In: Categories » Business » Customer services » Empowering the Customer
|
Loyal customers are confident partners in your company. As a partner, we feel that it is our duty to empower our customers with more than CRM solutions. We have to also empower them with problem-solving techniques that will allow them to fully understand the benefits of what we bring to the table. It’s a win-win situation – our value is better communicated and customers have confidence in their ability to maximize how well our solution works for them. A past goal at Firstwave was to reduce the number of support calls we received. Through surveys, we realized that many of our calls were the result of customers failing to use the help documentation and training manuals. So, we developed a new strategy, which has achieved two goals: reducing our support calls, and more important, empowering our customers with the ability to solve their problems. Our first tactic was to introduce a shift delay in our response to support calls. In other words, when a customer call comes in, their question is logged in to provide tracking and then directed to the most appropriate support manager. That manager then returns the customer’s call within five minutes and provides them with the answer. This process has multiple purposes. First of all, the most appropriate person contacts the customer. It shows our desire and care, and eliminates any room for error. Second, the waiting period has statistically and dramatically reduced the number of calls. In the past, people found that calling the support line would provide an immediate response, as opposed to having to look up the answer in the manual. By introducing the five-minute delay, customers would be more inclined to first find the answer in the manual. But, if they did not find the answer, or they chose not to look in the manual, we were able to get the most knowledgeable person on the phone. This helped us reach our goal and, more importantly, we helped the customers help themselves, resulting in increased confidence in our product. There is a definite danger in giving too much technical support and therefore not empowering the customer – this is human nature. Human nature states that a person will always want to show off how smart they are. Therefore, a support person or manager might tell a client to type in a lot of highly technical computer code (read: intimidating) to fix the problem, but that shows they didn’t have any confidence in the product. It is more important to show the product structure, and work through the product’s documentation, which has defined the answer. If the support person gives the client a “geek shortcut,” then the client becomes dependent on the support staff. The staff member, on the other hand, thinks he’s doing the customer a favor, but really, he’s giving them a fish instead of teaching them how to fish. Interestingly, he's also inadvertently setting the client up to believe that the product is not easy to use. In order to ensure that our support managers were assisting the customers in solving the problem, we added a box on the support call log that required the manager to point out the page number where this item was described or addressed in the manual. This way, if the “cool” support guys aren’t properly addressing support complaints, we can confront them. We don't alienate them, but deal with it fairly, inquiring whether they knew that the issue was covered on a particular page. In reality, they didn't know the page number, because they hadn't read the documentation. They were techies, so they didn't need to read the documentation. But they were cheating the customers. So by forcing them to enter the page number on their logs, they had to know the documentation. Then they would give the customer the page number, the customer would look at it, feel good about it, and the call would end positively. Both sides win in this kind of customer relationship
|
legal disclaimer
1) Our website is not responsible for the information contained by this article as well for any and all copyright infringements by authors and writers. E-articles is a free information resource. If you suspect this article for any copyright infringements, please read the Terms of service and contact us to investigate the problem.
2) The E-articles directory team is not responsible for inaccuracies, falsehoods, or any other types of misinformation this tutorial may contain and will not be liable for any loss or damage suffered by a user through the user's reliance on the information gained here. Please read the Terms of service
Useful tools and features
If you like this article (tutorial), please link to it from your web page using the information above. Linking to this page, this is the only way to help us improve our service, the same time providing your visitors with a way to improve their online experience.
related articles
If you have a product or service that provides worthwhile benefits, you have an obligation to present it to customers and help them decide whether it is the right solution for them. If you don’t bring the product or service to the attention of a customer who could use it, he or she will have to tolerate problems they could solve. Have you ever been approached by a salesperson with a product you liked, and then not been asked to buy? One survey found that only one in five customers would offer to buy when they wer...
2. Attainment Measurement
For both customers and you, this filter is the single most important piece of information you need to have. It is how you and customers know how they measure the attainment of their goals. You have discussed with customers many details concerning the previous eight filters. You combine and summarize the decision makers' prerequisites of dates and funds with their SOEs and measurable benefits. This summary forms the attainment measurement (often referred to in sales vernacular by using the more general term critical success fac...
3. Why Do The Customers Buy ~ The Seven Keys for Customer Relationships
Typically, customers buy from two perspectives: Value/quality/solutions: These customers tend to make rational decisions and are concerned about budget, durability, and return on investment for their organizations. Reliability/convenience/image: These customers tend to make emotional decisions and are concerned about low buying risk, trust, and prestige for themselves. The relative importance of each of these factors depends on the i...
4. The Verbal Structure and Tactics of Explaining to Customers
The structure of explaining highlights the difference between the benefits of goals and the benefits of features. Start your explanations with customers' goals and they will value them more as they listen to how you connect features to them. Avoid leading with the features of products and making customers wait as you work your way back to their goals. It takes a little practice becoming comfortable starting explanations with customers' goals—not product's features. It is like visiting a country where they drive on the wro...
5. Account Management
In account management, you protect and grow your base of positive customers. You count on their untapped opportunities to grow your sales production at a faster rate than their market segments (or, at least, your sales quotas) grow. You concentrate on ensuring that their goals, filters, and systems of evaluations still favor your company. You want to be at the joint planning level (where you progress from vendor to supplier to partner) and help customers set and achieve their long-term goals. Your sphere of influen...
6. Business questions Not product statements Demonstrate expertise
You let customers know how well you understand their business by the questions you ask. When you recite large amounts of technical facts about your products, you reflect only how well you understand your products. Nevertheless, a common myth prevails among salespeople that product experts are customer experts. It is easy to understand the roots of this myth. If your sales training was typical, it mainly involved learning features and benefits. There is one slight problem: Your customers do not have features and benefits; ...
7. How Different Companies Review New Accounts and existing Customers` Accounts
Not all companies review credit in exactly the same manner. Depending on the nature of the business, the corporate culture, the resources devoted to the credit review process, and the amount of credit granted with open terms, companies set credit review guidelines. The range of what is done is quite wide. The following list includes just a few of the ways companies evaluate credit of the new customers: • Every new customer must complete a credit application. • Have credit policies ...
8. How to Motivate Customers to Share Information
When customers qualify themselves, you ask them to share information. Sometimes, they consider this information confidential. For instance, customers often consider topics such as funding and their roles in the decision-making process to be private information. A customer's biggest disincentive to share information is the fear that it weakens his or her negotiating position. It does when you mention specific products before customers state their goals. Customers know how the game works. They quickly realize that any infor...