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Running a business takes a lot of effort and dedication, and success doesn’t come easy. There are a number of things that can affect your business such as finances, the economy, and customer service. Your customer service is actually one of the most important parts of your business and it can make or break you. Some companies will utilise a customer service consultancy in the UK so that they can immensely improve their service levels. So, if you’re curious as to how customer service impacts your business, keep reading and find out!
Loyal Customers
Businesses thrive on returning customers, and if you want to ensure you have a full roster of them, you need to have good customer service. If each customer you have only bought from you once and never returned, you’d soon start to struggle to generate a profit. Bad customer service shows customers that you don’t actually value them or their time, so why should they waste their hard-earned money on your brand when others will treat them better. Retaining customers is crucial to success, so you need to ensure that your customer service is top-notch 100% of the time. Demonstrate to your customers that you value their business and they’ll be sure to return to you again and again.
Reflects Your Brand
You can have the best logo and marketing out there, but if you’ve got a reputation for having bad customer service, all of that means nothing. The level of service you give directly reflects on your business and customers will definitely see it. If your values are all about caring for one another and delivering amazing service, then your customers will expect this. If you give them anything less, they’ll pick up on it and head off to another company instead. One study showed that 96% of people said customer service plays a deciding role in their loyalty to a business. Knowing this, you want to have full control over the levels of service you provide and make sure that you give your customers the best experience you can.
Happy Customers Equals Happy Employees
Nobody wants to work a job where customers are shouting down the phone at them all day, but if you don’t have a good level of customer service, this could soon become a reality. Not only is it bad for your customers, but it’s also detrimental to your employees. You’ll find it hard to retain staff if they don’t feel motivated to do their job each day, so make sure you invest in their training and upskill them when necessary. If your employees are happy, they’re more likely to give brilliant customer service which in turn, helps keep your customers even happier. Make sure that everyone is on the same page when it comes to service levels, and you’ll all be able to motivate each other as you work towards a common goal.
Friend And Family Recommendation
If you think about the worst customer service you’ve ever received, there’s no way you’d recommend the company to your loved ones. The same thing will happen to your business if you don’t focus on delivering great service. Consumers want to be able to trust a brand and if they don’t believe they can, they’re much more likely to speak badly about you their friends and family. Referrals are actually pretty easy to get if you’re giving every customer a fantastic experience as they’ll want to tell people about it, helping to get your name out there for free. This is invaluable advertising that you don’t want to miss out on.
Generate More Profits
A recent survey showed that 67% of customers are happy to pay more for a product if they experience good customer service. This means that if you were to raise your prices and you deliver amazing customer service, then you shouldn’t face much backlash for it as people will still be happy to pay. Each customer has a Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) and it shows you how much money you can expect them to spend while doing business with you. Ideally, you want this value to be high and in order to do so, you need to demonstrate high levels of customer service. This way you can ensure you keep your customers loyal and increase their CLV to help you generate a better turnover.
Makes You Competitive
If you really want to stand out from your competitors, then you need to be showing that you offer high-quality customer service. With customers valuing service over price, you may be able to charge more and still gain more customers than other businesses in the same market as you. One bad experience is enough for a customer to never return to a company again, so it’s vital you try to eliminate this from happening if you want to ensure customer loyalty.
Reduce Complaints
Complaints aren’t fun to deal with, but instead of treating them as a negative, you should use them as a learning opportunity. Figuring out what went wrong and how you can prevent it from happening again is essential for customer happiness and delivering good service. Having better customer service will actually reduce the number of complaints you receive as your staff will be trained enough to be able to deal with things properly before they escalate. You don’t want your business to be full of complaints because that clearly means something isn’t right. You can’t avoid all complaints, but how you deal with them matters a lot. Make sure that you are proactive when it comes to these types of things, and you’ll soon have happy customers again.
As you can see, customer service has a massive impact on your business, and it goes both ways. If you have bad service, your business won’t be able to succeed. But if you have high-quality service, then you can expect your business to go from strength to strength. So, if you’ve been overlooking your customer service for a while now, it’s time to make a change. Assess your service and see where you can make improvements and you’ll find your business can achieve more than you ever thought possible.
