7 Tips to Higher Level Customer Satisfaction

Achieving high customer satisfaction is crucial for business enterprises to achieve their repeat purchase and increase customer retention. While there are no rigid rules or strategies to keep customers satisfied, following certain best practices definitely help to achieve higher customer satisfaction in any kind of industry. Few of such tips can be discussed as follows.

Well trained customer service staff

Customer facing staff such as the front line customer service representatives must be effectively trained in soft skills, customer handling skills, including strong product/process knowledge to serve the visiting customers, either in case of online or offline business. Frontline staff forms the first impression on the customers and their behavior plays a dominant role in maintaining a high-level customer satisfaction.

Collect timely feedback and act upon it

Collecting feedback from the customers after a sale by making a courtesy call will make the customers feel valued. Seeking their feedback over telephone verbally or electronically through emails or live chat will help to understand their grievances and areas of dissatisfaction. Such areas can be acted upon and strategies must be formulated to provide permanent solutions to such customer problems.

Communicate clearly and listen actively

Customer queries, issues and complaints must be actively listened to and response must be given promptly. It is a poor practice to ask customers to repeat their concern again and again. This may irritate the customer and lead to customer dissatisfaction. Understanding their problems the very first time and giving them proper resolution through clear and open communication keeps customers satisfied. It is also essential to communicate the product & service offerings clearly to the customers before they make a purchase. This will help to avoid setting up wrong customer expectations and control customer dissatisfaction afterwards.

Maintain an effective CRM

In the current cut-throat competitive business environment, it is essential to maintain an effective customer relationship management system with well-trained staff personnel. The CRM team will be able to maintain an extensive customer database including their names, addresses, contact numbers, frequency of store visits, and nature of products purchased and/or services availed.  This data will help in creating customer profiles and tailor the services according to their needs & expectations.

This will also help to identify the loyal customers making repeat visits to the store, either online or offline and create loyalty schemes to make them happy. Contemporary customers expect the company to remember them and reward them for offering their long-term loyalty. Hence, CRM will help to offer the customers with rewards, loyalty points, discounts etc and provide them a higher level of satisfied. The CRM team must also conduct customer satisfaction surveys to understand their queries, needs & expectations.

Adopt state of the art technology

Delivering excellent customer support helps to achieve a high level of customer satisfaction. In the technology-driven global business environment it is necessary  to deliver customer services through state of the art/ most updated technology such as social media, mobile apps etc. Integrating customer relationship management system with social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, will help to interact with the customers, exchange feedback, share ideas and involve customers in business activities such as contests.

Nowadays, the use of smartphones has changed the shape of marketing and building customer networks. Remaining connected with the customers through mobile applications will help them to conduct transactions with the company at the comfort of their home and as per their convenience. This will provide customers with convenience of shopping, making payments, tracking merchandise, return merchandise, availing discounts, gaining loyalty points etc at their finger points. This will it will be easier to achieve high level of customer satisfaction.

Provide excellent after sale services

It is advisable to deliver excellent after sale services once the sales transaction is over. Making regular follow ups on customer complaints, product replacements, servicing on defective products, return merchandising etc are few examples where customers would expect efficiency, honesty and transparency. Although, after sale services do not fetch money but it is considerably important to keep customers satisfied and achieve their long term custom.

Aim to achieve customer delight

Instead of striving to achieve high customer satisfaction, a company must set goals to achieve customer delight by going an extra mile. Treating the customers as the most important stakeholders, offering customer-centric solution, delivering value through an appropriate combination of a marketing mix (fair combination of product, price, place, promotions) combined with excellent after sale services is essential to keep the customers delighted.

Conclusion

Satisfied customers not only provide their lifelong loyalty but also recommend others to choose the company. This helps in retaining existing customers along with acquiring new customers leading to increase in sales and profitability. Hence, it is of utmost importance for companies to implement effective strategies to keep customers satisfied and increase their business reputation.

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Building a Loyal and Long Term Consumer Engagement

Satisfying your customers is key, and having a solid strategy about how you’re going to engage them is important. In order to establish a philosophy about how to best maintain a long term engagement with your customers, you need to take a few key ideas into account. Most of these core principles stem from high standards of communication utilizing the best tools available, and a solid understanding of your customers’ needs. Here are a few tips on how you can develop and maintain a loyal program of long term consumer engagement.

Communication Is Key to Long Term Consumer Engagement

Forbes pins communication as a top priority, advising businesses to routinely provide customers with updates that are both positive and negative. No news is not good news, whether you have to deliver a setback or an achievement. There are many reasons to stay in touch with customers. Not only is it a practical method of moving projects along and making sure everyone is on the same page, but it’s also an important part of presenting your business in a positive light. Trust is just as important as communication when you’re dealing with customers, and you can reaffirm that quality by never falling off the radar.

Beyond Your E-mail Inbox

The Marketing Donut recommends that for effective management of customer relationships, you should use every possible channel to communicate with your customers. E-mail alone isn’t good enough anymore, and utilizing other modes of interaction, such as video conferencing or even social media, makes them feel valued and in the know. This is essential to maintaining a positive feeling in your business dealings. Video conferencing in particular has become a very popular mode of business communications, with providers such as Bluejeans and others offering select services specifically designed with consumer engagement in mind. Blue Jeans for customer management offers many different options tailored specifically for customer communication. It’s essential to stay on the cutting edge of this type of technology, since it will push your customer relationships forward and into the 21st century.

Implement Your Game Plan Innovatively

John Tschohl, Desk.com blogger and self-described “guru of customer service,” is an expert in the consumer engagement and service industry. While developing an effective, long-term strategy, he recommends taking a three-pronged approach:

  • Product. View your service as a product, and realize that your customers have a choice in a competitive market.
  • The Boss. Your customer is really your boss. This is an essential part of the ideology behind customer service, and placing it at the center of your company’s core is extremely important since customers are what drive your business.
  • Reliability. Maintain consistent performance to meet and ideally exceed your customer’s expectations time after time.

These core principles are always good to keep in mind when you’re planning a longer term approach to your customer communication and engagement program. Always keep your eye on the prize when it comes to the product, since that’s ultimately the core of what the customer pays for. However, a huge part of maintaining business isn’t just a great product, but the package that comes with it. Customers don’t want to have to feel like they’re bothering you or that they have to hunt you down. They really are the boss, and when they snap their fingers, you should expect to jump. And last, but not least, reliability is also of equal importance. All of these elements can be better achieved using a technology like video conferencing due to the fact that it’s immediate, it’s user friendly given current advances with browser compatibility and other multi-platform availability, and it puts a face to the business.

Don’t Be Afraid of Feedback

It’s easy to send feedback that’s watered down in an e-mail, because no one likes confrontation. This includes your customers. However, although it might seem counterintuitive, you should encourage your customers to give you the good, the bad, and the ugly all at once. Using a video conference to get feedback can better facilitate this once you establish a rapport. It’s easier to rap with a colleague that you’ve worked on a project with if that’s the type of relationship you establish with customers. Don’t make them feel like you’re on opposing sides, just because they’re paying you for a product you provide. Sit down for a video meeting, armed with a pen and paper, and tell them you want the real feedback. It’ll help you in the long run and strengthen your other customer relationships.

In short, establishing an effective and functional consumer engagement policy requires a more proactive approach. Using tools like video conferencing and other types of communication methods that go beyond traditional e-mail correspondence not only facilitates a better relationship, but also helps to build trust and belief in your product. While many businesses are mostly focused on rolling out a great product, when you’re dealing with customers, you need to put a personality to the business as well as what you’re selling.

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