This is because it is not just an even but a process involving different things.

There are however several attempts at the definition of customer service.

It has been defined as the ability of a business or organization to meet customer needs and wants.

Another definition of customer service is treating customers well and meeting their expectations.

Whatever the definition of customer service is, it revolves around pleasing the customers and catering to their needs.

The Customer Is At The Heart of Any Definition of Customer Service

All businesses have become increasingly aware of the importance of good customer care for the sustainability and growth of their businesses.

Good customer care is seen as what distinguishes successful businesses from the not-so-successful ones.

Customer care has therefore become a central focus of businesses determined to retain their existing customers and attract potential customers.

The whole business from product development, sales and marketing are dependent on customers.

It follows therefore that decisions made should have the needs and wants of the customer in mind.

This is what customer service is about.

While sales and marketing campaigns may drive new customers to your business, it is the customer service they receive that brings them back to you.

One major reason customers switch allegiance is because they received poor customer service.

A positive customer experience has several benefits for the business.

It results in repeat business, you get customer loyalty, if customers are loyal they will be less sensitive to price changes, it created positive customer relations and it has a positive effect in staff morale.

For these reasons it is vital to focus on customer experience management.

Customer experience management can be greatly achieved by improving customer service.

How do you improve customer service?

The most important thing to do is to hire the right people for customer service.

Customer service staff should be friendly, patient, empathetic and courteous at all times.

They should also communicate well and have good problem solving skills.

Staff training will also help in having the right people for customer service jobs.

You should regularly keep in touch with your customers.

Find out their opinions and suggestions for improvement.

This helps you be more customer-oriented. It helps to see things through their eyes.

Find out if they are satisfied with your product or service.

It is a good idea to also send them occasion card.

This not only keeps you in their mind but also makes them feel important and appreciated.

Use customer feedback to make useful changes and create your own acceptable definition of customer service.

It is definitely a career that should be considered.

If you are looking for a customer service job, you should be prepared to attend a customer service interview.

During the interview the interviewers seek to determine your suitability for a customer service job.

They do this by asking some typical customer service interview questions.

The questions may seem hard but they also are trying to gauge how you react in a situation.

Here is a list of common customer service interview questions and their suggested answers.

1. What is the definition of customer service?

This question is to test your familiarity with the job you are interested in.

A possible answer to this question is – customer service is doing everything to ensure that the customer is satisfied.

2. How would you deal with an irate and dissatisfied customer?

This question is to find out how you would handle customer complaints.

Answer – I would listen calmly to the customer and wait for them to finish speaking.

When they finish speaking, I would apologize and ask them if I could make any reparations.

3. Give an example of how you solved a customer problem?

The aim of this question is to test your problem solving skills.

You should be able to come up with solution alternatives and then settle for the best solution.

4. Would you describe yourself as someone who would go the extra mile to ensure customer satisfaction?

You should provide proof of your readiness and willingness to handle difficult situations.

It is also an opportunity to demonstrate dependability.

You should demonstrate that you would put extra effort in providing better service to customers.

5. What would you do if a customer left without paying for their goods?

This question aims at finding out how you would deal with a problem.

6. What is more important, good service or a good product?

This is to test your priorities and knowledge of customer service.

A possible answer is that both are important.

Another answer could be that good service makes a product more attractive.

7. If a customer makes a request that is against company policy, what would you do?

This question seeks to test how you would handle a customer in this type of situation.

It calls that you are polite and courteous and explain to them why you cannot acquiesce to their request.

These are some (not all) of the most common customer service interview questions, use them to your advantage.

Customer relations can simply be described as the way a business relates to its customers.

It is the relationship between the two parties.

It can also be said to be how customers are treated by a business.

For business survival and for it to thrive, it is important to enjoy good customer relations.

This is for the simple reason that customers are your reason for being. You cannot exist without them.

There are many reasons for trying your level best to retain your customers.

For one, these are harsh economic times and every little bit, every customer, helps.

Because of the harsh economic times, customers are more discerning about what they are getting, they are also more aware about their right.

They need just a simple lapse in your customer service to look elsewhere.

Customer Relations Is About Personalizing The Way You Deal With Your Customers

Your customers are individuals and they should be treated as such in as far as it is possible.

Personalizing the shopping experience builds a positive feeling as the customers feel valued and important.

If customers feel valued they more often than not feel some sort of loyalty towards you.

Customer relations is not simply about customer service

It also has to do with the product or service being offered.

Businesses also have to try and produce a product or service that meets the expectations of the customers.

If customers feel like they got a raw deal, they will immediately get a negative view of the company and its product which is bad for the company.

Companies also try to build customer relations by marketing and advertising campaigns.

These let customers and potential companies be aware of what is on offer.

A company should get to know their customers in order to be able to build a positive relationship with them.

They need to find out what their customers want, their buying habits and such.

This in turn helps them create innovative solutions that will meet customer expectations and therefore enhance the customer relations.

The best way to find out about customer needs is to speak to them and ask them. This can be done through surveys.

The main benefit of good customer relations is an increase in sales.

Customers will buy more from you and tell others about you.

Customer relations however can easily be damaged by over-promising and under-delivering, selling sub-standard goods or offering poor service and bad pricing (over-pricing).

There are many definitions but customer experience can be described as the sum total of the interactions a customer has with a company and its product or service.

Customer experience is about what customer feel and think about the company and its product or service and its customer service.

It is also about what customers say about your company, product or service.

If customers have a negative customer experience at your hands, they will not buy from you again and they will tell others about it.

On the other hand, if they have a positive customer experience, they are likely to buy from you again and to tell others about it.

However, people speak more about bad service than good service.

This is the reason why customer experience management is of utmost importance.

Customer Experience Management Is Not Just About Good Customer Care

It is much more than that.

This is because customer service is only a part of customer experience.

In the beginning, companies were interested in customer experience management because they saw the potential of using customers as their brand advocates.

Managing the customer experience was seen to lead to customer satisfaction.

Satisfied customers become loyal customers.

Loyal customers then tell other people (potential customers) about the company and its product or services and this leads to the attraction of more customers.

Now, custom experience management is more customer oriented.

It is about giving customers the best possible experience, giving them what they want and expect.

In order for companies or business to effectively manage their customer experience, they need to look inward at their own processes.

This is aimed at finding ways to improve the customer experience at every step of the way.

An important thing to note however is that this should be done from the customer’s perspective.

There are several ways to improve customer experience and thereby manage the experience.

First, you need to get your employees in on this endeavor as it must have employee support.

You should create a good and positive work environment so that you have positive and committed employees.

Customer service staff should be properly trained about company products and also how to provide a positive customer experience.

The customer service representative is crucial in customer experience.

It is important to seek and listen to customer feedback. This feedback is useless if you do not act on it.

Use these customer experience management techniques to better your all around customer experience and reap the benefits of happy customers.

This is because companies have realized that the only way to distinguish themselves from their competition is to offer good customer service.

One of the main reasons that customer service has taken such a focal position is the increasing awareness of customer rights, the increasing competition and the customers need for value for their money.

If a customer feels that they did not get good customer service or were treated badly, they will not come back and it will be nearly impossible to convince them to come back.

To make it even worse, they will not hesitate to go out and spread the word to their friends.

This can cost a business a whole lot.

On the other hand, should customer have a positive experience, they will buy more and also tell their friends.

This is the power of word of mouth which any business should harness.

It certainly beat spending loads of money on advertising campaigns.

So what is good customer service?

There is simply no one definition of good customer service.

However, it is made up of several components.

For customer service to be deemed to be good you must deliver what you promise or even deliver more than you promised.

It also entails treating customers well, efficiently and in a friendly way.

You should be able to respond to customer enquiries promptly and with thorough knowledge of the product or service.

Customers should not be kept waiting too long for service or on hold on the telephone. You should be polite and helpful.

Good customer service also involves helping customer make the right choices.

Efforts made in customer service are aimed at building customer trust, loyalty and good customer relationships.

It is impossible to offer good customer service if your customer service staff is not well trained.

A company bent on offering excellent service should invest in customer service training.

Some of the benefits of customer service training are increased job knowledge and increased staff morale.

Staff are therefore better placed to deal with customers plus happy customer service staff more often than not provide better service.

It may be worthwhile too for companies to look into customer service software.

The software goes a long way in improving service delivery.

All businesses today claim to offer excellent customer service.

It is however important to actually provide good customer service, as actions speak louder than words.

The survey can be carried out as a face to face interview, a telephone interview or through an emailed or mailed questionnaire.

The survey should be able to provide useful information.

The information gathered from the survey is however useless if it is not used to improve customer experience and customer satisfaction.

The survey can also be used to measure customer satisfaction.

When designing the survey it is important to keep the customer satisfaction survey questions short, simple and as neutral as possible.

This way you are able to get more people to participate in your survey.

Here is a list of typical customer satisfaction survey questions

1. Which one of our services or products do you buy?

2. How long have you bought from us?

3. How often do you buy from us?

4. On a scale of 1 to 10 how would you rate your satisfaction with our product or service?

5. Will you continue to buy our product or service?

6. What in particular did you like about our product or service?

7. Would you recommend our product or service to your friends and family?

8. Any suggestions on how we can improve our product or service?

These customer satisfaction survey questions are usually for measuring customer satisfaction.

9. How satisfied are you with our customer service?

10. Were you satisfied with how we handled your complaint?

11. Were you offered a follow-up call if our customer service staff could not immediately resolve your problem?

12. How long did it take for us to resolve your problem?

13. How long did you wait on hold on the phone before you could speak to a customer care person?

14. On a scale of 1 to 10 how would you rate our customer service?

These questions are meant to measure customer service support and responsiveness.

15. Have you used our product or service?

16. How satisfied are you with it?

17. Have you used our competitor’s product or service?

18. How do we compare?

These questions are to get some sort of product review and to compare with competitors.

Other questions that may be included in the customer service satisfaction survey is in regards to age, gender, income level, location, mode of purchase (online or at the physical store) etc.

These questions are aimed at segmenting the different categories of customers in order to serve them better.

The customer satisfaction survey questions should mostly be multiple choice or on a scale, however, a few open ended questions are useful to get more information.

So how do you hang on to your customers?

The answer to this question is by simply providing excellent customer service.

While excellent customer service may not guarantee that your customers will not look askance to the competition, it sure puts you in the positionof putting up a good fight.

The Top Customer Service Tips

Here are some customer service tips that if implemented should give you a fighting chance at customer retention.

1. The customer is king.

This is one of the more common customer service quotes and it also serves as a customer service tip.

The customer is very important to your business, he determines your survival and should be treated as such.

The customer should be treated with dignity and respect.

You should also listen to them to find out what they want.

2. Listen to the customers even when they are angry and shouting.

Let the customer finish venting and when they stop apologize for any omission that may have been committed.

Do not compete with the customer as to who is right or wrong, just give the customer the benefit of the doubt.

3. Customer service quality is determined by the quality of the people offering it.

You should always hire the right people to do customer service as they are the direct contact with your customers.

Also, pay them well. If customer service employees are unhappy or unmotivated, it will show in their work.

Employees should also be treated the way you would like your customers to be treated, well.

4. Get to know your regular customers and well.

When they come in, greet them by name as this makes them feel valued and appreciated.

5. Go the extra mile for your customers.

If you exceed customer expectations, you are more likely to retain the customer.

Send thank you cards, or birthday and Christmas cards.

If they make a special request do what you can to make it happen.

6. Encourage your customers to give their opinions and thoughts on your product or service.

Ask them to make suggestions as to what you could do better.

This not only makes the customers feel valued but also helps gather useful information on how to better serve your customers.

7. You should always try to discover and anticipate the needs of your customers.

You can only do this if you get to know your customers.

Use these customer service tips and watch as your sales increase and your customer satisfaction goes up.

Not only do the customer service representatives maintain relationships, they are also expected to create or establish these relationships.

In a nutshell, they are responsible for ensuring that customer needs and wants are met.

The day to day duties of a customer service representative may vary depending on their work context.

The duties of a CSR (customer service representative) at, say a bank will be different from the duties of a CSR at a call center for instance.

However, the main similarity the different work contexts have is ensuring good customer relations.

The duties of a Customer Service representative may include:

1. Answering customer inquiries.

2. Providing customers with information on product or services.

3. Answering phone calls, emails or letters.

4. Transferring customers calls to the relevant departments.

5. Processing customer orders.

6. Attending to customer complaints.

7. Resolving customer complaints and disputes.

8. Discussing features of the company’s products or services with customers.

9. Compiling and maintaining customer records.

10. Supporting the sales team.

The CSR plays the role of the business representative.

Required Skills For A The Customer Service Representative

The customer service representative should therefore be very knowledgeable about the company’s products or services and should always present them in a positive light.

Most companies will train their customer service representatives in product knowledge, in how to deal with their customers and how to use their phone and computer systems.

A customer service representative should possess the necessary skills that are required for customer service.

They should be personable, have good interpersonal skills, excellent communication and listening skills, problem solving skills and great attention to detail.

The customer service representative should also be able to maintain their cool in a difficult situation, even at the end of a long day.

A CSR is required to be polite and greet customers appropriately whether on the phone or in person.

They should be able to offer timely response to customer queries and process orders efficiently and in a timely manner.

They are directly responsible for customer satisfaction and for customer experience.

Customer service representatives usually work in a team and by necessity should be team players.

Sometimes they are part of the sales team and their efforts often lead to the team meeting their sales targets or not.

A Customer service representative are also required to have tact, be sensitive, upbeat, positive and hardworking.

Excellent customer service entails more than just ‘service with a smile’.

It includes timely response to customer queries and complaints, fast but quality service and responsiveness to customer needs and wants.

The quality of customer service is how customers judge a business and not simply the quality of product or service.

The Best Customer Service Software

1. Comm100 –

This is an open source customer service software that is free.

This software is suitable for small to medium sized businesses looking for software that allows them to serve their customers well without breaking the bank.

One of the features of this software is to enable a business track the number of customers you have visited the business website, sent emails, customers who have used the chat function to talk to a customer care representative and many other functions.

This software basically helps businesses interact more with their customers.

2. SysAid CSS –

This is another free customer service and help desk software.

It comes with tons of features such as live chat, ticket management, email or text message alerts, report making and analysis tools.

The customer service software can be integrated with the business website and is completely customizable.

3. Smarter track –

This is a help desk software.

It is offered free for two months and then there is a license fee to be paid thereafter.

It features live chat, time logs, call logs, ticket management system and many other useful customer service features.

4. Sage SalesLogix –

This customer service software that has the typical bells and whistles found on any helpdesk software.

Its features include multi-language and multi-currency options, email tracking, live chat, reporting and customer management.

Some of its features are customizable.

5. Tracker –

This particular software is rated quite highly.

It allows logging of many support tickets, it generates reports, has call tracking, live chat, complaint monitoring and alerts.

It is also customizable.

One downside of this particular software is that it has a steep learning curve.

6. CustomerWise –

This is customer service software by TechExcel.

It is easy to install and is available on windows platform or web-based. It has a free 30 day trial.

7. IssueTrak Customer Support Software –

This can be used by both small and large businesses.

It features a queuing system, call and email tracking, call management and alerts.

There is a free online demo for this product.

8. Zoho Discussions –

The beauty of this particular software is the ability for a business to create its own customer support community.

It allows you to set up discussion forums for customers.

9. iSupport –

This is software by GWI.

It is a web based solution that is customizable.

Some of its features are call tracking, alerts, lead tracking integration and periodic reporting.

10. TeamSupport.com –

Also a web based solution and allows the creation of customized fields.

We hope you found this list of the top customer service software informative.

Billions of dollars are spent every year in marketing and advertising campaigns which are aimed at attracting customers to particular products and services.

After gaining the customers, the next thing to focus on is customer retention.

Customer retention is directly linked to customer satisfaction and loyalty.

If your customers are pleased with your product or service, that is you have met or exceeded their expectations, then they are likely to come back for more.

Not only are they likely to come back but they are also likely to tell other about you.

The positive word of mouth of current customers to potential customers is priceless.

Customer retention for many businesses is becoming increasingly difficult in the backdrop of harsh economic times.

Customer loyalty is easily forgotten over the best deal.

Businesses therefore need to be in touch with what the customers want and need and continuously try to meet their wants and needs.

A business should carry out a customer survey to find out what the current customer needs are.

They should also find out from former customers the reason they lost them to the competition.

This information will help in designing product or services that the customers want.

Customer care also plays a crucial role in customer retention.

Your customer care staff should therefore possess the right customer service skills in order to be able to handle customers well and efficiently.

It is also important to treat your staff well so that they can in turn treat customers well.

There are several strategies that can be employed to increase customer retention.

1. One thing you should do in order to retain customers is to provide excellent customer service.

This is the one thing that will distinguish you from your competition and have customers come back.

2. Loyalty programs are an excellent way to help you retain your customers.

This is a way to reward your customers for coming to you and not going to the competition.

Customers are encouraged to make repeat purchases and they will tell their friends about the benefits of purchasing from you.

3. Sending out customer satisfaction surveys to customers is also a customer retention strategy.

It not only lets you know what customers think and need, it also has the effect of making customers feel valued and appreciated.

Feeling valued is crucial for customer loyalty.

4. A good first impression is possibly the simplest customer retention strategy.

If a customer has a good first impression, you are likely to increase your customer retention.