Amanda Stillwagon As Chief Marketer for Small Business Trends, Amanda oversees online marketing, email marketing and social media marketing for the Small Business Trends group of sites.

17 Reactions
  1. The last one is a big one since most of the time, the employee is the person delivering the customer service, not the manager, or the vice president, or the owner/founder Even the most recent hire should know how to handle the problem or how to properly escalate it so it gets resolved.

    • Great point Robert! It’s important for the entire team to know the process for escalating an issue to get it resolved.

      And for customers who may not be comfortable bringing up an issue face-to-face (but often have no reservation leaving a scathing online review), gathering structured feedback is critical as well…

  2. The key is to really pay attention. Just be there and listen. Customers will usually talk about their needs and wants.

  3. Spot on not only on the steps but the premise of the whole article. Too many times I wonder if businesses realize that without customers they wouldn’t be in business. And to add to the “when a customer complains” I would say in a weird way be happy they took time to complain as many will just never do business with you again, and then your out of business never knowing why you lost all of your customers.

  4. To me the first and last points are the key. First you have to know how your customers are feeling about your business. Without it you are operating in dark. The last point about employee education is very important. Customer service is the responsibility of everyone, not just sitting at the top. If your field employees are not treating customers right not amount of corporate initiatives will make any difference.

  5. Educating employees should be the main priority for companies. Not only because it is essential for customer service, but it also gives employers the opportunity to learn about their employees. During training, managers can see which employee has excellent customer service and who could use a few lessons. All employees are different and it is up to management to decide who is best suited for the companies goals.

  6. I agree with Geoffrey, if it weren’t for the customers there would be no business. So customer service and satisfaction is a #1 priority. Treat each customer reaction as valid and important, no matter how insignificant it may seem on the surface. As well, all employees should know the service routine – keep the customers happy, talking and coming back.

  7. Great list .. The Scores on the Board system makes it easy for any business to do all 12 every day

  8. The key to success of any better customer service is creating a good rapport with customers, at the same time responding accordingly with new plans, when things are not in place.

  9. Very good list! We at Helprace also came up with our own set of customer service principles – all 20 of them 🙂 Check them out here: http://helprace.com/blog/20-modern-customer-service-principles-from-helprace