Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Lesson Goals:
• Realize the relationship between customer
service and customer satisfaction
• Identify qualities of excellent customer service
• Learn how to handle difficult customers
• Enhance communication skills
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Is 99.9% Good Enough?
• 5,516,200 cases of flat soft drinks
• 2 million lost documents
• 811,000 faulty rolls of film
• 12 babies given to wrong parents
• 1,312 calls misplaced per second
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Service Statistics
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Only 37% of brands received good or excellent
customer experience index scores in 2012. 64% of
brands got a rating of “OK,” “poor,” or “very poor”
from their customers.
Poor customer experiences result in an estimated
$83 billion loss by US enterprises each year
because of defections and abandoned purchases.
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89% of consumers began doing business with a
competitor following a poor customer experience.
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Customer power has grown, as 73%of firms trust
recommendations from friends and family, while
only 19 % trust direct mail
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Service Statistics
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Over 60% of customer service managers select customer satisfaction as
the key metric for determining the success of their support organization.
Secondary priorities include first call resolution, average handle time, and
wait time.
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86% of consumers will pay more for a better customer experience.
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Only 26% of companies have a well-developed strategy in place for
improving customer experience.
$289 – Average annual value of each customer relationship lost to a
competitor or abandoned.
US consumers prefer to resolve their customers service issues using the
telephone (90%) face to face (75%), company website or email (67%),
online chat (47%), text message (22%), social networking site (22%).
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Why Customers / Clients Stop Doing Business
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1% die
3% move away
5% other reasons
9% competition
14% don’t like the product or service
68% indifferent attitude of sales people
Around 95% of the customers that leave will not
tell you when or why, they just leave.
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Customers Evaluate Service Quality on Five Points
• Reliability
• Assurance
• Tangibles
• Empathy
• Responsiveness
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Reliability
• Perform and live up to promises
• Dependable
• Accurate
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Assurance
• Trust and confidence in you
• Possess required skills and
knowledge to perform the job well
• Answer questions
• Product knowledge
• Listening skills
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Tangibles
• Quality in what can be seen or felt
• Physical facility
• Equipment
• Staff
• Letters
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Empathy
• Caring and individualized
• Available when customers need help
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Responsiveness
• Willingness to assist customers
• Prompt service
• Resolve problems quickly
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Barriers to Effective Listening
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Listening with “half an ear”
Acting as the judge and the jury
Tuning in and tuning out
Turning off ideas you don’t agree
with
• Jumping to conclusions
• Emotional and physical health
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Ten Tips for Effective Listening
1. Stop talking!
2. Put the customer at ease
3. Pay attention to nonverbal
language
4. Listen for what is not said
5. Know exactly what the other person is saying
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Ten Tips for Effective Listening
6. Be aware of “tune out” words
7. Concentrate on “hidden” emotional meanings
8. Be patient
9. Hold your temper!
10. Empathize with the Customer
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Telephone Reminders
• Greet the caller pleasantly and
promptly
• Identify yourself and your
department to the caller
• Use the caller’s name
• Every call is an important one
• Stress what you can do, not what
you cannot do.
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
More Telephone Reminders
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Take the time to be helpful
Say, “please,” “thank you,” and “you’re welcome”
Keep all your promises; return calls promptly
Treat all callers as customers
Treat all customers as friends
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
More Telephone Reminders
• When leaving messages, always leave your first
and last name and your telephone number
• Do not leave a caller on hold for more than 20
seconds without coming back on the line
• Always ask “Is there anything else I can do for
you?” before you say goodbye
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
When a Customer is Angry
• Don’t argue
• Listen carefully
• Apologize and use
reflective communication skills
• Show empathy
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Service Related Phrases
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
When a Customer is Angry
• Thank the customer
• Make restitution
• Do what you promise
• Follow up
• Give them something
Gaining the Customer Satisfaction Edge
Rewards for Excellent Customer Service
• Increased customer loyalty
• Positive word-of-mouth
promotion
• Happier customers
• More productive and happier employees
• Smoother working operations
• Increased intangible competitive advantage