The Magic of Customer Service

Gladly Team

Read Time

6 minute read

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It’s not witchcraft — it’s customer service! Effective, personal, and empathetic customer experience strategies have the power to shape lives, businesses, and even entire industries. And now more than ever, in light of the sheer volume of traffic moving through ecommerce sites, companies and their service representatives must perform daring and impossible acts before the eyes of millions in order to deliver a satisfactory customer experience.

Digital customer service is moving from an obscure concept reserved for the tech-savvy few, to a ubiquitous implement used by businesses everywhere. As a result, consumers expect more from their service interactions, and satisfaction is drawn from these experiences rather than simply whether or not they liked what they bought. But great service can win a standing ovation for your brand: over 80% of customers have said that they would make another purchase from companies with great support in place.

So how do you keep consumers bewitched by your brand? In the following paragraphs, we’ll give you some surprisingly non-magical pointers that will help you cast a spell on your audience using nothing more than great customer service.

Spells for Creating Magical Moments in Customer Service

Invite them onstage.

Every trick you might pull out of your virtual sleeve won’t mean anything to the customer if it’s not what they want or need. To deliver your best performance when it comes to a customer support strategy, you have to know what it is that your audience loves to see. So ask them to participate: this can be done through email, on-site survey, or social media polls. What is important to them in a customer service interaction? And what would make that interaction truly shine? This should be an ongoing conversation, as well. Demonstrate to your audience that you are invested in their experience by soliciting regular feedback, and do your best to implement it and fix any problems as quickly as possible.

Implement service at the speed of light.

Fast, informative, and helpful inquiry responses are an all-too-easy way to wow your audience. In Gladly’s Customer Expectations Report, it showed that customers indicated  quick resolution as the top reason for rating a service interaction as “great.” Which makes sense: customers don’t like to be kept waiting. The reigning expectation is that inquiries will be taken care of with as much expedience at night and on the weekend as during a standard weekday. And if that’s all it takes to impress your customers, why make them wait?

Never miss a special occasion.

It’s all too easy for business – customer relationships to feel sterile, boring, and by-the-book. A simple spell to help your audience connect and engage with your company is to surprise them with small gifts such as promotional items, personalized exclusive content, cards, or discounts. Whether it’s birthdays, half-birthdays, national holidays, or obscure events like Bat Appreciation Week, offer your audience an extra special and personalized treat to let them know you care. (If you’re a tea company, why not send your loyal customers an un-birthday gift of a box of their favorite leaves?)

Let them put their cards back.

One aspect of customer service that even the professionals dread is the return and exchange touchpoint. Awkward at best, impossible at worst, all too many barriers exist in the returns department which have the potential to damage your relationship with a customer. The fact is that online purchases are inherently risky, especially from first time customers. Upwards of 30% of online sales result in returns or exchanges, whether that’s due to issues with size, color, material, etc., etc. Businesses should expect, and welcome, these customer interactions and make the returns process easy and intuitive for the customers: it’s guaranteed to foster a sense of trust, and keep your audience returning.

Make the risks not-so-risky.

As mentioned in the previous section, online purchases can be a bit of a gamble. Something might not fit, the color might not be right, or the product itself may just not be what the customer wanted. You can go out of the spell book to address this issue, depending on what business is like and what products you carry. Popular eyeglasses brand Warby Parker mitigates the risks of buying glasses online by sending 5 pairs of frames to their customers, which they can physically try on before choosing which piece they prefer. And if they don’t like any of them, Warby Parker won’t charge them a dime for the return of all five frames. There is no risk whatsoever to the customer, and it makes doing business with WP a wondrous experience.

Use Gladly.

What’s more magical than a brand that remembers your name? Gladly is a comprehensive customer support solution designed to deliver radically personal customer service. Gladly integrates omnichannel contact methods which are assigned to the customer, and not the ticket, so they never have to ask the same question twice. Support representatives have access to the consumer’s unique customer profile which is packed with personal information based on their previous purchases and inquiries. This enables them to deliver a positively magical customer experience, every time.

Last Thoughts: The Magic of Customer Service

Customer service, more often than not, is simply applied common sense. But give your customers the treatment they deserve, with a few special surprises sprinkled in, and the results can be magical.

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