CUSTOMER SERVICE TO INCREASE CUSTOMER VALUE: BEST PRACTICE EXAMPLES

Customer service is another source of competitive differentiation for businesses and therefore, it should be enhanced to increase customer value. Consumers have access to an increasing number of customer service touchpoints; traditional telephone support, email, digital channels like live chat, social media and mobile. 

Delivering good customer service does not necessarily come cheap but as stated by eMarketer, consumers have demonstrated they are willing to pay more if a retailer acts in their best interest, helps them to get more value out of the products they purchase, creates convenient new ways to shop, and let them know when to expect delivery of an order.

As stated by SkillsYouNeed, we tend to remember positive and negative experiences more vividly than average day-to-day ones. It is essential to make every customer’s experience a positive one that they’ll remember and talk to others about. Nothing is more powerful than going out of your way to give a customer something that they were not expecting or anticipating from you. Every contact between customer and company is a new opportunity to create an unforgettable experience.

It is important to know which are the preferred touchpoints and improve them to deliver the best customer service. According to a study from eDigital’s Customer Service Benchmark, from all the customer service touchpoints available within a company, live chat has the highest satisfaction levels (73%), followed by email (61%) and app (53%). SMS (41%) and phone (44%) can be found at the bottom of this list. 

Given that customers appreciate it, and it has shown to be helpful as a sales driver, I can see the use of live chat becoming more popular in order to increase customer value.

As we can see, those companies that understand how to use the latest digital channels to help customers will be rewarded with loyal customers who spend more and advocate for the brand. No matter the size of your business, if you wish to increase customer value, it is important to provide good customer service to all types of customers, including potential, new and existing customers.

BEST WAYS TO DELIVER HIGHER CUSTOMER VALUE

When the customer perceives that a product is of a great value the willingness to pay a price premium increases, and again, we are not just talking about money. After searching several sources I made my own list of the 3 best ways to deliver higher customer value:

1. Personalization

With personalization we mean that the more personalized the experience, the happier the customer. Personalized marketing are messages and actions tailored to the visitor based on their previous viewing and purchasing behaviour. 

According to a study from the University of Texas, with personalization we feel more in control because we are getting something tailored to us, but also personalization can help reduce our perception of information overload. For example, when we know that certain product features have been tailored to us, it provides a higher level of engagement as we will be presented with the characteristics we were looking for. In short, personalization is an effective tool to create a closer relation between the company and the customer, increasing therefore, customer value.

2. Efficient Customer Service

A study by Zendesk found that consumers rank customer service higher than price to stay loyal to a brand. Such a statement should make every company aware of the importance of coming up with consistent multichannel approach, incorporating email, social and a call centre, but being present is just not enough. It is essential to have a proactive approach on every channel and the main objective is solve customer’s problems delivering value. In an ideal situation customers should end the conversation with the customer service team thinking that what started as a problem ended as something beneficial.

Having an efficient customer service is one of the pending subjects for the majority of companies in the market. In a bid to reduce costs many companies make it extremely difficult for customers to speak to someone on the phone and instead force people to get in contact via email or a web form. This damages the overall customer experience, and therefore diminishes customer value.

3. Storytelling

According to Zideate, an online site where marketing concepts are explained, storytelling is a marketing tactic based on the premise that people remember information better when it is told as a story rather than presented as a list of facts. The main reason for it is that, stories evoke an emotional reaction on the audience. Marketing campaigns that arouse an emotion response are more likely to be remembered even when the public is not interested in the product. The perceived customer value can be enhanced by using storytelling as a less obvious form of persuasion. The audience will be willing to pay more for the product as they perceived it of a high value because of the story attached to it.

Conclusion

There are many more ways available to improve customer value. After researching several sources I detected the above forms of delivering a higher customer value as the most used ones. I would like to deepen my knowledge in the following posts, so I will try to find best practice industry examples for each one of them.