Extract (summary)
The goal of every organization is to provide proper services to its customers. This will help attract them and ensure that they maintain them. This is necessary in order to maintain the sales and ensure profitability and sustainability of the business.
Employees are required to understand the needs of their customers. This will put them in a position to match the products of the company with their needs. When the needs of the customers are met, they get satisfied (customer satisfaction) and this is what keeps them coming back for more. Therefore, customer service is important for the success of every business.
Providing customer service is quite a simple task, however, providing efficient customer service is another story all together. This requires proper skills. Organizations can ensure that its employees are well equipped with these skills through providing them with proper training. This may be in the provision of courses that would impart these skills and knowledge to them.
This way, the organization will be able to maintain its customers, make numerous sales and make profits constantly. The main objective of this paper is to look at the importance of effective customer service in the organization’s success.
A vivid definition of customer service will be provided. The importance of customer service will also be evaluated. The impact that customer service has on sales in a business will be looked at. Some of the factors that enhance better customer service will also be discussed.
Introduction
Proper customer service, which is the act of providing services to the customer during the whole transaction process, is important for the success of every business. This involves providing the services before, during and after the customer has purchased the good or service.
Effective customer service is meant to ensure customer satisfaction in order to be able to retain the customer base. This is necessary to maintain the number of sales that the business makes and consequently, continue to make consistent profits.
In order to ensure that the customer service is effective, the organizations require to have well trained customer service providers. This can be achieved through the training of the employees (Pollitt, 2008). In addition, all new employees should also be introduced to the training in order to ensure that all the customer service staff is competent and understand how to handle their customers well.
The future profitability of a company is greatly determined by its effectiveness to deliver customer satisfaction and providing quality real-time training to staff members, which will influence the success of the business.
Customer service
Customer service is generally the provision of quality service to the consumer of the organization’s products. It entails a series of activities during all stages of the consumer’s purchasing process. The main aim of providing customer service is to ensure customer satisfaction.
Price (2011) likes to think about customer service in different perspectives. He believes that it must be thought of as a leadership issue. He believes that one of the most important roles of a manager is to establish an environment of trust.
Another way of viewing it is as a marketing issue. Customer service is a way of reaching and keeping customers. It should be made to be part of the organizations marketing strategy.
How and why it is important
Pollitt points out that being honest to the customers even when the mistake was the company’s is a recovery factor for the customer. Research indicates that telling the customers the truth of the matter when a problem is encountered creates trust. After such encounters, the customers become even more loyal since they can trust the company (business). Reinforcing this trust is the work of the leader.
Making customer service the main agenda of the company is a very vital move. Such organizations are set to achieve a great competitive advantage. This is because the companies that deliver effective customer services are recognized by the customers. When they receive services from other organizations that do not match up the services received from such companies, they will always create preferences hence customer loyalty.
The importance of effective customer service starts at the company’s mission statement. It should be realistic rather than well developed. It should be public relations-related. When it is realistic and genuine, it will provide the foundation to the development of the operational principles.
This way, the company’s core values will be reflected. This way, the customers will be able to relate to them and identify with them. Consequently, this will enhance customer loyalty and the success of the business.
In the current market, nine out of every ten businesses fail after some years of operation (Schlocker, 2004). Schlocker (2004) agrees with John Dijulius that customer service is what makes the difference between the successful businesses and those that fail.
Superior customer service is the necessary ingredient in the operation of the business. Such organizations take time to evaluate and enhance the experiences of the customer. This is done with the main aim of enhancing client loyalty.
Impact of customer service on sales
The main goal of every business is to make profits and this is made possible when the organization makes sales. Charan (2010) believes that people need to think differently when it comes to making sales.
There are situations where an organization constantly loses sales even when it is providing good products and after putting a lot of effort on the services. In such situations, the organization needs to reconsider its goals and the ways of achieving them. It is then to reinvent the strategies to employ while selling them.
Triest, Bun, Raaij, and Vernooij (2008) studied the factors that enhanced customer retention and customer profitability. As they student certain service providers, they concluded that those customers who received free equipment during their previous visits came back for the same services. In other words, retention rates were higher. Therefore, the businesses could make more sales and more profits.
However, these authors argued that this was only applicable for those businesses that had large number of customers. It did not have any effect on the businesses that attracted a smaller number of customers. Essentially, this means that effective customer service is important in order for the business to be more profitable as it retains its customer base.
According to the authors, targeting on marketing expenses that were customer-specific was effective in retaining the customers. This was as opposed to the development of new customers into larger numbers or deriving more profits from them. This was a smart marketing procedure that involved incurring extra costs in the business in order to make more revenue from the customers.
Other similar studies have proved that such marketing decisions positively impact other marketing decisions. These include the pricing of services, customer loyalty, and the frequency of contracting customer, among others.
By offering free equipment, the businesspersons were able to strengthen the relationship with the consumers in order to make them avoid opportunistic behavior, which could negatively affect customer retention initiatives.
The salespeople should not only be people who take orders. They should also be ambassadors. This involves acquiring social skills that would enable them to learn about the needs of their customers. Having a good understanding about the product is also important. This would enable them to present them together with other services in a way that would match the specific needs of the consumers.
Creating value for the customers is very important in creating customer loyalty and ensuring that they will always come for the products (increase sales). The customers will differentiate such salesperson and will be regular customers. Therefore, a salesperson needs to acquire new knowledge and skills so as to be respected and supported by the teammates (Charan, 2010).
Factors that enhance better customer service
In order for employees at any organization to understand how to conduct effective customer service, they require to acquire social skills that will enable them to learn customer needs. This would enable them to understand how to match the customer needs with the products and services they offer (Charan, 2010).
Pollitt (2008) emphasizes on staff training as a factor in enhancing better (effective) customer service. This explains why the passengers on Stena’s Caledonia ferry like the services provided. The staff is provided with training that helps them provide the best customer services. This type of training was referred to as the ‘experiential’ training. It mostly targeted the workers from the catering units.
Those from the lowest ranks to the ones in senior positions were included in the training. It was a course that lasted for one day. All the employees who attended the training provided positive views about the training. They believed that it was helpful. The organization also had a policy that ensured that all new employees had to undergo that particular training.
One of the most important goals of an organization should be to provide customer service that would make the organization stand out from the rest. In order to achieve this, the employees need to be aware of the emotions and needs of the customer. They should also be able to deal with them appropriately and this calls for proper training in customer service and relations.
Experiential training may be provided to the employees in order to develop the necessary skills. This is different from the chalk-and-talk training, which is less effective. This is because experiential training enables them to develop skills by putting them in scenarios that resemble those in real life.
They would be able to go through self-discovery and identify themselves with the needs of the company. Consequently, they would be able to develop new skills that they would incorporate in the corporate culture.
The success of the world-class companies selected in Japan and Brazil was also attributed to training (Da Silva, Tadashi, & Kikuo, 2005). The companies had initiated training programs that raised the awareness about total quality management. This training also emphasized on teamwork in order to ensure that the customer satisfaction is made a team business.
With such training, the employees will also develop an interest and need to improve the organization and to satisfy the needs of the customers at the same time. The success of these world-class organizations is also attributed to the policy of training all new customers. This means that both the new and old employees have the same skills in terms of customer service. The contracted employees are also not left out in the training.
Customer service should also be delivered in a way that depicts respect and humility. Different people from different cultures have their own way of providing customer service. For example, the Japanese have a very different culture from the westerners. This cuts across the business sector and specifically in terms of customer service.
The difference between Japanese culture and westernized culture in terms of customer service is that the Japanese believe in the demonstration of respect and humility through words. The Japanese also believe that one should carry out his duties to the best of his abilities. This seems hypocritical to the westerners. Therefore, the westerners should embrace this in order to enhance customer satisfaction.
Conclusion
Customer service is a vital tool for any organization. It determines the success or failure of an organization. Those organizations that provide excellent services are recognized by their customers and are able to make sales continuously. In order for organizations to ensure efficient customer service, they are required to provide training to all its employees. This would ensure customer satisfaction and the overall success of the company.
References
Charan, R. (2010). Profitable growth. Leadership Excellence, 27(11), 3-5.
Da Silva, J., Tadashi, O., & Kikuo, N. (2005). Look through and beyond the TQM horizon: Lessons learned from world-class companies. The TQM Magazine, 17(1), 67-85.
Pollitt, D. (2008). Experiential training ensures customer service in ship-shape at Stena. Training & Management Development Methods, 22(3), 557-561.
Price, B. (2011). Being a customer service leader. The American Salesman, 56(3), 21-24.
Schlocker, D. (2004). Secret service: Hidden systems that deliver unforgettable customer service. Journal of Applied Management and Entrepreneurship, 9(1), 159-162.
Triest, S., Bun, M., Raaij, E., & Vernooij, M. (2008). The impact of customer-specific marketing expenses on customer retention and customer profitability. Journal of Applied Management and Entrepreneurship, 9(1), 159-162.