Small Business: Your Staff Can Create Seamless Customer Service If You Create The Concept and Lead.

By: Leon Noone Click author's name for more of his/her articles

Summary. In tough economic times, retaining current customers is essential. "Seamless" customer service will go a long way towards that. Your customers will judge the quality of your service on how they're treated by your staff. And regardless of all your lecturing, hectoring and exhortation, you won't change that.

What "Seamless": Means. "Seamless" customer service means that no matter how complicated the issue, the customer's distress is relieved and they enjoy doing business with you. "Seamless" also means the customer looks forward to doing business with you again.

Tell Your Staff. Let your employees know exactly what you mean by "seamless". Jargon without explanation is verbiage. And you need to ensure that "seamless" means to them exactly what it means to you.

Review Your Customer Contact Process. What happens when a customer or prospect contacts your business? Are they held in a queue listening to music, asked to wait and told how important they are, or do they get straight through to staff. who can help them? How long do they have to wait on the phone or in person? How quickly is their order processed and filled? Without exception do you absolutely insist that commitments and promises are honoured in full and on time? What follow up is there? How promptly and successful are complaints handled? These are just a few of the issues to examine. If you're not sure of the answers, the only way to obtain them is to ask your customers. Never guess or presume.

Set Clear Performance Standards for Service. You cannot provide "seamless customer service" without precise and crystal clear performance standards. Avoid fuzzy statements of intent. Words like "promptly" and "efficiently" are useless. If orders must be processed within 3 hours, say so.

Importance of Job Aids And Good Systems. Job aids and good systems are more effective than training. A simple, easy to follow list of actions is usually superior to elaborate training. Design systems that are easy for staff to follow and that satisfy customer needs. Eliminate systems that create delays and administrative confusion. Use scripts so that staff know exactly what to say and when.

Rewards Work. Use rewards and incentives to show that you're serious. Design your customer feedback process so that employees receive rewards when customer opinion merits them. Incentives also enable non sales staff to participate in record systems.

Involve Staff. Get your staff involved. Seek their ideas on making "seamless customer service" a reality. Staff deal with customers daily. They're the ideal people both to find out what customers expect and how to provide it.

Set Clear Objectives. "We'll provide seamless customer service when …" make a list of all the things that need to happen to create seamless customer service. Decide what is most important and what can be done to get started. Have a timetable and establish a system to measure progress. It's also useful to have a list of "no nos": things that must never happen when interacting with customers.

Conclusion. Seamless customer service is possible. Making it a reality may be difficult. But it is the foundation on which you can build truly breathtaking customer service that will leave your competitors gasping.

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About The Author: If you've enjoyed this article, you might like to read my FREE, 42 page Special Report, "5 Proven Methods For Improving Employee Performance On The Job". It's yours to keep. You'll also get a free bonus eBook about setting Performance Standards for employees. Just go to www.leonnoone.com and they're yours. I work with small-medium business managers to improve on job staff performance without using training.