Sian's Three Top Tips for Excellent Customer Service

Losing just one customer can be really costly. It’s very important for companies to turn a complaint into a positive for their customers, for the company, when moving forward.

So how can you make sure you don’t lose out on business?

Our expert Sian Davies has three top tips to ensure your service is on point and keeps customers coming back for more:

1. Treat customers like family.

“By encompassing our family values and treating all customers as I would treat my family, I find conversations are much more positive and engaging. Although the customer cannot see me, I keep a smile on my face as naturally I sound more upbeat and friendly – the customer can hear that I am genuinely interested, which makes the customer feel valued and it builds rapport. I also take the time to listen – the customer opens up more and the conversation becomes quite memorable, so when they phone back, make sure you ask them how their holiday was or how their new job is going!”

2. Slow down your pace.

“I’m naturally a very fast talker and I am quite excitable on the phone. When I first started in customer service, I naturally spoke quite fast, which often caused conflicts with the person on the other end of the phone. They would struggle to understand me at times and I found it difficult to react to what they were saying as I didn’t give myself time to think through my response. Slowing down my pace helps the customer understand me, and it gives me time to prepare my response”

3. Avoid negative language.

“I can’t do this”, “I can’t do that”. No one wants to hear these words. In fact, I don’t even like using these words as they sound very blunt and unhelpful, so opening the conversation with this is bound to get the customer’s back up. Delivering bad news in a positive way can really turn the conversation around. Tell the customer what you “can” do, not what you “can’t” do. Focus on the solution and not the problem – that way, you won’t have a problem on your hands any longer!

Sian has been with Memiah for almost 5 years. She has learnt a lot during this time and is a valued member of our award-winning Customer Service team.

“As a team, we placed second in the NiceReply Customer Happiness awards in 2015 and placed third in 2016 with an average rating of 9.87 out of 10. This is a huge achievement for us as we are a small company up against bigger global companies, and this year we are aiming for first place!”

“I enjoy the variety customer service brings – each day is different. We are fortunate enough to speak with really lovely customers who we can enjoy a conversation with – and even have a little bit of banter. Yes, we do get the odd tough call, but I like that. It challenges you and gives you a sense of achievement when you can turn a negative call into a positive one.”

An advert from Enterprise Rent-A-Car hit our screen bearing the slogan ‘it’s UK and global car hire, with American customer service’. The company clearly recognises that our transatlantic cousins seem to have a greater reliance on how companies interact with customers.

A recent study by New Voice Media backed this up, and found that only 25 per cent of people in the US will continue to hold whilst on the phone after 10 minutes, compared to 64 per cent of Brits, for whom it is a regular occurrence.

Expectations are indeed higher in the US. Even then, Forbes estimated that businesses are losing $62 billion per year through poor customer service. In the UK alone, it is estimated that firms are losing about £12 billion every year owing to poor customer service. It seems businesses are ignoring great customer service.