continuous improvement of customer service performance is vital as it is one of the ultimate drivers of company profitability. in fact, it’s not unrealistic to expect sales increases of 20% or more of a company’s total revenue by delivering excellent customer service.
fortunately, there are many tactics you can try to improve your team’s performance. From implementing a quality assurance strategy to soliciting honest feedback from your customers, this will help provide a seamless customer journey from prospect to post-sale.
Reading: Review how to improve customer care solution
Having the tools to show your team their performance and impact on the customer experience can help them improve their performance. the right tools will help you take corrective action before it’s too late. genuine and ongoing conversations with your team will help you improve your performance and increase your customer retention rate.
In this article, you’ll learn 15 strategies to improve customer service performance in 2022, so let’s dig in.
15 Sure-Fire Ways to Improve Your Team’s Customer Service Performance
Your customer support team is the front line of your business. they will be the “face” of what customers see as a representation of your brand. Agents will provide the impression that each of your customers has about your company, so it’s important to ensure that the quality of service is up to company standards. there are several practical ways to improve customer service performance on your team.
Let’s take a look at strategies for providing great customer service here:
1. understand customer needs
When wondering how to provide good customer service, this tip comes first for a reason: it’s the most important. everything your customer support team does should be based on the needs of the customer. understanding exactly what those needs are will help guide your customer service strategy.
The best way to find out what your customers need is to ask them. use a survey, email, phone call, or whatever resources are available to you to ask them about their specific needs for your industry.
2. train empathy
Understanding your customer’s specific need is only the first step. what, and often more importantly, how you interact with them is vital to ensuring the success of your customer service performance strategy.
Often when companies look to improve their performance management systems they are driven by the bottom line of the business, but customer service teams need to understand that how a customer feels after their interaction with you will increase customer loyalty.
Including empathy in your performance training initiatives will help you focus on increasing customer satisfaction, which, in turn, will affect your results.
3. encourage honest customer feedback
Having a culture of honesty and integrity means more than just putting it up on a sign in the office. means promoting it in every meeting, email, and call you and your team have with each other and the customer.
Hearing feedback from your customers not only makes them feel valued, it also makes them feel positive about your brand. good customer feedback generates positive reviews. bad customer feedback generates opportunities for improvement.
even difficult conversations with customers will be easier and more productive if the customer feels more comfortable. Encourage your agents to maintain this culture and you’ll receive real feedback that will help you and your team learn and improve performance.
4. set up a framework to measure your team’s performance
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Having customer service performance metrics to work with is the perfect way to set your team up for success. The only way to determine the correct Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) is to create a solid framework to guide you.
Based on the core competencies of your teams, you may decide to track:
- customer satisfaction scores (csat),
- negative response rate (nrr),
- reopening rate
- first contact resolution (fcr)
- mean time to resolution (art)
- employee engagement
Work with your team to determine what KPIs you’ll be tracking, and use these numbers to provide guidance on what activities to focus on.
5. set individual and team goals
Once you have your framework, you can determine what your team and each individual should accomplish. Let your agents determine and track their individual goals based on what the team agreed upon together.
Having your agents set their own goals allows them to take ownership of them and achieve them. This feeling of accomplishment translates into more engagement and increased productivity. Your team’s customer service performance goals then naturally align with company goals.
but this doesn’t necessarily mean they will achieve the goals you agreed upon. Tracking your performance (and having a culture of honesty and integrity) can help you support your team when a problem arises, so you can get through it together.
6. optimize manual processes
In many cases, streamlining processes can save you and your team time and reduce errors. One option is to use software built to reduce tedious tasks, calculate trends, or automate your reports.
With the extra time you get, you can focus on more important things, like training your team, evaluating data, or solving customer problems. Eliminating these manual processes can also encourage agents to adopt technology that increases their productivity.
7. set and communicate service standards
Simply setting goals is not enough to achieve them. Create a customer service quality assurance framework and make sure your team is on top of your expectations. Provide agents with a quality control checklist to detail what is most important when helping customers.
However you choose to provide quality feedback to your team, make sure it’s consistent, regular, and clear. this kind of transparency (see number ten below) will do wonders for your team’s overall success and motivation.
8. set up a training environment
Giving your customer support teams quality feedback is only half the battle. Sure, you can measure your performance: how long it took to answer a call or resolve a problem. But when issues do arise, having the ability to flag them and immediately report any issues can help your teams improve their customer service. often the ‘why’ and ‘how’ of your feedback is what makes it useful.
Counseling your teams on how to improve, rather than just telling them they’re not meeting their goals, helps motivate change. provides clarity.
Training is also vital to prevent those problems from occurring in the first place. Continuously training, coaching, coaching your customer service agents and giving them the tools to anticipate your customers’ needs simply improves your customer experience.
9. use an omnichannel customer service strategy
It’s important to create a sense of accessibility in today’s digital world, but it’s also crucial to make sure you’re not overburdening your resources to be everywhere. You can consider options like email, facebook, whatsapp and twitter to make the customer experience easier and faster. The first step in creating this accessibility is to figure out where your customers prefer to seek help and focus your efforts on those channels.
You can also create a place for customer self-service (css) to reduce the customer contact rate of your teams. For example, a FAQ page, help center, or community forum can help customers resolve issues without having to contact your CS team.
10. be transparent and provide feedback
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Transparency between your team combined with the regular supply of quality feedback will solidify the communication you have with each other. allowing each team member to see their numbers in real time will not only motivate them, but give them a sense of ownership.
Open communication also results in more efficient 1:1 meetings, as agents are no longer blind to their performance. this information allows them to be more productive, make quicker adjustments to their performance, and be prepared for conversations about their results.
11. use customer service performance management software
Technology can be intimidating to some. The most important thing with customer service performance management software is to ensure that it is effective and easy to use. Choosing software can seem daunting at first, but once your computer is up and running, you’ll save a lot of time.
Of course, connecting you to the Kaizo platform will ensure that you’re set up for success. you’ll be able to create gamified tasks, monitor performance, provide remedial instructions, and improve quality control with ease.
12. create an attractive company culture
Creating an environment where your team members feel engaged can help increase employee happiness and reduce agent turnover. One way to do this is to gamify training and performance management.
By using gamification, providing productive feedback, and maintaining great relationships and communication with your team, you can ensure that your employees are engaged. this type of company culture leads to a better team spirit that translates into better performance and more satisfied customers.
13. set up an employee recognition and rewards program
maslow’s hierarchy of needs states that our fourth need after food, safety and love is esteem. this includes feelings of recognition, attention, trust, and the ability to achieve.
Create an employee rewards program to help your employees feel appreciated. Anything from a $5 gift card to announcing someone as Employee of the Month can boost confidence in themselves and the company. Also, do not underestimate the non-material and non-monetary recognition. for some, it could mean the difference between the bare minimum and a month of stellar results.
14. hire the “right” candidates
When thinking about how to improve customer service skills on your team, the starting point is hiring the right people for the job. one way to do this is to look for personalities and aspirations in interviews as well as skills because motivated people can learn what it takes.
It can be difficult to identify the best candidates, but gauging their empathy and problem-solving skills is essential to finding great customer service agents. the key? looking for people who live to help other people.
15. do it the first time
One of the best ways to achieve higher performance is to solve all customer problems the first time. Calculating and tracking your First Contact Resolution (FCR) score will help you understand the importance of spending more time up front to provide a quality response the first time.
Often, leaders spend more time focusing on speed of resolution than actually solving the problem. Ultimately, this leads to a much higher reopen rate, thus negating all your efforts.
further reading: 12 Essential Customer Service Metrics & kpis + how to apply them
start improving your team’s customer service performance
There’s no single answer to the question, “What’s the key to great customer service?” but combining these strategies will allow your team to work together and help each other, which can dramatically improve your business. results. Creating a strategy, setting customer service goals, and involving your team in the process help foster the teamwork necessary to succeed. make it part of your culture and lead by example to motivate agents.
No matter what process you choose, what kpis you measure, or how you motivate your team, your company expects the best. you can come prepared with kaizo solutions to save the day and ensure your team is aligned all at once.
See also: How to improve customer service and win big with customers
