How to Lift Your Customer Service

One of the things we’re constantly working on at Smartplan is customer service. We live to make our customers happy, so to speak, but we can always do better. Here are a few tips that we at Smartplan try to live by, in terms of customer service and contact:

• Get to know your customers – talk to them, find out how they feel about your product, what works for them and what doesn’t. We love to hear what our customers think and what they might be missing in the system. It’s important not to be afraid of hearing what people think, even though they might not share your thoughts.

• Don’t think too much about “the right way“ of contacting your customers. The important thing is making the contact – post a survey, email them or ask them, if they call you about something else. Most customers will appreciate the interest.

• This advice is in relation to the previous one; don’t be afraid of being annoying. Yes, some people might be annoyed when you contact them, but our experience shows us, that many actually appreciate the interest you show in them and the personal contact. It shows that you care about their experience with your product, and it gives them a chance to share their thoughts on the product.

• Don’t think of customer contact as a tedious obligation, but rather a chance to explain the features that your product possesses. People aren’t as familiar with your product, as you are. Therefore they might not get the full experience of using it, as they simply don’t know all the features. By frequently communicating with your customers, you increase the chance of detecting possible misunderstandings.

• You can’t satisfy everyone. However, you should definitely consider what your customers are saying. Optimally you should rank all of the suggestions, so that you get an overview of which you hear most often. Then you should consider how much it would cost and how much time would be spent on implementing the suggestions, and think about what you could achieve from implementing it. Maybe you’ll find that the suggestions could actually do something good for your product. In reality you probably don’t have time for making all kinds of lists and rankings. Most often we just listen to the suggestions, and it’s first when we see a pattern – hear them enough – that we write them down and discuss what we might do about them.

All in all, good customer service and customer contact can be the key to a successful business. And really, isn’t it logical that you should listen to the people that actually use your product? We think so, and we try to the best of our abilities to stay in contact with and listen to our customers.

These advises are inspired by Andrew Scharge’s advises on customer service as well as our own experiences with costumer service.