You’ll never please all the customers all the time. But you can keep most of them happy all the time if you avoid the things that bug them most.
Meeting all of customers’ expectations is a challenge for most contact centers, a recent ASQ survey found. While most contact centers won’t be able to be everything to everyone, they can keep customer satisfaction high by eliminating or reducing the issues that cause the most complaints.
Here’s what customers dislike most, according to the ASQ survey:
- Long waits – for an agent, delivery or answer (25%)
- Lack of communication from the company (20%), and
- Errors – in orders, billing, information, etc. (17%)
Fortunately, some customers (like those in this survey) speak their mind, telling you what makes them upset. But most research finds that most customers never complain: They get frustrated by long waits, errors or lack of communication and never give contact center agents or companies the opportunity to make things right and apologize.
That’s why you want to take steps to eliminate customers’ biggest frustrations – and be assured they’ll stay satisfied.
Try these tips to cover the major bases:
- To eliminate unnecessary waits, set the right expectations. Under promise, over deliver is never more relevant. When you know products will be delivered in three days, tell customers to expect them in four (a classic Amazon move). If you can’t take calls immediately, give customers the option to be called back, and let them know when they can expect that call or have them choose the time they’d like the call.
- To better communicate, you don’t have to just increase communication. More email, calls or correspondence from the contact center doesn’t mean customers will actually listen. More importantly, you want communication with customers to be relevant, timely and focused. Reach out to customers when the information you are providing is important to them – perhaps when their current supply should be running out, and you send an order reminder or quantify discount. Use as few words as possible in correspondence so they read, rather than scan. Include bullet points for the most important information.
- To reduce errors, ask for customers’ confirmation more often. You probably don’t have time to verify every order or bill, but anything that’s out of the ordinary needs to be verified. Encourage agents to turn to each other for a double-check on customer orders, invoices and information regularly.
