What is good customer service?

What is good customer service? It’ll differ from business to business, but there are some core principles everyone can follow.

Here we run through what makes good customer service in the 21st century, as well as how to improve customer service.

What is customer service?

The dictionary definition of customer service is the assistance and advice provided by a company to those people who buy or use its products or services.

So, if you’re a small business owner with clients or customers – and you have employees who interact with those clients or customers – then you’re undoubtedly giving some form of customer service.

And increasingly, people expect more from the businesses they support. Research from Salesforce, a customer relationship management (CRM) software company, in 2020 revealed that customers now expect businesses to go beyond the basics like quality service and fair prices.

Their expectations now include, for example:

• connected interactions – the same quality service in-store, over the phone, and online, with consistency throughout each interaction
• personalisation
• innovation
• trustworthiness – great data protection processes, for instance

So, what is good customer service?

Armed with a definition of customer service, as well as what today’s customers want from businesses, let’s look at what makes good customer service.

Some of the core principles of good customer service include:

1. Being friendly and courteous

We’ve all been in this situation – you go into a shop and are greeted with a couple of mumbled words, no hint of a smile, and blank faces in response to a question.

We all know that people can have off days, but being friendly and courteous is one of the most important factors that makes good customer service, in person, online, and over the phone.

This doesn’t only involve smiles, it also means showing professionalism and respect for your customer. For example, if you run a shop, you can respect your customers’ time when queues form by being more urgent and apologising for the wait.

2. Rewarding loyalty

Repeat customers will be some of the most enthusiastic about your business, so it’s important to encourage loyalty. By retaining long-term customers you’ll have a lower ‘churn rate’, which will help to keep your finances stable and increase your chances of becoming a growth business. It also helps you create an identity for your business that people will remember and think positively about. Tesco Clubcard is one of the most well-known loyalty schemes, with shoppers getting access to lower prices if they have a Clubcard.

Lots of coffee shops also run loyalty schemes, giving their customers cards that get stamped every time they buy a coffee. After getting a few stamps, they get a free coffee. Can you implement a loyalty scheme like this in your business?

3. Personalisation

The Salesforce research mentioned earlier found that 52 per cent of customers expect offers to always be personalised. This is largely in relation to online interaction, but online expectations are increasingly spilling over into the real world too.

Can you use technology to personalise your customers’ experiences? For example, Tesco analyses data from loyalty cards and transactions to send personalised vouchers to shoppers.

If you run an online shop or business, it’s possible to look at a customer’s previous purchases and send them personalised emails and offers.

Forgetting technology, you can also personalise a customer’s experience in physical interactions – ask them about what they’re looking for, whether they need any help, and let them know you’re available if they need you.

4. Using technology

Technology lets customers get in touch with you quickly and easily. Email is a great place to start. But if you haven’t set up any social media accounts yet, not only are they great for marketing your business, they also help you build connections and rapport with your customers.

And looking at the Salesforce research again, connected interactions have become increasingly important. This means that if someone contacts a business through social media and then subsequently emails them, replies should be consistent and refer to what was said in each interaction.

The alternative is that interactions are ‘siloed’ – meaning the person dealing with the email doesn’t have access to what was said through social media, leading to repetition and potentially awkward communication.

5. Investing in your employees

If you have staff, you should focus on your business’s culture, making it a great place to work.

This will translate to the service they give to customers. While small costs now will impact your bottom line in the short-term, you should see spending on staff as a long-term investment.

Beyond offering a competitive reward structure (including pay, pension contributions, and benefits), think about hosting social events for your employees, and investing in their learning and development.

It’s also important to have a clear business mission that employees can connect with. If they identify with the mission, they’ll often want to give customers the best service possible.

How to improve customer service

Think about how to make the customer’s needs paramount – then work backwards. Apple’s founder, Steve Jobs, said that you should “start with the customer experience and work backwards to the technology.”

It might not always be obvious to see how to apply this to your small business. But if you’re just starting out, it could mean identifying potential customers as part of your market research and asking what exactly they expect from a business like yours.

New businesses can also use their business plan to discuss the service they’re going to give to customers. And tone of voice guidelines help you identify how you want to communicate as a business.

If you’re an established business, it might mean looking at all the ways your customers interact with your business, then working backwards to find out whether they’re getting what they want and need from your product, service and customer experience.

Here are ways to improve customer service:

Make it easy for customers to give you feedback

You can collect feedback through surveys, reviews and even by interviewing customers.

One way to do this is by handing out paper forms in store, offering incentives for completion – 10 per cent off their next purchase, for example.

You can collect feedback electronically too over email, social media, or by including polls on your website. There are also platforms like SurveyMonkey that make collecting feedback easy.

And be sure to monitor online reviews on sites like Google and Trustpilot. They’re a great source of feedback, but people can be more likely to leave a review if they’ve had a bad experience.

If your Google review score is being dragged down by some negative responses, why not balance this out by proactively asking customers who’ve had a good experience to leave you a review?

Listen to feedback honestly and openly

Once you’ve collected feedback, you need to do something with it – and being open to what’s been said will help you make positive changes and improve your customer experience.

Sort through the responses and identify common themes, working out a plan for how to tackle them. Are there any quick wins you can introduce now? And what problems need a longer-term plan to solve?

Listen to your employees

If you have employees, you can ask for their feedback about how to improve products and customer service.

Each employee will have a unique perspective on how to deal with customers, so it’s important for them to get their ideas heard.

This could be as simple as letting them know that you’re always open to new ideas, or introducing regular one-to-one sessions if you don’t run them already.

And be sure to coach and train your employees so they’re always building their knowledge of your product or service – and on what makes good customer service.

Give training for customer service

As mentioned above, if you have employees, it’s worth investing in their training. While training will vary depending on the type of customer service you give, there are some common processes you can introduce.

It’s worth thinking about:

• structured training for all new hires – are new employees all introduced to your business in the same way? If you establish expectations for customer service at this stage, your customers should receive a consistent experience from all of your staff
• teaching core customer service skills – you should be hiring for these in the first instance, but learning is continuous – consider how to foster empathy, positivity and clarity of communication
• crisis management – how your business responds to problems and emergencies can have a big impact on your reputation, both positively and negatively. Talk to your staff about how to handle various scenarios, potentially role playing different situations

Learn more about how to deal with customer complaints.

How to protect your customers

Business insurance can help you protect your and your customers. Public liability insurance, for example, covers you if someone suffers an injury or financial loss and blames your business.

The classic example is if someone slips and hurts themselves while on your premises – if your business is found to be at fault, public liability insurance can cover legal expenses and compensation claims.

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What do you think makes good customer service? Let us know in the comments below.