Marketing
2.01B - EXPLAIN THE ROLE OF CUSTOMER
SERVICE AS A COMPONENT OF SELLING
RELATIONSHIPS.
Customer Service
DISTINGUISH
BETWEEN PROCESS
OR FUNCTION
Customer Service Process Flow
 Provides the overall structure providing a
consistent set of processes to record and track user
contact.
 When a customer contacts the business’s Service
Desk, the Customer Service Representative (CSR):
Records the user’s contact information and the details
of the request.
 Classifies the user’s request.
 Determines the supportability of the request.
 Resolves the user’s request.
 Confirms the resolution and closes the request.
 Ensures good service

Customer Service as a function
 A department or function of an
organization that responds to
inquiries or complaints from
customers of that organization.
Customers may communicate in
person or via written
correspondence, & toll telephone.
Customer service as a process
 Requires step by step instructions
to follow a specific system.
Customer service as a function is
broader than a process. It is a
governing philosophy that
oversees the business as a whole.
Customer service to beat competition
 There’s no real secret to keeping
your customers or getting your
customers to come back. All you
need to do is provide customer
service that exceeds your
customers' expectations and
outshines your competitors'
customer service.
1) Determine what makes what you offer
special.
 Study the competition.
 Think about their customer service
and the customer service you provide.
 can you offer your customer that is
“better” than the competition?
 There are sure to be aspects of your
customer Service that you can
promote as “Special”.
2) Study the customer service ideas on your
list and examine their feasibility.
 Can you really guarantee that you
will always stick to your written
estimate or provide a faster
turnaround time than your
competitors?
 If you aren’t sure, or can’t do it,
cross it off your customer service
ideas list.
3) Choose one or two of your shiny customer service
ideas and implement them.
 This doesn’t just mean do it; you also
need to let people know that you’re doing
it.
 Feature this aspect of your customer
service in whatever ads you run, including
your yellow pages listing.
 Put it on your business cards and in your
email signature.
 Make it part of your greeting spiel when
you answer the phone.
4) Stay proactive and keep gathering
customer service ideas.
 Neither Sears nor Sleep Country Canada have achieved
their success by doing the same thing for the last thirty
years, or by simply reacting to customer complaints.
 Listen to your customers and find out what kind of special
customer service they want.
 You can do this formally, by creating a customer
satisfaction feedback form that you enclose with every sale
or post on your website, or informally, by asking them for
their customer service ideas when they're in your store or
office. Shiny customer service is service that’s responsive to
customers' needs.
Customers are tired of dealing with….
 retailers that ignore customer
service or only pretend to have it,
and as always, they’re voting with
their dollars.
 Shiny customer Service will draw
customers to your product or
service, rather than a competitor,
and bring them back in droves.
Factors that influence customer
expectations
When I’m a Customer, I Want…
 To be taken seriously
 To be informed of the
 Knowledgeable help
 Competent, efficient service 
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 Friendliness
 Anticipation of my needs

 To be kept informed

 Explanations in my terms
 Follow-through

 Basic courtesies
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 Honesty
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options
Feedback
Not to be passed around
Professional service
To be listened to (and
heard)
Empathy
Dedicated attention
Respect
Customer service and sales relationships
 It seems to be a universal, ever-present, nagging
concern – how do I present myself in an authentic,
effective manner that makes me feel comfortable
and accomplish my sales goals all at the same
time?
 Here’s how to create an authentic and powerful
transformation. Move from your worried
perception of yourself as a sales persuader
targeting a victim with money, to a professional
consultant whose goal is to partner with a
customer to help fulfill their wants, needs and
desires. Sounds better already, doesn’t it?
5 key elements of a professional, comfortable,
consultative relationship
Honesty and Candor
Peer-Level Perception
Patience to Allow a Relationship
to Develop
Respect
Trust
Honesty and Candor
Communicate clearly what your
product or service can and
cannot provide, even in the face
of losing the customer’s
business.
Peer-Level Perception
Present yourself as a colleague;
a peer who is jointly evaluating
with the buyer, whether a
business relationship will be
mutually beneficial.
Patience to Allow a Relationship to Develop
Sometimes you can hit it off
immediately with someone;
other times it can take months
for the relationship to develop.
It’s ok to let time take its course.
Respect
Although you may not be
friends, respect what the buyer’s
values and intent are, and the
buyer will respect your
approach to business and your
professionalism.
Trust
Hold the perspective that you
will sell to the “right” buyer.
Trusting that true needs will be
served, if the buyer is a good fit
it will keep you relaxed and
enjoying the process.
Pre-sales opportunities, customer service, and sales
relationships
 Does pre-sales' and post sales'
customer service mean anything to
you?
 It should mean a lot to anybody in a
business relationship.
 Customer service leads to customer
satisfaction.
 Customer satisfaction determines the
life and death of ANY company.
Presales
 All the effort needed to prepare to make a sale.
This includes the research and planning those sales
people go through or the marketing that companies
employ.
 The primary focus is to identify the clients’ needs so
they can offer a solution.

 Presales is a process or a set of activities normally
carried out before a customer is acquired, though
sometimes presales also extends into the period
the product or service is delivered to the customer.
In a typical sales cycle the stages are:
Contact
Lead / Suspect
Prospect / Opportunity
More on Presales
 The task of a presales person starts from the initial contact phase
and often ends once the customer is acquired i.e. sale is made.
 In some cases, presales also provide some initial or transitional
support post sale.
 The role of presales falls right in the middle marrying the customer
needs to the (provider) company's services or products.
 The presales professional understands what the customer needs,
develops an initial view of the solution the customer needs, then
tailors the product or service of his company to meet what the
customer needs, explains (or helps sell) this solution to the
customer, helps close the deal or sale and often stays on to ensure
that the delivery team or product specialists that follow him provide
the intended solution.
More on Presales
 Company can maintain data about customers and generate mailing
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lists based on specific customer characteristics
Marketing activities such as tracking customer contacts, including
sales calls, visits, and mailings
Customers can get pricing information about the company’s
products Through an inquiry or a price quotation
Salespeople study their products, keep abreast of industry trends
and competitors, research potential customers, and develop
familiarity with their company’s policies and procedures.
Self-evaluation by reviewing actions through the sales process and
identifying actions that results well and results poorly
Review ethical and legal issues surrounding the selling situation
Post-sales opportunities, customer service,
and sales relationships
 Post sales is the effort that
companies and sales people go
through after the sale to ensure
that the customer is happy and
build future business.
Support Post-sale activities
 The performance outcomes, skills and knowledge
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required to attend to post sale activities that build
and strengthen the partnership between a
salesperson and the client, and enhance the
prospect of future sales.
Process Order
Deliver Support to Agreed expectations
Handle client feedback
Strengthen client relationships
Offer additional benefits to Clients
Process order
 Record client order details in
accordance with organizational
policies and procedures
 Forward order for product to the
relevant section of the
organization
 Monitor the processing of the
order
Deliver support to agreed expectations
 Provide technical assistance and/or
advice in relation to the product
purchased
 Handle defective returns in accordance
with organizational requirements
 Provide information to facilitate product
repair, support or servicing
 Provide liaison services to assist clients to
access appropriate after-sales support
Handle client feedback
 Clarify and confirm feedback with clients
 Determine client's needs and requirements
 Identify and evaluate possible responses to
client feedback
 Respond to client needs and requirements in
accordance with organizational policies and
procedures
 Make contact with client to ensure the
response is satisfactory
Strengthen client relationships
 Ensure contact is made with the buyer
post-sale to ensure agreed
expectations have been met
 Use feedback solicitation methods on
the sales process and product
satisfaction
 Identify, address and resolve service
problems and difficulties identified
through feedback
Offer additional benefits to clients
 Develop and implement client loyalty
strategies to secure buyer loyalty and to
facilitate ongoing contact
 Contact buyer regularly post-sale at an
appropriate level to maintain relationship and
to identify new sales and cross-selling
opportunities
 Offer additional sales solutions and benefits
to clients when opportunities arise
 Salespersons maximizing from the customer
service activities
Four phases of the cultivation of customer
relationship:
 Prospecting
 Acquiring
 Servicing
 Retaining
9 Sales Activities to Take This Week To
Improve Your Results
 Call and Thank Your Largest Client
 Maybe your largest client gets plenty of attention. Maybe they demand plenty of
attention.
 Call three contacts at your largest client this week to thank them for their trust.
 Call a Client to Schedule and Unscheduled Review
 Formal, scheduled reviews are a wonderful way to work with your clients to
continuously improve. But there is no reason to wait for the calendar to change to sit
down with your clients, even if a review is imminent.
 Call one client and schedule an unscheduled review. Find out what you can do to
improve your service between now and the next scheduled review.
 Review and Analyze Your Wallet Share
 Make a spreadsheet with four columns. In column one, make a list of your clients by
name. In your second column, make a list of how much they have spent with you this
year. In the third column, add the amount you believe they spend in your category.
 In the fourth column, divide column two (the amount they have spent with you) by
column three (the amount you believe they spend). The result in column for is your
wallet share. Just stare at the list and let the numbers sink in for a while . . . when the
pain is too much to bear, move on to number 4.
Steps 4-9
 Schedule to Review Your Performance with Low Wallet
Share Clients

Schedule appointments with your highest value, lowest wallet share
clients. Visit them with the sole objective to listening to them talk about
you, your business, and your performance. Find out what makes you
hard to do business with so that you can make the necessary adjustments
and sell the changes inside.
 Schedule an Unscheduled Visit with You Sales Manager
(Or Sales Person) to Strategize on Dream Clients and/or
Wallet Share
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You don’t have to wait until you have a scheduled meeting to work with
your team on improving your performance. Schedule a meeting with
your sales manager to discuss ways in which you might move some of
your dream clients into the pipeline. If you are a sales manager (or a Vice
President of Sales), schedule to meet with a salesperson to brainstorm
how you might help them move a dream client.
Also, this is the perfect time to talk about your Wallet Share report.
Steps 6-7
 Take Two Non-Sales Members of Your Team to Lunch
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To succeed in sales (or anything else), you need to build relationships. The relationships on
the inside of your company are every bit as critical to your success as the relationships you
develop outside your company.
Identify two members of your team with whom you need to develop a closer, more effective
relationship and take them to lunch (yes, you have to pay for their lunch . . . we are courting
them like we would a client!).
 Write a Public Letter (Or Email) of Appreciation for Your Non-Sales (but
Still Essential) Team Members
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We win deals. But that endeavor, no matter how it might seem, is the result of the work of
your whole team. Don’t believe me? You know those letters of reference you carry around in
your binder? You don’t really think those are about you alone, do you?
You received the credit for the win. You received the public accolades. You are receiving the
commission. You aren’t doing all of the work. Write a very public email thanking your team
for their work on a single account. Choose the account for which you will publicly praise their
work based upon how much it stretched the whole team.
Let them know that their work means the world to you and your client . . . it does! (Less than
two paragraphs isn’t thoughtful enough and more than three means they will know someone
put you up to it)
Steps 8-9
 Make Your Pipeline a Work of Fact—Not Fiction
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Your pipeline is full of client names that aren’t in any way, shape, or form
real opportunities that you should be pursuing. Review your pipeline with a
fine-tooth comb. Remove any opportunities that are no longer
opportunities—and remove the entries that never were really opportunities.
It is likely that you will have a much narrower list of opportunities, but that
the opportunities you have left will be ones that you have a possibility of
winning. If you want a bigger list of opportunities, you must prospect.
 Make a List of Dream Clients (And Call Them)
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This is old advice for readers of this humble blog. But it is still rock solid.
Dream clients are the prospects for who you can do breathe taking, aweinspiring, results-transforming work. If you have not made this list, do it
now!
Make a list of the prospects that fit the above description. Then make a list of
reasons you believe you can do drop dead, magnificent, game-changing work
for them. Then call them and share what you have been thinking about.
Nurture these relationships!
Conclusion
 Your sales manager doesn’t measure
all of the activities that you must take
in order to succeed in sales. Some of
the most important performanceimproving activities aren’t measured
at all. Complete these nine activities
this week; they won’t show up on your
reports, but they will show up in your
results