In the push to keep clients coming back, AI’s smart solutions are leading the charge—merging innovation with that human touch.

Thanks to artificial intelligence, the game has changed for how companies talk to you and me – it’s all about getting personal in a smart way. Thanks to AI’s power, sifting through massive chunks of information helps businesses get up close and personal with customer trends and necessities. With this smart tech, businesses aren’t just shooting in the dark anymore; they’re pretty spot-on at figuring out what you’ll likely do next.

This means communications tailored to fit you perfectly and experiences that feel deeply personal.

Personalization at Scale

One of the most significant advantages of AI is its ability to personalize interactions at scale. Old-school marketing often blasts the same message to everyone, but with AI, companies can now chat you up with deals that feel like they were made just for you. Imagine an AI so smart it learns what you love to shop for. Now picture getting perfect offers and custom content that makes shopping feel like it’s tailored just for you.

Smart data use lets us get ahead by truly engaging with people first.

Diving into past purchases and behaviors, AI cleverly forecasts what customers might buy next and spots those who may soon wave goodbye. Companies that look forward can quickly reach out to address customer worries and propose solutions right away making it more likely for them to hold onto their clientele.

Enhancing Customer Support with AI

Customer support is a critical touchpoint in the customer journey. AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants can provide instant, 24/7 assistance to address customer queries and resolve issues promptly.

With these AI solutions working overtime, a flood of customer inquiries gets handled all at once – making sure everyone’s sorted out quickly and nobody’s left hanging. With AI on board, it feels like your support team knows you personally by pulling up your past interactions and preferences – streamlining solutions to keep customers happy.

Continuous Learning for Ongoing Improvement

AI systems are designed to learn and improve over time. Imagine having a backstage pass to every customer’s thought. That’s kind of what it feels like when AI sifts through feedback and chats – it lets businesses shape up their strategies in real time to keep pace with changing desires. Companies that keep learning stay nimble, always crafting experiences that evolve as quickly as customer tastes do.

Implementing AI for Customer Retention

To harness the full potential of AI in increasing customer retention, businesses should consider the following steps:

1. Data Integration: Consolidate customer data from various sources to create a comprehensive view of your customers. To get those spot-on insights, AI must gobble up plenty of good quality data first.

2. Choose the Right Tools: Invest in AI tools and platforms that align with your business objectives and customer retention goals. Picking the perfect tech tool, whether it’s a chatbot powered by AI, software that predicts trends, or systems that offer tailored experiences, makes all the difference.

3. Keep your eyes on the prize – a stellar customer journey. From first click to final purchase, smart use of AI can turn ordinary interactions into memorable experiences that keep people coming back. Let every interaction count – from custom-tailored ads to quick and helpful support that keeps them coming back for more.

4. Monitor and Optimize: Continuously monitor the performance of your AI initiatives and be prepared to iterate and optimize. While AI dishes out the insights, we can’t forget that keeping those strategies in line with our business objectives and what our customers want is a job for humans.

5. Ethical Considerations: Always prioritize customer privacy and ethical considerations when implementing AI. Transparently communicate how customer data is used and ensure compliance with data protection regulations.

Imagine an AI that not only gets your needs before you voice them but also wraps it all up with top-notch help – now that’s how lasting bonds are formed between brands and their fans. With each leap forward in AI, strategies to make sure shoppers stick around are also leveling up. Imagine a future where your favorite brands know you so well; they anticipate what you want before even you do.

We all make mistakes. If anyone tells you they never a mistake, that’s a lie. More likely, what those people actually are telling you is that, even when they make a mistake, they won’t own it.

Owning our mistakes is a critical step in service recovery—and service recovery is critical to the success of your business, no matter what that business is.

I estimate that, in the United States, 80 percent of employees lie when there’s a problem instead of confessing to it and solving it. When you make a mistake, you can either solve it and keep the customer, or you can say goodbye. In order to keep the customer, I encourage you to take these four steps—and to take them within 60 seconds.

1. Act quickly

Listen to what the customer has to say while describing the problem. Then act quickly. That’s when the magic occurs. The faster you respond, the better, and you won’t need to move the problem up the chain of command.

2. Take responsibility

Don’t let pride or the fear of losing face get in the way. Simply—and sincerely—apologize and admit to the mistake. It doesn’t matter who in the company made that mistake, you must own it on behalf of your organization. Don’t argue with the customer, even if he’s wrong. Your objective is to get him to return and continue to do business with your company.

3. Be empowered

Take care of the customer to that customer’s satisfaction. When you are empowered to do so, you won’t have to send the problem up the line to a manager.

This gets a little tricky because the company has to empower its employees in order for this to work. Management must commit to empowering—and supporting–every employee in the company, particularly frontline employees who have the most direct contact with customers. The company also has to train every employee on service recovery.

Employees must be trusted to make decisions that will solve customers’ problems. When they do so, those customers will be more loyal to you and your company than if they had never had a problem or complaint.

4. Give customers something of value

Compensate them for their problems by, in essence, paying them for their inconvenience. That something must be of high value, but its cost to the company can be almost nothing.

Every company has something of high value and low cost they can give to customers who experience a problem with a product or service. If it’s cheap, it has no value. Management should identify five to 10 things its employees can give to a customer in order to solve a problem and retain the customer’s business.

Let me give you some examples. If you work for a car dealership and told a customer that his car will be serviced and ready to pick up by 5 p.m., but it isn’t ready at that time, you can give him a free oil change. If your customer has a problem with his laptop computer, you can give him a one-year extension of the warranty on it. If you work for an airline, you can give a customer access to the first-class lounge or add 20,000 miles to her account.

If you work for a hotel, give a customer who had a problem a free night, upgrade him to a suite, or give him a voucher for a free dinner at your restaurant. If you work for a restaurant and a customer’s meal took 45 minutes to arrive at his table, don’t give him a free cup of coffee; give him a free dessert. A dentist who messed up a patient’s appointment can offer to clean her teeth at no charge.

Remember this because it’s important: Whatever you give customers must have high value in their eyes. When you do that, chances are good that they will tell everyone they know about how well you worked with them to solve their problems. On the other hand, if you don’t take the steps I offer here, chances are good that your disgruntled customers will leave bad reviews on Facebook and Twitter. Those reviews can last for years and can wreak havoc with your bottom line. A greater concern is that the customer won’t come back to you.

In a nutshell, when dealing with a customer who has a complaint, act quickly, take responsibility, make an empowered decision, and give the customer something of value.

Repeat customers not only buy more, but they also often serve as unofficial brand ambassadors. Here are ten ways to help you get new customers to become loyal, repeat customers.

1. Understand What Your Customers Want

If you want to convince your customers to give you their loyalty, you’re going to need to understand what they want, so you can give it to them. Do they care more about performance than price? Or is cutting costs more important? Are they looking for certain extra features? To find out, you need to conduct market research on your target demographic. There are a few ways you can go about it. You can give your customers a short survey when they buy something, with a small bonus for filling it out. You can hold focus groups to do more in-depth research. You could also pay for a survey company to do it for you. You can be as involved or uninvolved as you like.

2. Make Purchases Easy and Convenient

If you want first-time buyers to become repeat customers, you need to make their first purchase easy and convenient. As customers become increasingly tech-savvy, businesses must ensure that their customers have the best purchasing experience possible. The convenience of being able to purchase items from the comfort of one’s own home is an integral part of a successful purchasing process. Customers today expect streamlined purchases with intuitive interfaces and payment security measures. Purchasers want to know that their information is secure and buyers need access to customer service at any time. Companies must make sure customers feel confident in their buying decision by making purchases as easy and convenient as possible.

3. Treat Your Employees Well

If you want your customers to keep coming back, you need to treat your employees well. They are the ones who determine if your customers have a pleasant, fun experience or a difficult, irritating one. Showing appreciation for customer service employees will motivate them to go the extra mile for customers and boost customer satisfaction. Simple gestures like recognizing customer care staff in team meetings or giving rewards for exemplary performance can make a huge difference on employee morale and productivity. Investing time into customer service staff trainings is also invaluable to allowing employees to increase their skills and provide higher quality customer experiences. Taking these small steps can have a big impact, creating happier customer care employees who are willing to put in the work that customers need, making both your staff and customer experience better.

4. Provide a Customer Service App

A customer service app is a great tool for businesses of all sizes. Not only does it make customer interactions more efficient, but it can also ensure customer satisfaction. A customer service app allows customers to get their questions answered quickly and accurately, and they no longer have to wait on hold or navigate confusing customer service menus when they need assistance.  Other features include things like ticket notifications, customer management systems, customer tracking capabilities, customer feedback surveys and reporting tools. If companies want to create a custom cross-platform app that will help them manage the customer experience, they can hire Flutter developers: https://doit.software/blog/hire-flutter-developers. In today’s digital age, a customer service app is an invaluable asset for businesses looking to improve their customer service offerings.

5. Make Your Business Website Easy to Use

Having a well-functioning website is essential for any business in today’s digital world. It can make customer service easier, help to build customer relationships, and even boost sales. To ensure your business website is easy to use, you should focus on having a well-organized layout, clear navigation menus, and simple contact forms. Additionally, keeping content minimal and avoiding any long or wordy explanations can also help to increase customer engagement. With these steps you can ensure your business website is user friendly and create a great customer experience.

6. Reward Customer Loyalty

People like being recognized and appreciated. So, when you show customers that you truly value their repeat custom, they’ll be much more likely to continue giving it to you. Try instituting a customer reward program, with discounts available after repeat purchases. Give the occasional free product or service to your long-term customers. If your business is a small one, get to know all of your repeat customers’ names. Do everything you can to make your loyal customers feel valued and appreciated.

7. Resolve Problems Quickly

From time to time, your customers are going to have problems with your business. How you handle these problems will have a huge impact on whether those customers will ever come back. So, when you find out about a customer complaint, you need to make fixing it a top priority. In fact, no matter how busy you are, no matter how long it will actually take to fix the problem, you need to at least issue an initial response within 24 hours. And to make sure that happens, you need to check your business website and review sites like Yelp on a daily basis.

8. Make It Easy for Customers to Shop with You Again

It’s important to make it easy for first-time buyers to shop with you again in the future. One way to do this is to save their information so they don’t have to enter it every time they make a purchase. You can also offer guest checkout options, so they don’t have to create an account if they don’t want to.

9. Build a Community Around Your Brand

Building a strong customer community around your brand is an important part of maintaining customer loyalty. Creating strategies to foster customer interaction and engagement with your brand helps create a personal connection between customers and your product or service. Utilizing customer service experiences to collect customer feedback, generate conversations, host contests and activities that promote customer involvement can all be used to build a cohesive customer community around your brand. This will also help build a positive reputation of your brand as people come together, share experiences, and form relationships around the shared interest in your company or product. In the long run, having a loyal customer community will ultimately increase customer retention to ensure long-term success of your brand.

10. Stay in Touch with Your Customers

It’s important to stay in touch with your customers even after they’ve made their initial purchase. It helps to build customer loyalty, deepen customer relationships, and gain insights into customer needs. To stay connected with your customers, use email newsletters to send out announcements or events related to your business. You can even use mailers and rewards programs by sending physical mailers with discounts or coupons. With the right strategies, you can easily keep in touch with your customers and build long-term relationships.

Final Thoughts

Customer loyalty will either make or break your business. By following these tips, you can develop the kind of customer loyalty that will make it instead of breaking it.

Your customer retention rate tells you how many of your customers are staying with you, rather than defecting to a competitor.

Of course, every business wants to retain 100% of its customers (and increase the amount they spend!), but you’ll need to implement effective retention strategies if you want to keep hold of your customer base. To get started, take a look at these four ways to increase customer retention:

1. Automated Payments

When customers sign up for automated payments, remaining loyal to a brand becomes a passive action that requires no effort on the part of the consumer. Conversely, switching to a competitor requires effort and input. Due to this, customers are more likely to remain with an existing supplier if they’re signed up to make automated payments.

What’s more – this can be cost-effective for your company too. As well as increasing retention rates, Yodlee ACH payment solutions offer competitive transaction rates that can lower your operating costs. With real-time verification checks and fraud reduction protocols when you use Yodlee ACH payment solutions, you can even optimize business security while reducing your spend and growing your customer base.

2. Loyalty Incentives

When consumers receive something in return for their brand loyalty, it encourages them to continue using the same vendor, supplier, or retailer. Loyalty incentives have been an effective way to increase retention rates for some time, but the digital revolution has enabled businesses to implement more exciting and rewarding schemes.

You might want to reward loyal customers with voucher codes to secure a discount on their next purchase, for example, or you could invite regular customers to exclusive online events and promotions.

3. Enhanced Convenience

When your business provides a customer with increased convenience, it’s a surefire way to gain their loyalty. Consumers will often choose to engage with a business simply because it’s convenient for them to do so, even if they end up spending a little more. Whether it’s free delivery, hassle-free returns, or expedited shipping options, there are numerous ways to differentiate your business from its competitors and offer enhanced convenience to your customers.

4. Re-Targeting Campaigns

Many companies lose customers simply because they don’t bother to re-engage them once they’ve made an initial purchase. However, failing to run re-targeting techniques means that your churn rate is likely to increase, and your retention rate could plummet.

Re-targeting existing customers allows you to build on the relationship you’ve already established and gives you an opportunity to reinforce your brand attributes. By doing so, you can retain more customers and ensure they remain in the sales funnel.

Maximizing Customer Retention

Companies typically invest a lot in customer acquisition, but this will only pay off if you successfully retain the customer you’ve gained. With the right retention strategies, you can boost your customer base and grow your market share, while generating increased profits. Furthermore, implementing the right retention strategies gives you a chance to increase the average customer’s lifetime value, thus increasing your marketing ROI and your revenue.

If you want to run a successful business and experience revenue growth, it’s not enough to simply bring in the customers. To achieve these goals, you also need to take care of retaining these customers.

It takes a lot to earn your client’s trust and loyalty, so once you bring them into your company’s ecosystem, the last thing you want is to see all your efforts go to waste.

Fortunately, there are plenty of proven ways that help improve the relationship between the business and the customers and maintain steady retention. Some entrepreneurs emphasize the clients’ first experience with the brand, so they feel as encouraged to come back as possible. Others rely on customer feedback, decide to run newsletters, or invest their time in rewarding loyalty.

It’s as easy as it sounds –  all you need is to create your own objectives and focus on achieving them. If you want to learn more about how to improve customer loyalty and retention and make your business even more successful, continue reading below.

Send Out Surveys

One way to learn about your customers is to ask for feedback using surveys. The surveys should be short and simple to fill out so that they don’t take too much time or effort from the client’s side, but they should still provide valuable information that can be used to improve your business offerings. By asking for feedback from clients once in a while, you can make sure that they’re happy with their purchase and continue coming back to your company.

Additionally, there are plenty of useful tools out there that might come in handy and make collecting feedback even easier than before. For example, paying attention to the reviews should become an integral part of the way you’re running your business. Because keeping track of them might be overwhelming, you might consider visiting websites like getwave.com and find out more about how you can work on improving customer interaction.

Build Trust

The most important element in building long-term relationships with your clients is being consistent, whether you fulfill their needs or use the feedback to make improvements. It’s not enough to simply state your business’s values on your website if you don’t live by them in real life. For instance, if you promise to provide all of your customers with the best products and services possible, you need to follow through with this promise.

Trust is at the core of every good relationship. The more trust you build with your clients, the better the relationship becomes. You can start by providing information about your business. Be transparent in your communication with clients, explain what is going on when there are changes, be honest and friendly in your communication, and let people know that you care about them.

It’s also essential to learn from your clients. Thanks to open communication and collaboration, you can learn a lot and improve your own business. For example, you can learn more about their needs and expectations and use the feedback to improve your business offerings.

Invest in Customer Rewards and Recognition

There are plenty of ways for businesses to reward their customers and recognize their loyalty. Some companies choose to give away prizes for making referrals or engaging in social media activities, while others offer special discounts or coupons. However, if you want to make a lasting impression on your customers, you have to invest in a thoughtful rewards program. This program will help you to not only retain customers but also attract new ones.

Contests and giveaways are excellent ways to engage your customers while promoting your brand. Create online surveys, trivia questions, raffles, or any other type of contest where people can win something in exchange for an entry. Start small with simple contests but remember that bigger events might bring more attention to your brand, so they’re worth considering in the future.

Don’t Forget About Referrals

The easiest way to grow your business is through referrals from existing clients. If someone has been satisfied with your service, they may want to help by spreading the word about your brand and recommending you to other people who might need your products and services.

To encourage referrals, you need to do two things: firstly, provide fantastic service so people will want to recommend your business, and secondly, make it easy for them to refer other people to your business by offering rewards. For example, you can offer a free trial period for every customer who refers someone else to your company.

Conclusion

As we mentioned earlier, trust is the core of every healthy relationship between a business and its customers, so even if you manage to achieve all of these goals, it won’t be enough unless you earn the trust of your customers. If you can make your clients trust you, you’ll have no shortage of loyal customers who will keep coming back for more.

But it is not as difficult to achieve as you might think. All you need to do is to focus on the right things and make sure that you’re constantly working on improving your business, as well as the relationships between your company and your customers. Are you ready to continue growing your business?

Get ready to do a little math. While not my typical lesson, this is very important. It’s about customer retention—which can lead to customer loyalty.

Loyal customers are important to all businesses regardless of industry or size—large, small, B2B or B2C. Most businesses know their numbers, but do they know the right numbers? It’s easy to measure customer satisfaction at different levels. We find out how they liked our experience. We know that if they liked the experience, that is the first step in getting them to come back. The “getting them to come back” number is different than the “were you happy with us?” number.

I’d love for customers to rate our business as a five out of five every time, but the number that is almost as important—maybe even more so—is the one that proves to us that the customer came back. That’s your customer retention number.

If this is of interest to you—and it should be—then get out a pad of paper and a pencil. It probably wouldn’t hurt to have a calculator, either. Let’s get started.

According to Zendesk, the customer retention rate measures the number of customers a company continues to do business with over a given period of time. It’s a percentage of existing customers that maintain loyalty to the business within that window of time.

The formula for calculating customer retention is pretty simple. First, you need three pieces of information:

• You need “S” – the number of existing customers at the Start of the period of time.
• You need “N” – the number of New customers added in the period of time.
• You need “E” – the total number of customers at the End of the period of time.

Subtract the number of new customers added over a period of time (N) from the total number of customers at the end of that same period of time (E). That’s E minus N. Divide the resulting number by the number of customers at the start of the time period (S). Finally, multiply that number by 100 and you’ll have the percentage of customers who stay.

In other words: [(E – N) ÷ S] × 100 = customer retention rate.

Obviously, the closer you are to 100% the better. Very few companies can say, “We retain 100% of our customers!” But if you’re close, you’re in the zone. When you continue to bring in new customers and get existing ones to return, that’s a recipe for success and growth!

About the Author

Shep Hyken is the Chief Amazement Officer of Shepard Presentations. As a professional speaker and best-selling author, Shep helps companies develop loyal relationships with their customers and employees.

How supervisors manage customer conflict also determines how long employees stick around.

Whether they’re dealing with impatient diners at a restaurant, handling returns at a clothing store or appeasing angry consumers at a call center, anyone working in the service industry will tell you: it’s a tough gig.

In fact, studies have shown that dealing with problematic customers can lead to emotional exhaustion, negative moods, poorer physical health, reduced performance and lower job satisfaction.

But does it also lead to higher employee turnover?

According to a new study led by the UBC Sauder School of Business in collaboration with the UBC-Okanagan Faculty of Management, the University of Illinois, and the University of Queensland in Australia, customer conflict plays a big role when it comes to workers saying “I quit” — and how supervisors manage that conflict helps decide whether employees stay or go.

The study, entitled Unpacking the Relationship Between Customer (In)Justice and Employee Turnover Outcomes: Can Fair Supervisor Treatment Reduce Employees’ Emotional Turmoil?, involved 420 retail workers and 363 restaurant employees in the Philippines, as well as 940 call center employees in Canada. The researchers measured the workers’ experience of customer mistreatment and its emotional effects, as well as their quit rates.

Even when controlling for other factors that would lead a worker to throw in the towel — factors including low pay, long hours and poor working conditions — the researchers found a significant link between customer mistreatment and employee quit rates.

“We were able to predict who was going to quit based on their experience of customer mistreatment and emotional exhaustion. You can see it coming,” says UBC Sauder School of Business professor Danielle van Jaarsveld, lead author of the study.

“It starts accumulating, and eventually you hit the wall and say, ‘I’ve got to look for another job.’ Because if you don’t find a way to replenish those emotional resources, they deplete and you’ve got nothing left,” says study co-author and UBC Sauder School of Business professor Daniel Skarlicki.

But it turns out that how supervisors respond to front-line customer service staff can make a big difference when it comes to employee retention. When the surveyed workers felt their supervisors treated them with dignity and respect, listened to their concerns, and supported them when dealing with demanding customers, they were far more likely to stick around.

“Whether you quit isn’t just about the customer; it’s what’s called an interaction effect — that is, the customer mistreatment is buffered when the manager treats you fairly,” explains Skarlicki. “So if you get berated by a customer and your boss says ‘that’s disrespectful, I’m going to support you,’ it reduces the effect of that customer mistreatment.”

This study is one of the first to examine the effect customer injustice has on workers’ decisions about whether or not to stay in the job, and adds to the extensive existing research on how employees’ interactions with their coworkers and supervisors affect churn rates.

The findings are important because, especially in the age of social media, online reviews and razor-thin margins, customer service quality can make or break a business — and in the service industry, turnover rates can range from 26 to 200 percent.

They can also come with a high financial cost. According to Skarlicki, in one company, turnover attributed to bad management can cost a company more than $300,000 in a single year — and that’s not taking into account the customer dissatisfaction that invariably comes with a constantly shifting workforce, and the effect of the customer dissatisfaction on the company’s reputation.

“Even though companies know these difficult encounters happen, the effect of customer mistreatment on turnover is huge — and these are really significant effects,” he says. “People think employees quit primarily because of factors like salary and workload, but it’s also about how they’re treated by customers and supervisors.”

Skarlicki says companies that rely on customer service can reduce turnover by ensuring supervisors treat the employees with dignity and respect, having regular conversations with their employees, and training employees on how to deal with abusive customers.

“We know that employees don’t leave companies; they leave managers. Our findings support this mantra,” emphasizes Skarlicki, who says too many customer service managers focus solely on employee productivity. “Companies should make sure managers are going from employee to employee checking in on how they are dealing with the potential stress that can come from difficult customers. Although this may seem like common sense, common sense doesn’t equal common practice.”

About the Author

Unpacking the Relationship Between Customer (In)Justice and Employee Turnover Outcomes: Can Fair Supervisor Treatment Reduce Employees’ Emotional Turmoil? was authored by Danielle D. van Jaarsveld, Daniel Skarlicki, and Pascale H. Frické of the UBC Sauder School of Business, David D. Walker of the UBC-Okanagan Faculty of Management, Simon Lloyd D. Restubog of the University of Queensland and Yueyang Chen of the University of Illinois. The study is forthcoming in the Journal of Service Research.

82 minutes…

This is how long I waited for a customer service rep at Virgin America when my flight was canceled.

Now I guess you’re waiting for me to rant about how unacceptable this wait was, and bellow about how Virgin America took their eye off the ball. Or to insist that consumers just aren’t going to stand for this anymore!

But, guess what?

After that ridiculous wait, I actually stayed on the line to provide a positive review of my experience…

Why?

On that day, I was just one of thousands of customers caught in the crossfire of two company disruptions:

1) The acquisition of Virgin America by Alaska Airlines, and

2) The unpredictable spring weather hitting the East Coast.

Needless to say, both the people and processes involved were breaking down. And like any major disruption, both the customers and employees were caught in the middle.

Imagine my surprise when, after an hour and a half of hold music, I was greeted by a friendly voice on the other end.

I was expecting an exhausted “It sucks to be me” employee. Instead, I was met with a considerate, kind and humorous representative who greeted me, listened to me and patiently worked through various technology challenges.

I just had to ask her… “What is your secret? After dealing with massive changes and stressors, how are you still so positive?”

Her response was simple: She loves her job. She loves her bosses, who chipped in to do anything and everything they could to help the situation. And she loves how time just flies when she’s busy.

I was flabbergasted.

So, what was Virgin America’s secret? Here’s what I heard from that amazing representative:

Leaders Show Up During Disruptions

As leaders in organizations facing both expected and unexpected disruptions, it’s easy to fall into the “nothing I can do about it” trap. But, courageous leaders know that they need to show up when navigating the storm.

Here’s how Virgin leaders were showing up for their employees that day:

Setting Crystal Clear Expectations

Having a crystal clear vision of what the team was trying to achieve that day was the key to a successful customer experience. The employee didn’t rush me off the phone; rather, her goal was to focus on my needs and to take the time to make it right. As she said, “I’m successful if you feel a little bit better after we talk.”

Hiring for Values

Leaders who use values-based hiring know that skills and knowledge are important for the team’s success… but they don’t stop there. They look for the essence of an individual when making hiring decisions. Clearly, the leaders had taken the time to identify what values were important for this role (i.e. caring about others, having a positive outlook, compassionate problem solvers) and hired employees who were a ‘values’ fit first.

Getting in the Trenches

All hands on deck doesn’t mean that you get to sit by and watch your team handle stressful situations. It means getting into the trenches and fighting alongside them. The leaders on that team were on the floor, taking calls, handling questions and doing what they could to help. Employees need to know that we leaders have their backs.

Creating the Right Behaviors by Using the Right Metrics

There’s an old adage: What gets measured gets managed. In most call centers, average handle time is one of the leading metrics used to manage a rep’s performance. Customers can often ‘feel’ this expectation as they are rushed off the line (sometimes without problem resolution). But leaders who have the right behavioral-driving metrics in place—whether it’s resolving a problem in one call or ensuring customer satisfaction—make sure the metrics are driving the right behaviors.

About the Author

Nationally recognized Speaker, Consultant and Executive Coach Cindy Solomon provides inspiring keynote presentations, transformative workshops, and world class executive coaching programs to help you create long-term, profitable relationships with your customers, your leaders and your employees.

The ability to retain customers is based on how well your internal operations run. While it’s important to smile and be nice to customers, it’s a good idea to make sure that your internal systems are able to consistently perform at optimum levels. Do you want better customer retention? Let’s take a look at how to get there.

Map and Analyze Your Internal Processes – When working with clients, I always like to start here. Process mapping gives you an overview of what is actually happening within your company. Customers are impacted by your internal processes. How well your processes are constructed determine the level of service received by your customer. Hand off points and delays become clearly visible during this exercise. Process participants can communicate their requirements for completing their part of the process. Customer communication points can be identified. Process cycle time can be determined as well.

Create Consistency – It’s important that your company has a standard way of completing routine tasks. With your employees’ assistance, determine the best way to complete tasks and then develop standard operating procedures. These procedures become a guideline to follow to ensure consistent service delivery. This step also creates confident employees who can truly say “Yes – I do know how to complete that task.” Confident employees create happy customers.

Proactively Seek Feedback – Proactively seek both customer and employee feedback. Where possible, attempt to get customer feedback immediately after their experience with your company. Solicit employee feedback regarding ways to improve internal operations. When you proactively seek feedback, the way your customers and employees view your company goes to another level. The information gained can be utilized to improve the experience received by both parties.

Analyzing Customer Complaints – It’s one thing to solicit customer complaints, but it’s another to analyze the complaint information. Look for patterns – is there an issue with one of your service offerings? What time of day are you receiving the most complaints? Is there a particular location that generates the most complaints? On which day of the week do you receive the most complaints? Do the complaints point to a particular process within your company? Did the complaints start after a new product launch? Analyzing your complaints will point you in the direction of quick resolution of the complaint sources.

Want better customer retention? Look inside of your business first. How you do what you do will determine how well you retain customers!

About the Author

Recognized as “one of seven useful Twitter people for retailers to follow” by Mystery Shopping Experts of the UK, Customer Service Speaker, Author and Consultant Errol Allen utilizes his 25+ years of practical hands on experience to assist organizations in developing customer service strategies for maximum customer retention. Errol believes that a systems mindset is critical to an organization’s success in providing great customer experiences.

The purpose of being in business is to grow your business over time. I can’t think of too many businesses (not any really) where the goal is to open and remain exactly the same size.

The most effective way to grow your business is by retaining your present customers.

Customer retention is important to the long-term success as the cost to gain a new customer is anywhere from 5 to 10 times the cost of retaining an existing customer.

According to the Technical Research Assistance Program (TARP), 68% of customer defections occur because the customer feels poorly treated. This next statement is shocking: only 4% of the defecting customers bother to tell the business owner why they chose to do business elsewhere – the other 96% of defecting customers just silently disappear. Retention efforts must be a priority for the following reasons:

• Retention is the key to long-term growth
• Retention efforts create loyal customers
• Loyal customers help to establish your brand in the marketplace
• Loyalty leads to referrals

According to a TARP study when interviewing marketing executives from 200 companies, all state that at least 25% (and in some cases as high as 75%) of their new customers were obtained via referrals. Here are 5 keys to customer retention that will turn your customer into a low cost marketing department:

1. Determine what’s important to your customers

This is done during the initial contact with your customer. Assess what your customer needs/wants and get agreement on what your customer expects to receive. This sets the tone for the relationship.

2. Meet or exceed your customers’ expectations

Deliver what you agreed to deliver and what your customer expects you to deliver. You must be consistent here if you hope to retain customers. Get this one right! Your reputation is at stake. How much will it cost you to fix any issues in order to meet your customer’s expectations? Let’s do the math: if your service is worth $75 per hour and it costs you 2 hours to correct an issue, that’s $150.00. Now remember, you could have possibly utilized those 2 hours to service another customer, so that’s an additional $150.

The inability to meet customer expectations may result in a lost customer. How much is that customer worth? Let’s get the calculator out again! If your customer spends an average of $150 per month, that’s $1800.00 annually. Not much you might say, but what if that number increases to 10 lost customers? That’s possibly $18,000 in lost revenue! Now remember, customers talk to others about your business, even more so when their experience is negative. If 10 other people are told about the not so pleasant experience, that’s another possible $18,000 in lost revenue.

3. Communicate regularly with your customers

Provide timely updates and progress reports. Solicit performance feedback via customer service surveys or phone calls. Your customer feels valued when you seek out their opinion. Advise of new offerings, upgrades or product/service enhancements that create a better experience for your customer. Find ways to say “Thank You” on a regular basis.

4. Empower your employees

Provide your employees with the proper “tools” to service your customers. The “tools” that I am referring to include product/service knowledge training and customer service skills training. Give your employees options for resolving customer issues. Proper “tools” create confident employees who in turn create loyal customers.

5. Value customer complaints

A complaining customer is your best friend. I can already hear you saying “Come on Errol, how is a complaining customer my best friend?” Glad you asked! A complaining customer provides an insight into areas of opportunities within your business before a negative pattern develops, possibly resulting in a defection of customers. In bringing their dissatisfaction to your attention, the complaining customer is providing you with the opportunity to retain their business by correcting the issue versus just silently disappearing and telling 10 to 20 others about their negative experience. Create a database to monitor complaints by type and occurrence. Develop corrective actions to insure that you are consistently providing a great customer service experience.

Take the time to focus on your customer retention strategy. Your long–term success depends on your ability to get your present customers to be your referral ambassadors.

About the Author

Errol Allen has over 25 years of experience in the customer service industry including 13 years in a management role. Having held positions as an Internal Customer Service Consultant, Call Center Quality Manager and Operations Analyst, Errol understands the need for a “systems” orientation to providing excellent customer service.