You could have an amazing product or service, but that alone does not result in happier customers. If your business deals with a large number of customers on a regular basis, you must be aware of the importance of customer service. If your customers don’t get your support, they will simply choose your competitors. Improving customer service with innovative customer service ideas is the ultimate need of the hour – and can’t be ignored any longer!
Why Customer Service Matters: Importance of Innovation in Customer Service
The most important reason for improving customer service is reputation. Your company’s brand image and reputation depends on the way your customer service agents deal with customers on a regular basis.
89% of consumers stop doing business with a company after experiencing poor customer service, according to the RightNow Customer Experience Impact Report
Customer expectations have increased dramatically in the modern digital era with the widespread adoption of innovative technologies. If you don’t adapt your business to the changing needs of your customer, you could be losing out on a really great opportunity to make your customers even happier.
Not just that, improving customer service can save you money! In fact, companies lose more than $62 billion due to poor customer service, according to NewVoiceMedia.
Unique Customer Service Ideas to Improve Customer Service
Businesses often want to differentiate themselves from their competitors by doing something unique. When brands do something unique that surprises customers, it makes them come back for better experiences. Innovative ideas are effective and they work, which is why they are so powerful.
Here, we share some unique customer service ideas you’ve probably never heard of and should definitely try out:
- Improve Customer Service with Chatbots
Chatbots will save over $8 billion annually by 2022, up from $20 million in 2017, according to Juniper Research.
“40% customers don’t care who answered their query — an agent or a bot – as long as it was resolved.” – HubSpot
- Offer a Self Service Channel
45 percent of companies offering web or mobile self-service reported an increase in site traffic and reduced phone inquiries.” – CRM Magazine
- Randomly Call a Customer and Create a WoW Customer Moment
- Create Content that Destroys Itself After Some Time to Create Demand
- Catch a Customer in a Happy Moment and Share it on Social Media
- Mail a Handwritten Message via Post to Thank your Customer
- Give Incentives to Customers when They Engage with You on Social Media
- Create a Customer Service ‘Hall of Fame’ with Your Best Customer Testimonials
- Create a Catchy Team Motto and Stick to it
- Ask Each Team Member to Do One Thing to Improve Customer Service besides their Everyday Routine
- Follow Up on Each Customer Query and Ask whether it has been Resolved
- Even if a Customer Feedback Sounds Crazy, Do it Anyway
- Create a Facebook Group of your Most Loyal Customers and Engage them
- Let a Team Member Be a Customer for a Single Day, and Gather Their Feedback
- Always Smile when Talking to a Customer
Want to Delight Customers even while you are Working Remotely?
Innovative Ideas to Improve Customer Service Experience
Your customers don’t just talk to customer service, they experience it. And, customers today are beginning to feel that brands just don’t care about them anymore.
According to Kampyle, 87% of customers think brands need to put more effort into providing a more consistent experience.
This is why customer service teams should focus on delivering a good overall customer service experience. Here are some innovative ideas to improve customer service experience:
- Know Your Customer and How to Solve Their Problem
- Foster a Customer-Centric Culture
- Assign One Customer Service Representative to a Single Customer / Account
“Over 35% of customers expect to be able to contact the same customer service representative on any channel.” – Zendesk
- Make it Easier for Customers to Engage with your Business
Customer engagement leads to customer retention. Research by Rosetta Consulting found that engaged customers are five times more likely to buy only from the same brand in the future.
- Make it Easier for Customers to Switch Channels During Customer Service
“15 years ago, the average consumer typically used two touch-points when buying an item and only 7% regularly used more than four. Today consumers use an average of almost six touch points, with 50% regularly using more than four.” – Marketing Week
“Omnichannel shoppers have a 30% higher lifetime value than those who shop using only one channel.” – Google
“61% of customers have not been able to easily switch from one channel to another when interacting with customer service.” – Aspect
- Create a Customer Service Strategy
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- Be Available 24 Hours a Day, 7 Days of the Week
- Automate 20% of All Customer Service Queries 80% of the Time
- Aim to Please your Customers
- Provide Quick Responses
“82% say that getting their issue resolved quickly is the number 1 factor to a great customer experience.” – LivePerson
“33% of consumers would recommend a brand that provides a quick but ineffective response.” – Nielsen-McKinsey
“75% of online customers expect help within 5 minutes.” – Mckinsey
- If a Particular Query is Never Resolved in the First Interaction, Find Out Why and Fix it
- Have a Dedicated Knowledge base with Frequently Asked Questions
- Use the Power of Artificial Intelligence to Improve Customer Experience with Real-Time Intelligent Insights
Ideas to Improve Customer Service in the Workplace
Apart from investing in new technology and coming up with creative ideas for customer service improvement, businesses can improve customer service in the workplace and customer service team as well. Here are some ideas to improve customer service in your workplace:
- Consider Customer Service Training for your Customer Service Agents
- Create a Customer Service Vision that Defines your Ideal Customer Service Experience
- Improve Customer Service Processes to Result in Maximum Efficiency
- Create a Team Culture that Focuses on Building Relationships with Customers
- Create Brand Advocates Out of your Employees with a Strong Brand Image
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Invest in Innovative Customer Service Technology to Power Up Your Engagements
“Organizations on average, use 35 different data gathering systems with little to no integration.” – Forbes Insights and Sitecore
Best Idea for Improving Customer Service
Many experts argue that using chatbots for customer service automation is the best idea for improving customer service. Although automation works great for efficiency, it necessary would not result in happier customers.
An interesting research by Stella Service discovered that automated systems put customers on hold 1 minute longer than real people.
The best idea for improving customer service is not automation, rather it is complete personalization! Surprised? You shouldn’t be. Your customer doesn’t want to be another statistic lost in your system – they want your undivided personal attention.
If personalizing every customer response seems like an impossible task, try using email templates and personalize them to fit the customer’s description.
Customer Service Innovation Examples
Here are some innovative customer service examples to inspire you to do more with your customer service team:
- When Lily Robinson, a 3 year old, asked UK-based Grocery Store Sainsbury’s why their Tiger Bread was named ‘Tiger’ and not ‘Giraffe’, Sainsbury’s renamed the bread to ‘Giraffe Bread’
- A Zappos employee set a world record for the longest customer service call that lasted 10 hours and 29 minutes!
- MasterCard launched the “Priceless Surprises” following the success of their “Priceless” advertisements, where they would connect with users via social media and surprise them with gifts, celebrity dates, and more!
- With the release of Kindle Fire HDX, Amazon offered live video chat tech support to resolve customer queries within seconds. Notably, Amazon strives to become “the most customer-centric company on earth.”
- To better engage customers, Starbucks gave away a free Cafe Latte to everyone who interacted with the staff and introduced themselves by name. They ended up giving away in excess of 350,000 free lattes!
- Wufoo, an online form builder, send personal hand-written ‘thank you’ notes to customers who helped build contact forms on their site.
Innovative Customer Service Solution
Although innovative customer service ideas would definitely add some spice and pump up your customer engagements, imagine if you had an innovative customer service platform that has everything you need to create happier customers? Ameyo’s Contact Center Solution for Customer Service powered by technological innovation is your answer to delivering an awe-inspiring customer service experience!
