Customer Support Software Featured Articles

Customer support tips – your agents can probably list a dozen or more off the top of their heads, rolling their eyes as they do. The buzzwords and catchphrases appear to bring value to the conversation, but are they truly helping your business or are they simply something to fill the customer support software description? If the solution you have in place isn’t delivering real and measurable value beyond the buzzwords, time to look a little deeper.

A recent kissmetrics blog by Len Markidan explored this topic, suggesting a few real and actionable customer service tips that can actually help grow the business. It’s a given that your agents should be human, provide genuine service to the caller and do so in a timely manner. What may not come naturally, however, is the importance of the upsell and cross-sell opportunity.

When it’s appropriate, the cross-sell and upsell is a great way to deliver value to the customer, while also adding revenue to the company. This doesn’t mean that every interaction is a sales opportunity. The first goal is to deliver value to the caller by answering a question, solving a problem or completing a transaction. If the customer is happy with you and he or she has an unmet need that you can meet, the opportunity is there. When done correctly, you not only get the sale, the customer feels valued for the offer.

Do you have an FAQ section available on your website or a knowledgebase that you invite customers to use? In some cases, this is a great way to support the customer’s desire for self-service. If you don’t cater to the self-service generation, however, are you leaving too much to chance that the customer won’t find what they need or that you won’t feel their pain so as to fix it or improve upon your service or product? Customer support software can help you capture this information and use it to your benefit.

This concept points to another suggestion Markidan made in the post – reduce the effort the customer has to make. I recently covered the Do Not Reply concept in automated text messages and how this approach to using the channel the customer prefers misses the mark – it makes it impossible for the customer to respond with a question, to confirm or to reschedule. In essence, it communicates to the customer that the company wants to use the easiest method to communicate, but doesn’t want to extend the same benefit to the customer.

Finally, use your customer support software to track red flag metrics – is there something in your script that triggers a particularly stressful response? Is there an increase in customer complaints during a particular campaign? Is there a product flaw that is causing an overload in communications with the contact center? Look for elements that can have an impact on volume both positive and negative to understand what’s happening and why so you can adjust accordingly.

TeamSupport is focused on helping companies stay focused on the customer experience, improving processes and interactions so that customers can become your biggest advocates. If this isn’t your current experience, time to take a closer look at this provider and how you might benefit from a proven strategy and solution.