Today I’m speaking at a Progressive Business Conference on how to build rapport over the telephone. As a special bonus for my attendees, I am providing resources to help create an amazing customer experience. Enjoy. […]
Customized Engaging Online Customer Service Training
Tag: Customer Service
Inside the Zappos Contact Center
On Wednesday, March 23, 2011, I will be speaking at the Contact Center Expo in Nashville. I’m very excited about my presentation because I will be giving an in-depth profile of a company that I […]
Zappos Only Hires People Who Are Passionate About Customer Service
Zappos is about the very best customer service and that starts with hiring the very best people. Watch this interview as Zappos CEO, Tony Hsieh talks about the Zappos Customer Service Culture.
Sorry Works! The Bottom-line Benefit of Apologizing to Customers
One of the easiest and quickest ways to diffuse anger, create rapport, and regain goodwill with unhappy customers is to apologize. Offering an apology to a customer who experiences a problem should be a natural response from customer service providers. Yet, recent research reveals the startling fact that 50 percent of customers who voice a complaint never receive an apology from the organization.
Not only does an apology provide “soft” benefits such as creating calm, shaving minutes off of talk time, reducing stress on the employee, etc., but it can also translate into significant and measurable savings in decreasing lawsuits, settlement costs, and defense costs.
Doctors and hospitals are beginning to discover what savvy customer service professionals have always known: sorry works. A new program for doctors, nurses, and hospital administrators called Sorry Works encourages doctors and hospitals to apologize quickly when mishaps occur and to offer a fair settlement upfront to families and their attorneys. The Sorry Works program has resulted in a dramatic drop in lawsuits. The University of Michigan hospital recently implemented Sorry Works and reports that the number of pending cases has dropped and defense attorney fees decreased from $3 million to $1 million annually. Clearly, sorry does, indeed, work.
Does a 2 million dollar savings based solely on an apology sound too good to be true? Let me walk you through exactly why sorry indeed does work… here are the facts:
How to Be a Fantastic Chat Agent
I recently chatted with a QVC Customer Service Representative about the status of a product return. I only wanted to confirm that my return was received, but I walked away from the chat session with a Beyond WOW reaction. The WOW started with this message from the Representative:
“Ms. Golden, I’m so sorry the Canon Vixia HV30 MiniDV HD Camcorder hasn’t been processed as of yet. I know you’re anxious to have this completed. The return processing time can take up to 17 days from the date an order is returned to QVC. I hope your item is processed soon.”
Four important things happened here. And when you do these four things in your chat interactions, you will deliver a fantastic chat experience.
Top 6 Ways to Get An Angry Customer to Back Down
Here’s a short (old) video training from our original online training series. Learn. Enjoy. Share. If you like this video, you may want to check out our customer service eLearning. Learn more or try for […]
Customer WinBack
How to recover revenue by recapturing lost customers Profitability and growth are dependent on a firm’s ability to successfully acquire and retain customers. And if a high net-worth customer defects, the firm needs a proven […]
Identify Customer’s Needs by Asking “What does a man in the desert need?”
What does a man in the desert need most? In my onsite classroom customer service training sessions, I ask my participants to imagine they’ve come across a man stranded in the desert. “What do […]
7 Soft Skills to Transform Your Customer Experience Over the Telephone
This is the 7-point call strategy I use when my work is to improve the telephone customer experience in a call center. The lead-in, step 1, gets calls started on a positive note. Steps 2-6 […]
The Issue is Not the “Issue.” It’s how the issue is “handled.”
Here’s a “throw-back” customer service training video from our early years. But the point remains relevant today. Most times, the problem the customer experienced isn’t the issue at all. The company’s response to the presented […]
De-escalation Training for Customer Service & Soft Skills Training 