Great Customer Service: The Key to Small Business Success

Small businesses confront various obstacles when it comes to acquiring new customers and keeping the ones they already have. However, there is one critical component that can rocket them to the top of their industry: excellent service to customers.

Extraordinary customer service has become a significant weapon for small businesses to differentiate themselves from competitors and develop long-lasting relationships with their audience.

This goes beyond simply responding to customer enquiries or complaints. The provision of outstanding service has the potential to gratify customers and transform them into devoted brand champions. This can occur through the personalization of interactions and the prompt resolution of problems.

This is the first in a series of articles that will delve into why excellent customer service is essential for the success of small businesses and explore successful tactics for delivering an exceptional experience that will keep consumers coming back for more.

Why Customer Satisfaction Is No Longer Sufficient

Let me ask you a question:

“What is the purpose of your business? What do you want to achieve?”

In workshops, the most popular answer to this question is: “to make a profit”.

However, to make a profit, you must make sales; to make sales, you must have customers. This means you must:

• create new customers,
• make sure they keep coming back, and
• turn them into advocates for you.

Here are some interesting statistics about customers from a simple Google search:

• “96% of customers will leave you for bad customer service” Forbes .com
• “80% of customers said they have switched brands because of poor customer experience, and 43% of respondents said they were at least somewhat likely to switch brands after only a single negative customer service interaction. Poor customer service was the most cited reason for switching brands.” Qualtrics.com
• A study conducted in 2008 by John Gattorna – a visiting professor at Macquarie Graduate School of Management, cited that 68% leave because of perceived indifference! topsalessuccess.com

“Perceived indifference” means they don’t think you care. It’s been a while since the study by Gattorna was done, but I would suggest that there has not been much change.

The implication for a small business is that you must not only actually care about your customers, they must perceive that you care.

Understanding Customer Expectations and Needs

The expectations of consumers are currently at an all-time high and are only going to continue to grow.

Customers in today’s market want access to product information at all hours of the day and night. They take pleasure in doing their own research and weighing the pros and cons of various possibilities, and they anticipate having the flexibility to make purchases whenever and wherever they like.

Customers today want more than just high-quality goods and services that offer good value for the money; instead, they are looking for experiences they will never forget.

The days are long gone when a transaction was a straightforward buy-and-sell exchange. Nowadays customers want:

• Transparency: They want transparent communication regarding pricing, product features, and corporate policies. This is a must.
• Convenience: They want to communicate with the company on their terms, which frequently means being available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, through various channels such as websites, social media, and email.
• Personalization: Customers are grateful when businesses take the time to comprehend their requirements and preferences and adapt their products and services accordingly.
• Social Responsibility: A growing number of consumers now anticipate that companies will demonstrate social responsibility by showing concern for the community and the environment.
• Consistency: Customers expect consistency from a company, whether it pertains to the quality of the products or the service they receive.
• Loyalty Rewards: Many clients anticipate being rewarded for their continued patronage through discounts, loyalty programs, or other privileges.
• Up-to-date Technology: Customers have come to anticipate that small businesses will stay up with the latest technological developments and provide up-to-date and effective services, particularly in the age of digital technology.
• Exceptional Customer Service: They anticipate that the service they receive will be prompt, courteous, and efficient. This includes coming up with efficient and speedy solutions to problems.

The Need for Great Customer Service

Customer service has become more challenging due to the rising expectations of buyers. It is no longer adequate for businesses to react to complaints and handle issues as they happen; instead, organizations need to anticipate the demands of their customers and act accordingly.

Cutting-edge customer service is an absolute must, and this is true whether you run a solo or large business operation.

Cutting-edge customer service isn’t just about resolving issues promptly; it’s about creating memorable experiences that foster customer loyalty and word-of-mouth promotion.

The most desirable outcome would be for happy clients to be eager to spread the word about the company to their extended circle of acquaintances, including friends, family, and others.

This will lead to a boost in sales, improved brand recognition, customer loyalty, and a clear advantage over the competition.

Understanding your consumers’ expectations is the cornerstone of providing excellent customer service.

Creating your Ideal Customer Profile and analyzing the expectations of your ideal customers is the first step.

Customer Service Implications for Smaller Local Businesses

Larger businesses typically have marketing teams that use various software tools to follow purchasing trends on social media platforms, analyze and segment customer data, and produce feedback surveys, in an attempt to provide service that clients want.

However, there are several distinct ways in which a local small business might differentiate itself from larger corporations through customer service:

• Personalization: Because small firms typically know their clients by name, the service provided to those clients feels more personalized and custom-made. They can also tailor their products or services to the specific requirements of individual customers.
• Rapid Response Time: One benefit of being a smaller business is the ability to address customer concerns or questions quickly. This has the potential to make the customer feel appreciated and heard.
• Relationship Building: Small business customers can benefit from a more personalized level of service. This can involve things like remembering the consumer’s preferences, engaging with them on a more personal level, and demonstrating a genuine concern for the client.
• Local knowledge: Self-employed people are often involved in and understand the local community. This can be mirrored in their customer service, and more relevant to local needs.
• Exceeding Expectations: Because of their smaller size, small firms often have greater leeway to go above and beyond to satisfy their customers’ requirements and surpass their expectations. This can be accomplished by offering exceptional service, unexpected discounts, or kind gestures.

Keep in mind that every connection you have with a consumer is an opportunity to demonstrate how your company is unique and superior to others.

Getting Your Customer Service on Track

Step 1: How do current and prospective clients interact with your business? Depending on the nature of your company, the following choices may be available to you:

• Website: When a potential client visits your website to look at your products or services.
• Physical Location: When a customer comes to your storefront or office location.
• Social Media: In social media, an interaction refers to a client responding to one of your posts, comments, or direct messages.
• Telephone Calls: When a customer or potential client contacts your company by telephone.
• Email: If they receive and open email communications from your company or contact you via email.

Step 2: How do different types of customers:

• Find information about your products or services and how to acquire them;
• Get help or advice;
• File complaints if something goes wrong;
• Return products and access your refund policies?

Is it simple to locate you or get in touch with you? The inability of customers to quickly find the appropriate telephone number or email address for you is one of the most common sources of customer annoyance.

This is the thing that peeves me the most. Nothing is worse than being in the heat of the moment when you need assistance, and you cannot find a number to contact someone.

It is vital to ensure customers can easily reach out to you for any reason.

Step 3: Design Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) that will tell everyone precisely how to deal with all areas of providing customer support.

They might contain items like the following:

• Answer the phone in 3 rings.
• Introduce the business and yourself with “Good morning (afternoon), Welcome to [business name], this is [your name].
• Greet each customer by their first name.
• Use the phrase “Can I ask you to hold?” if you need to put the customer on hold or transfer the call – and wait for the answer.
• Answer all customer inquiries within [designated time frame].
• Solve any client issues within [specified time limit].

Keep these standard responses front and center so everybody uses them.

Step 4: Monitor how well you are doing.

Tracking the quality of customer service can be accomplished using a variety of approaches, including the following:

• Customer Retention Rate: Track how many customers return to do business with you. A high customer retention rate often indicates good customer service.
• Complaints and Feedback from Customers: Always be sure you keep a record of the feedback and complaints from customers. Reviewing this information on a regular basis will help you discover any recurring problems or patterns.
• Keeping an Eye on Social Media: monitor comments, reviews, and direct customer messages on your company’s social media channels. This can provide constructive insight about the perceptions of customers.
• Analytics for websites: Programs such as Google Analytics can reveal how customers engage with your website by analyzing the data it collects. If customers quickly navigate away from your website or do not finish their transactions, this may indicate a problem with the quality of your service.
• Surveys of Customer Satisfaction: Collecting customer feedback is one of the most effective ways to monitor the quality of the service provided. Online survey tools such as Google Forms or SurveyMonkey are ideal for this task.

Combining these approaches to obtain an all-encompassing picture of the level of customer service you provide is frequently the most effective strategy.

Summary

To summarize, providing excellent customer service is essential to help small firms differentiate themselves from their rivals.

Small businesses can cultivate strong relationships and customer loyalty with their clientele by offering consumers individualized experiences, actively listening to their requirements, and exceeding their expectations.

Spending money on training personnel and giving them the authority to provide outstanding service will be profitable in the long term because it will bring in new customers and encourage existing ones to come back.

Small businesses have the unique opportunity to provide a level of care and attention that larger corporations often struggle with. Embrace the power of great customer service and grow your business.
 

 
Other articles in this series:
How to Create a Winning Customer Service Strategy