Yes, customer service skills are part of selling. Unless of course you don’t want additional work from the clients you already have.
Think of your clients as a mirror to what you give them emotionally. Your attitude toward them will impact future sales.
Let me make the easy point first: Your client’s attitude towards your company will mirror your attitude toward them as you serve them. Get the connection?
I was recently on the phone with three different customer service agents, all from big companies you would recognize. One of them infuriated me so much I’ll never do business with them again. Another was pretty indifferent, leading me to a similar indifference toward their company and its offering. The third was was so wonderful that in a surprisingly short interaction I became convinced that I absolutely have to keep working with them.
If customer service can determine the fate of future business, what made that difference? What made these interactions sucky, so-so, and ultimately superb?
You’d think it would relate to whether I got helped, or whether they seemed to know what they were doing, or whether I could understand what they were saying, but interestingly in all three cases the customer service agents were able to help me, and they all seemed to know their stuff. But I despised one, tolerated another, and loved the third enough to pledge future customer loyalty.
This sounds like a communication issue to me. So I made a little checklist of what I liked and didn’t like about the calls and darned if I didn’t create a very short list.
- Emotional Leadership: In all cases, the customer service agent had a substantial leadership role in the emotional tone of the conversation, but where they led me was different. “Sucky” and “So-So” weren’t aware of this, or they just didn’t care. “Superb” knew clearly that agent attitude would determine customer attitude, which made Superb’s job very easy and me more cooperative.
- Meet Me At The Bottom: Sucky and So-So agents had no interest in empathizing with me or my problem. They spoke only to the fix, adhering strictly to a matter-of-fact tone with no empathy whatsoever for my experience. The Superb agent took the time to be with me in the problem, and emotionally empathize with me. Superb knew that the first step to getting me up the mountain was to come down to the bottom and take my hand.
- Let’s Walk Up Together: Agent Sucky didn’t really want to help me. I could tell he knew how, but he just didn’t work very hard at guiding me to solve the problem, so I had to do the heavy lifting. That made me mad. On his own accord, Agent So-So offered the steps I needed to take, but he wasn’t too active in doing the fixing with me. He stayed on top of the mountain (where I wanted to be), and shouted down instructions about the path to get to the top. Agent Superb had already come down to the bottom where I was, so he walked up the mountain with me.
- Celebrate at the Summit: Only Superb bothered to celebrate the journey of the customer service climb. “Woo-hoo! Mr. Hyers, we did it!” That was a big deal in the emotional experience of having arrived at a good place – you wouldn’t want me to miss that I’d gotten what I wanted, would you? The Superb agent was really happy and summarized where we were, what we did, and where we ended up. Hmm. Sounds like story structure, doesn’t it?
When it comes down to it, there wasn’t much more than good communication behind three very different experiences. It’s what we coach and train in leadership and presenting. All three were successful for me in solving my problem, but only one of them was successful for them.
In review, what it took was: being emotionally positive, then being sure to put the context to the story of the customer service experience by meeting the customer where it hurts, and celebrating success with them. In the middle, walking the walk with them. As much as possible, trying to work side-by-side to solve the problem, or at least striving to create the feeling of solving the problem.
Of the four tips, I want to emphasize that by far, the first was the most impactful. Setting an emotional tone of happiness and interest is simply unbeatable. My successful agent had me at hello with a positive emotional tone. Eager. Certain. Interested. Happy. Hint: It’s what you gotta have!
I’ve been referring to customer service over the phone, but I want to stress that this isn’t limited to that. Every customer interaction you have – on the job, in person, when they call with a problem or show up pounding on your office door – is counting on these same things. Lead emotions upward. Meet them where they are. Walk together to a better place. And woo-hoo at the summit!
I’ll close with a final thought, which was the biggest surprise of all given that the successful agent did more for me than the unsuccessful agents did. The surprise? The call took about half the time that the unsuccessful calls took to get my problem solved. And it convinced me without a doubt which company I will be working with in the future. At the end of the call was a survey and I gladly took it. One of the questions was, “This customer service experience increased the likelihood that you’ll do future business with our company.” I hit “5″ for “Strongly Agree.”
This post series will continue with Customer Service Skills Are Part of Leadership? Watch for it!
There are some things you can control! Where you spend your HARD EARNED money. When a Big Box makes and error then their customer “DIS-Service” team makes you feel like its your fault! That tell me I am done with that establishment! Many americans are taught you have “RIGHT” you “DESERVE” you are correct you do have rights and you do deserve. But also along those lines you have a “RESPONSIBILITY” to treat everyone with KINDNESS and make sure you are doing the “RIGHT” thing. Own up to your mistakes… Don’t blame everyone else for them. Always give the service you want to receive! It’s not that hard!
It is quite true that when it comes down to it, the activity itself is really not that hard. You are correct. I’m not quite sure what is behind the tendency not to show kindness, interest, or own up to your mistakes. I suppose it’s a lot of things, like fear, like not feeling like it, like job dissatisfaction. But it’s certainly not because it’s hard.
My hope in writing this was not just to speak to the service you get on the phone, say for a product you bought, but also for us to think about the customer service we provide wherever we work. I co-lead a presentation training company, and customer service is a constant even though there’s no tech support, or the like. I still have to deal with customer’s issues, their evaluations, their request, etc., and it still requires that I lead the tone positively, meet them where they are, participate in them moving toward the better place, and help them recognize when they’ve arrived at the better place by celebrating with them. Thanks for the comment, and hopefully we can all see the customer service in every work activity we do.