How To Reduce Customer Service Costs Without Hurting Your Business
Guest Post by Lisa Michaels. Lisa is a freelance writer, editor and a thriving content marketing consultant from Portland. Feel free to connect with her on Twitter @LisaBMichaels.
Did you know that 70% of customers who end up buying from a competitor instead of the company they originally went to do so because of poor customer care?
That means ensuring your customer service is up to scratch is crucial for maximizing sales.
So, how are you supposed to reduce costs, maintain reliable and professional customer service in your business, and avoid losing customers?
#1 Create a Handy FAQ Section
Believe it or not, customers ultimately prefer to be able to find all the answers they need without having to contact customer support or use a chatbot. That means the more helpful information you have on your website, the better.
Customers will stay on your website longer, be able to find answers to their queries, and it reduces the need for more agents.
Collate the most commonly asked questions into a helpful FAQ section on your website, which is easy to find and prominently displayed.
#2 Use a Chatbot
By 2020, studies have predicted that 85% of customer interactions will take place without a human. That is because chatbots will have replaced the need for people.
A chatbot uses pre-written responses and sequences to reply to customer inquiries. Artificial intelligence analyzes the user’s message for set keywords that relate to common problems or topics.
The Re:amaze chatbot will, for example, provide a relevant solution via the FAQ pages, and often reduces the need for a physical customer service agent, therefore reducing customer service costs.
Chatbots can also function with your CRM, allowing you to personalize the interactions with your customers.
More complicated questions and problems can then be transferred to a human agent.
#3 Make Use of Social Media Channels
Did you know that properly using your social media channels helps you to serve your customers better, and can also reduce your customer service costs by up to 30%?
If you have a presence on channels like Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter, then it’s likely you’ll receive comments and questions from current and potential customers. These customers will expect to not only receive a response but often a response within 24 hours.
Not receiving any response will reflect poorly on your business, and increase the chances of them going elsewhere.
So if you want happy customers and lower costs, then take advantage of your current social media channels.
#4 Find Out What Your Customers Need & Want
One of the best ways to reduce customer service costs without hurting your business is to identify potential problems before they occur and remove all roadblocks. This means you elevate and become a solution-focused business, instead of one focused on issues.
To do this successfully, you must listen to your customers and act on the valuable feedback you receive.
Here are just some of the ways you can find out what your customers need and want:
- Get customer feedback (after the sale, and when carts are abandoned)
- Pay attention to what your customers are saying about you online
- Add a live chat option to your website
- Create am extensive FAQ section that attempts to solve all common customer problems
#5 Improve Your Ticketing System
An efficient customer ticket management system will allow you to learn about and tend to your customer’s needs and pinpoint any common areas of concern.
The right ticket management system will ensure your customer service department is organized and well-informed.
For example, if you notice a trend in feedback on issues with a particular product, you’ll be able to contact everyone who has bought this product and inform them on how to resolve it — before it even shows up.
This will reduce the number of customers needing to contact your customer service team and speak to an agent.
#6 Increase Agent Productivity
Most businesses will still need to employ people as customer service agents for when a chatbot or FAQ cannot solve the problem.
So how do you reduce costs here?
The more efficient your agents are, the lower your costs will be. That means you must hire the right people for the job, ensure everyone receives adequate training to do their job.
Implementing some of the options we’ve already discussed — such as a chatbot and FAQ page — will mean that agents will only have to deal with a smaller number of complex cases that don’t have a simple fix.
This will leave them with more time to deal with these types of cases, and means they’ll be able to get through more of them.
Here are some essential skills that customer service agents need to have:
- A helpful and friendly manner
- Strong listening skills
- High-level cognitive skills (to understand and address problems)
- Be able to make quick decisions
- Be able to calm down irritated or angry customers
- Be genuine and empathetic towards the customer
If you have a large team of agents, it’s worth reassessing if you have the right people doing the job. And if you don’t, it’s time to move people around, let some people go, and be much more selective when hiring going forward.
#7 Be Clear On Your Budget Projections
To implement the processes that we’ve covered in this article, it’s likely you’ll incur upfront expenses.
That means you need to be clear on your budget projections as a business, and weigh up whether or not the investment will pay off. When you get clear on your business goals and identify any financial risks, you’ll be in a stronger position to make informed decisions.
As you can see, it’s possible to reduce customer service costs without hurting your business. Many of these changes will improve the way your customer service department operates while saving you money, which you can then invest in other areas of your business.
Look at where you can reduce customer service costs in your business today, by upgrading your processes and leveraging technology.
About Re:amaze
Re:amaze is a modern helpdesk and customer messaging platform designed to help eCommerce businesses boost customer happiness and revenue. Re:amaze allows all customer-oriented teams to work together in a shared inbox through email, social, SMS, voice, and live chat. Re:amaze also comes packaged with automated messaging and chatbots so eCommerce brands can succeed at the front lines of conversational commerce.
