Great customer service is crucial for a competitive advantage in the business world. According to Microsoft, 90% of Americans look at the quality of customer service as a deciding factor on whether or not to engage in business with a company.
Providing quality customer service keeps customers coming back for more, with positive customer service interactions guaranteeing a customer return rate of more than 50%.
Proper training and support for your customer service team is the only way to create an environment where the team can grow and provide the highest quality of service. Your team’s training should focus on three important service aspects: attitude, skill, and industry knowledge.
A great customer service team can be the difference. Below are five modern tips for effective customer service training, sure to set your team up for success.
1. Consider an Enterprise Video Platform
Video training for customer service teams is not only the most effective way to train teams, it’s the most cost-effective as well. By using an enterprise video platform, your team isn’t limited to one trainer speaking to a room full of employees, you can have numerous videos featuring different aspects of customer service.
Studies also show that people are more drawn to and more likely to engage with training videos than a trainer orating in front of them, as the brain processes images 60k times faster than. These videos are verified and secure, offering a fast and effective way to train your team.
2. Emphasize Empathy
Ask your trainees to take a second at the beginning of each conversation to try to walk in the shoes of the customers. They may be distraught, distressed, displeased, and overall disinterested when coming to the customer service line.
It’s your representative’s job to empathize with those feelings and then move toward a solution, not react to anything the customer may do. This is how attitude plays into being a great customer service representative.
When your team can remove their own feelings and relate directly to the customer’s struggle, you are sure to have a positive outcome. Customers react positively when customer service representatives offer their empathy and support towards the issues they are reaching out about.
Nothing will ensure you more lifetime customers and positive reviews than customer service representatives who care about the people they’re speaking to.
Be sure to have training in place for active listening, as this is a great tool for finding ways to empathize with customers during the conversation.
3. Establish A Process
Your team needs to know how to handle any and all customer requests and concerns, and everyone on your team should be on the same page about how to handle those things.
By establishing a process for customers calling or writing into the service line, you can guarantee all customer’s problems will be sorted properly. Teach your team to be polite and concise, and to use correct grammar when communicating via chat or email.
Always follow up any interaction with customers with an e-mail. Establish a hierarchy, who to contact when a conversation is going awry or a well-known solution is not working.
Make an outline of how conversations should start and end with customers and give your team a pre-written template to fill out while speaking with customers. By guiding your team in the direction of the service goals your company is aiming for, they will be able to better their own service techniques.
4. Focus On Problem Solving Communication Techniques
There’s one reason people contact customer service and that’s because there’s a problem. A simple way to help your team stand out amongst other customer service teams is to compile a list of the typical problems that customers call in with and the answers to those problems.
Having this on hand will ensure swift and positive interactions between team members and customers. Ensure that your team members know who to contact if they don’t have an answer to a problem, and make sure a senior team member is always working with more junior staff to help show them the ropes.
5. Make Training Engaging & Fun
Your employees will be more eager to learn if you don’t make every training session dull and drag on. Employ some team-building exercises during your training, take some time during the beginning to participate in ice breakers. Do anything to make the room more comfortable.
You could set up a mentor program, where new employees can follow more senior team members for certain portions of their day to see how they conduct their conversations.
