Top 10 Customer Service Blunders

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Quality customer service can help bring new customers and retain old ones. Avoid common customer service mistakes, and you may strengthen your position in a competitive market.

1.Untrained staff. It does not matter whether you have two or 200 employees, you must train everyone in the art of customer service. Customers and clients will not tolerate rudeness, incorrect information, or apathy on the part of your staff. Not training the staff — and this should include everyone — is a major mistake made by too many businesses.

2.Trying to win the argument. It is worth remembering that it takes five times more effort and cost to gain one new customer as it takes to maintain one current customer. Therefore, to win an argument and lose a steady customer, you are punishing your business.

3.Inaccessibility. If you want to see repeat business, you need to be accessible to your customers. If it is difficult to contact the customer service department or speak to a manager, customers may not return. Many businesses, especially on the Internet, try to maintain a distance from their customers. This rarely works. Check out Online Customer Service Basics for tips on a positive online customer service experience.

4.Standing by your policy. While the clerk who is scared that he or she may lose their job can say "That's our policy," customer service representatives and managers should be able to find ways to bend policies to build customer relationships. The phrase "If I do that for you, I'll have do to it for everyone," is one of the fastest way to lose customers.

5.Unfulfilled promises. If you promise a customer that something would be ready by Thursday, then it should be there by Thursday. When you cannot make this happen, do not make excuses; the only words you need to remember are "We're sorry," backed up by an extra effort to make the customer happy.

6.Poor record keeping. If you keep referring to Mrs. Johnson of Jackson Avenue as Mrs. Jackson of Johnson Avenue, you can be sure that she will not continue to do business with your company. While any business can make a mistake, constantly misspelled names and similar foul-ups do not encourage regular customers to return.

7.The runaround. When someone calls for customer service, they expect a service representative to be the first or second person to whom they speak, following a receptionist perhaps. People do not like being passed from one person to another or sent from one department to another in a retail location. Passing the buck is akin to passing the customer on to your competitor.

8.Email/online cop outs. Since email is impersonal, many businesses send a form letter or a programmed response that answers 10 common FAQs, none of which may apply to a particular customer. Other businesses simply ignore customer complaints hoping that the customer will simply forget the issue. These are email cop outs, or excuses for not providing adequate customer service. It is very simple for a customer representative to respond to each inquiry in a timely fashion.

9.Failure to listen. Customer service representatives routinely do not listen closely to customers. Typically they respond with an answer that does not match the problem because they were not paying attention. Customer relation representatives need to be trained, particularly in the art of listening and even taking notes.

10.Forgetting the basics. "Please," "thank you," "we're sorry about the inconvenience," and so on are simple phrases that cost nothing, take little effort, and win big points.




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Top 10 Things Customers Don’t Want to Hear

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Thinking about the words you and those you work with use when you talk with current and potential customers. Sometimes chances are very good that sales people who talked with you about their product or service used language that either surprised you, bothered you slightly, or infuriated you so much that you vowed not to do business with them again. What are you saying that offends buyers? What should you be saying instead? Here are ten of the most common language blunders, with the comments you and your people should be making instead:

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Marketing Business To Business Websites

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Website Information Is Required.

The number one thing required in a business to business website is to provide pertinent information for customers and future customers to find via the search engines online.

While e-commerce B2B websites must be focused on providing an easy means of order taking and checkout, and also secure shopping carts, there are large numbers of businesses that sell to other businesses in which true e-commerce is not a factor. These business websites that are structured for information, marketing, and advertising purposes, are really about how well the information is marketed online.

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Businesses in Developing Countries can’t Afford to Ignore Global Trade Talks.

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International trade agreements are reshaping national laws on where and how companies can trade. Whether we speak of agriculture, services, textiles and clothing, intellectual property or other topics, WTO agreements dominate the international trade arena. WTO member states — 148 so far — are even now refining a set of global trade rules.What’s more, bilateral and regional agreements add layers of complexity to the environment in whichbusiness has to make decisions.

Businesses in developing countries have not made their voice heard enough in the trade negotiations that lead to these rules. And often they are not satisfied with the results. Governments have sometimes agreed to trade rules that hinder their firms’ ability to do business. Their most important exports don’t reach enough foreign markets, while their local markets are open to competition for which they were not prepared.

Negotiators need the views of business. They have many policy options to assess and their teams are often small. It’s not easy to analyse the business implications of market access barriers, influence international standards or evaluate the impact of different trade proposals on exporters. Nor is it possible if business and government do not work together.

There has been little tradition of “business advocacy” in the South. As global trade talks continue to shape the business environment, exporters and governments in the developing world must learn to work with one another to improve market access and obtain special conditions for their firms.





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Establishing an Effective Customer Service Team

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Customer service is the front line of any business. Staff in this area are very important and should be carefully selected. Initial training is invaluable. A small investment at the beginning will pay dividends in the long run. Below is advice on how to establish an effective customer service team.

Always Select staff carefully and screen. There are thousands of motivated person out there who are willing to give all they’ve got to make a customer’s contact with your business as enjoyable as possible. Take time to recruit and if necessary pay a recruitment agency to select new staff for you. Experience is not always the best indicator of aptitude – attitude and vocation are everything.Interestingly, women are often selected for exclusively telephone-based work. This is a sound practice, since studies have shown that women absorb a customer’s frustration better and are less likely to provoke anger or aggression, or respond to it.

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How to Earn Your Customers Trust

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When agents claim they didn't earn the sale they thought they deserved, the reason is often because the customer had more trust in another supplier. In order to land most sales your client has to trust you and your judgment. Don’t you generally work with the people whose judgment you can trust? Why, because you know that the job will be done right. The same goes with you and your customer. Your customer needs to know that you are going to do the right thing for them. They need to trust that care about them.

I know that seems like a heavy card to hold but it is not as complicated as you may think. You have to, of course, know your product, and then determine exactly what your customer wants out of your product. Next you have to tell your client how what you’re selling can positively relate to their needs. If you put their needs first that will show you care about them. Don’t you tend to put more trust in people who put you first? When shopping for my computer my sales clerk asked me everything I wanted in my new PC, and he listened. He didn’t show me any thing I did not ask for. When he recommended other features I might enjoy I trusted his judgment. Those are the type of salespeople I like to deal with. Don’t you? Be one of those salespeople.

The best way to put this into perspective is to treat your client as a friend or family member. You would never sell them something that they would not benefit from, would you? Another benefit to earning the trust from a customer is the credit they will give you. You will receive recommendations from that client. When you are recommended because of the trust a customer has in you, you win.




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