or not. There are two vital components to every interaction you have with a customer ...
Customer Service in Your Home Based Business - It Can Make or Break You
Have you ever been shopping and the salesperson ignored you? How did it make you feel to receive such poor customer service? Most people would say that they would never return to the store. Poor customer service can cost you more than clients, but...
DO YOUR POTENTIAL CUSTOMERS FORGET ABOUT YOU?
Your web business probably gets product inquiries from potential customers around the globe. Inquiries come via e-mail and your web site, and you try to send information to each hot prospect as quickly as you can. You know that you can drastically...
Fire Your Customers
It's time to thin the ranks and fire some customers. That's right, can 'em, send them packing and tell them their business isn't welcome here anymore. Sound crazy? It's crazy if you don't! Why would anyone fire a customer? Simple. It's costing you...
How a Customer Relationship Manager for MS Office Can Turn Your Small Business into a Productivity Powerhouse
The number one reason small businesses fail is due to lack of
experience. "Lack of Experience" in the industry the
entrepreneur enters and in management, as well. The fact of the
matter is small business owners nearly tear their hair out...
It's Still About Customer Service
My shopping experience lately has been amazing, and not in the good sense. Most of the time when I walk in a store one of four things happens: (1)I can tell who the salespeople are because they’re walking around with headsets on talking to one...
The Great American Customer Service Unawareness Campaign
Q: I'm so sick of you so-called business experts always saying the customer is always right. This is my business, not the customer's, so I'm the one who's always right. Sure, they can have an opinion, but in the end it's up to me to decide...
Top Ten Online Choices to Get Clients to Choose you Again and Again - Part 2
Did you know that 95% of coaching businesses fail because their owners don't pay enough attention to sales copy? Whether you are a professional speaker, coach, or entrepreneur, every business wants more clients. Even more, they want to entice...
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Are You Satisfying Your Customers?
The latest report from the American Customer Satisfaction Index (Michigan School of Business) reports the following:
Customer dissatisfaction with the quality goods and services offered in the marketplace is more than a nuisance. The US economy is heavily dependent on increases in consumer spending. Such increases are hard to come by when consumers become less satisfied. The ACSI fell dramatically in the fourth quarter of 2004. The Index now stands at 73.6 – dropping nearly 1% compared with the third quarter. One would have to go back almost seven years to find an equivalent decline.
While high levels of customer satisfaction typically lead to company growth, it is not always the case that business growth leads to satisfied customers. In many cases, the opposite is true.
What’s interesting with this study is that since 1995 customer service has consistently not made the grade, and services continue to top the list in terms of customer dissatisfaction. Remember we’re all in the service business!
Taken even further, growing customer dissatisfaction with contact center service levels is boosting the use of IVRs as 20% of customers opt for self service channels over live agents. That’s 1 in 5 customers bypassing the human because of poor service. (CRM Today, 2/18/05).
From past newsletters we know the impact and cost of repeat calls, bad call experiences, poor service, (if you don’t go to http://www.human-technologies.com/newsletter_archive.html). What can you do starting right now?
First, how and what are you measuring for customer satisfaction? Measurement systems must not only be in step with the customer's preferred communication channel, but the effectiveness of service delivery should be immediate. What does this mean? If the
interaction is via phone, a survey should be via phone, not by a subsequent email. Are you actually asking the customer for feedback on their experience—what is now jargoned as ‘the voice of the customer?’ Merely using metrics will give you guidelines, but could be false security. Go to the source. Ask your customers!
Second, according to the third National Complaints Culture Survey unhappy customers are growing increasingly frustrated with the way their complaints are being handled, and hard-pressed call center staff are being hindered by a lack of training and support from their employers.
Since calls coming into a center are escalated before they’re even answered—if I could successfully find my answers through the website, self service, VRU, IVR, etc. I wouldn’t need to talk to a human—agents need more tools than ever before to diffuse what is being presented to them such that they can move the customer onto a more productive interaction, and close the call.
Where will they find these tools? The simple answer is with customer centric training. Off the shelf, generic, or outdated training is like trying to put a round peg in a square hole.
Today’s training modules must be customized to the customer, not the statistics, and training must be presented ongoingly. Remember, training is a process, not an event.
About the Author
ROSANNE D'AUSILIO, Ph.D., industrial psychologist/President, Human Technologies Global, (www.human-technologies.com) provides needs analyses and customer service trainings. She authors Wake Up Your Call Center: Humanize Your Interaction Hub, Customer Service and The Human Experience, and Lay Your Cards on the Table: 52 Ways to Stack Your Personal Deck. Subscribe to Human Tech Tips at www.HumanTechTips.com.
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