Good companies offer excellent customer service. Great companies radiate it. Building a “customer service culture” is a beautiful first step if you’re trying to figure out how to improve customer service within your company. This big-picture perspective centers organizational procedures around treating people fairly.
Although developing a service culture is only sometimes straightforward, the benefits to your business, your employees, and, most importantly, your clients may be extraordinary.
LEARN ABOUT: Client Management
In this blog, we’ll look at what customer service culture is and the 10 steps for companies going through the process.
What is customer service culture?
A customer service culture is a business management style that places consumers at the core of service delivery and operations. Customer satisfaction is taken into account in all business decisions and day-to-day activities.
A customer service culture ensures that customers have an extraordinary experience, increasing the possibility that they will not only return to a firm but also suggest it to others. The more favorable suggestions clients make for a company, the more likely that company will thrive.
A customer service culture is concerned with what occurs within your organization. Your organization’s culture determines how your visions, values, and mission are communicated to your staff and consumers. With an excellent customer service and customer care culture, your workers will feel empowered to put the customer first.
Steps to build a customer service culture
Creating a genuine customer service culture is essential before outlining the ten steps to get there.
- Expand your perspective beyond specific client interactions to the broader view of culture—a “customer service culture”—to improve the customer experience.
- Superior customer service should be supported and sustained by creating and fostering such a culture. It serves as the foundation for a well-thought-out and targeted client experience.
The list of “customer service culture catalysts” that follow will aid you in developing and sustaining your customer service culture.
- Create your mission statement first
Your company’s fundamental beliefs should reflect in your mission statement about providing for customers. So that all of your employees can understand what you’re trying to change, it should be clear and catchy. It should also be short enough to remember but long enough to be useful.
- Incorporate a philosophical framework
A company doesn’t just start with staff members skilled at providing excellent customer service. It requires work. Sharing your philosophical framework with your staff can help guide that effort. Think of it as a more extended version of your mission statement. Keep it brief enough to print on a pocket-sized card for future reference.
- Embrace — and Display — Empowerment
In a healthy call center, agents can put things right. Their superiors tell them they have power and support it. Your training, leadership, and initiatives should emphasize and reward initiative-taking agents.
To go beyond lip service, clarify that employees can make costly judgment choices (after a training period, of course). Learning customer service and a critical operational point is essential when changing to a customer service culture.
- Reconsider the characteristics that make people hireable
Managers on the front lines are crucial to the success of any effort to foster a positive attitude toward customers. As you grow your team over time, promote those that genuinely care about serving others by providing them with opportunities for advancement. In a nutshell, you should prioritize specific personality attributes over work experience in your hiring process (though experience should still be given a level of preference and respect).
- Onboarding should involve senior leadership
The CEO or senior leadership should participate directly in training while establishing a customer service culture. Having executives present is the best way to demonstrate how seriously your company takes customer service and how keenly senior leadership is aware of the performance and success of front-line staff. It enables you to establish your mission statement and philosophical foundation right away.
- Start each shift with a service stand-up
Starting every shift by addressing customer service concepts sets the tone for the day. This ritual can be a cultural catalyst, especially if staff take turns running it. It communicates and reinforces group knowledge and helps employees build leadership abilities employee empowerments.
A daily reminder like this encourages togetherness and morale among the employees who directly impact the effort, mainly customer service reps.
- Refrain from Office-Based Management
Another essential component of developing a culture of customer service is floor leadership. A manager misses several opportunities to demonstrate support for the team and culture when they retreat to their office. It brings up the earlier hiring advice: Ensure that the appropriate individuals are performing the proper duties and that your supervisors are the kind of individuals who will engage frequently and roam around in search of chances to assist.
- Examine customer service training in detail
Training has a more significant impact than is typically realized on a company’s culture when fostering a customer service culture. It’s crucial to inform salespeople about the guidelines, procedures, and customer touchpoints that direct their everyday encounters. Inform them of the various ways your company enables them to treat clients fairly. Take the time to provide them with the best training if you’re going to have trouble choosing the best candidates.
- Stop thinking “Not My Job”
Any company considering increasing customer service should fully address this crucial lateral service point. It is exhibited when senior staff members join in to help during a crisis.
A lateral attitude finds practical solutions, boosts morale, and makes it abundantly clear to all employees that the entire company is working toward a single, shared objective.
- Encourage “All Hands” Thinking
After a customer service mishap, encourage all departments to participate in the investigation to determine what went wrong and how to avoid it in the future. Remember: The foundation of a customer service culture is accountability and a sincere desire to learn from past errors. It directly benefits performance and contributes to your firm’s culture by highlighting its core values.
LEARN ABOUT: Employee Experience Framework
Conclusion
This blog is about developing a good customer service culture, but the real challenge is maintaining it once you’ve established one. Too many businesses begin with a solid customer-centric focus but lose sight of it as they grow.
A company’s culture is constantly changing in response to the priorities, customers, employees, incentives, and emphasis of the organization that hosts it, so it necessitates continuing effort and attention. Company leaders must continue to be diligent and thoughtful about their customer focus.
The task is never finished, but it is always worthwhile.
Follow these ten steps, and you’ll be well on your way to developing a customer service culture that is continuously rewarding for your organization and its customers—a culture founded on and strengthened by the complete range of communications technology.
With the help of QuestionPro, you can figure out why a client feels a certain way and give them the attention they need to have the best customer experience. Just do it!