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Listen in! Pick up some expert advice to a reader's question that we selected from CyberSchmooz.

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Ushering Your Business Into the Modern Era of Customer Service

 

An essential element of a successful business is ensuring your customers maintain a positive impression of your brand. This requires ensuring that as many of your interactions with each customer paint the image of a company as accessible as it is modern. 

Wondering how you can increase customers' positive interactions with your brand? Here are some ways to make sure your customer relations methods are cutting edge.

Positive Customer Interactions

Though it may sound counterintuitive, a customer who encounters a problem with a service or product can provide the best opportunity for your brand to make a lasting impression. The first move someone makes when they have a complaint or question is often to look for a customer service phone number.  

Ensure the service is modern, using machine-learning processes like interactive voice response (IVR)and sentiment analysis. These new technologies greet customers professionally and quickly route them precisely to whom they need to speak. This saves your employees and customers time. 

A phone-based service resource is still the most popular way for a customer to reach out as it provides a sense of immediacy that emails and query portals fail to deliver. What matters most to them is their perception of your brand as being accessible and responsive to their needs. 

Early Engagement Is Smart Engagement

Not all new methods of customer interfacing require staff to support them. At least, none you have to put on the payroll.

Digital assistants (or predictive chatbots) are relatively new to the scene but are quickly becoming one of the best tools for businesses seeking to improve customer engagement. These programs will initiate contact with visitors to your website and use their advanced capabilities to assess potential customers' needs. Many can even create sales. 

It is essential to provide a contact method for your customer base that is immediate yet low-pressure. Less accustomed to speaking on the phone, younger customers prefer messaging options. Digital assistants allow the user to take their time with their responses without sacrificing the immediacy of attention.

A digital assistant can direct a customer towards information about your products and services more directly related to their interests. In many ways, these chatbots can be viewed as accelerants for the product engagement cycle as they intelligently engage a curious customer early on in the process.

Get Involved with Social Media Marketing

Since the pandemic, the use of eCommerce has skyrocketed. The US government reported over 870 billion dollars in online sales for 2021, a 14% increase from 2020. People are now engaged with retailers online more than ever before.

The newest of these markets are built into already popular social media platforms. Meta has opened marketplaces allowing users to directly purchase products from sellers through their Facebook and Instagram accounts. Snapchat, on the other hand, makes use of deep linking APIs and AR try-on tools to entice businesses to its platform.

Customers are now using their favorite social media apps to learn more about the companies and products that interest them. It is vital for your brand that your company is ready to engage with these interested user bases on as many platforms as possible. 

Even if you decide that selling your product in these marketplaces is not suitable for your business, its presence on them is still a must. Your brand cannot allow a DM to inquire about product availability or a tagged complaint to go ignored.

Providing a Genuine Connection

Optimizing every customer interaction is one of the most productive areas you can focus on. If you work to ensure that their grievances are well received and their curiosity is quickly rewarded, you will find their faith in your brand proliferates. Use these modern methods to provide successful customer service. 

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