Here are 5 simple ways you can make your customers happier. Most of them revolve around 2 simple things: treating them well and going the extra mile whenever you can. To show that we practice what we preach, this list of 5 items is followed by 3 bonus ideas to help build and solidify customer relationships.
#1 – Smile
Research has shown that when people smile at you, you tend to smile back. Oddly enough, this often happens in non-visual mediums as well, including telephones and even email. What this means is that if you have a smile on your face, customers tend to feel it and this helps build rapport.
#2 – Speak Clearly
In a multicultural society like ours, this becomes even more important. When dealing with customers, especially on the phone, try slowing down your speech and focus on enunciating clearly. Many a customer service representative has benefitted from a few hours of voice coaching to learn to speak more clearly.
#3 – Like People
If you don’t genuinely enjoy being around people, customers will sense it. Lackluster engagements and indifferent attitudes are relationship killers.
#4 – Know Your Product
This is the mantra of sales organizations, but it cannot be emphasized enough. Beyond that, though, you should also know your customers’ uses of the service and potential ways that the customers’ businesses can be enhanced with your service. Think beyond the sales brochure and individualize whenever possible. That leads us to our last point.
#5 – Have Leeway
You should always have some wiggle room and leeway to meet your customer’s needs. If you can personalize or customize your service in some way to meet the needs of your customers, individually, you’ll make more sales. If you sell widgets and wizzbangs and your customer needs a widgbang.. make one.
Bonus!
To build customer relationships you should do the following 3 things every day, at every customer interaction.
1 – Be courteous, friendly, and useful. The last point is key. Being courteous and friendly is great, but being useful to someone is valuable.
2 – Be human. Do more than just talk with your customers or take their orders, try to build in opportunities for face to face meetings for you and anyone on the support team. This helps personalizes things and build loyalty on both sides.
3 – Go the extra mile when thanking customers for their business or going the extra mile. A customer who refers another customer or who works to accommodate something unexpected should be acknowledged and rewarded. A little thing like a thank you card goes a long way to showing appreciation.