It isn’t easy to excel at customer service, and no one knows this quite like customer service employees do. It’s always been hard enough to stay calm when dealing with irate customers, but now that we’re officially in the Age of the Consumer, customer service has to go beyond being customer-focused to be fully customer-centric in order to provide the kind of experience that serves as an important differentiator.
So why should your employees be reading customer service blogs? There a plenty of reasons and below we list the top 5, but in a nutshell – it’s because every day they go to war with an untold number of companies to try and increase retention, loyalty and customer lifetime value, and they need to be fully and effectively armed.
Reason #1: Seeing the big picture
As with anything in business, customer service goes through major shifts and the emergence of significant trends. Just a few short years ago a business may have thought they were getting ahead of the competition by investing in call back technology. Today? The idea of prioritizing telephone customer support is quaint, to use a euphemism. Currently, a shift from customer service on social media to messaging apps is happening.
Your employees may not be able to identify changes and trends from inside the maelstrom of customer service, but customer service blogs are written by professionals whose job is analyzing the way customer service is evolving. Allow blogs to paint the big picture, and allow your employees to absorb it.
Reason #2: Examining the details
So customer service is shifting to messaging apps. That’s essential to know, but there’s a lot more to it than just that fact. Should you have live agents in the app? A self-service tool? How long are customers willing to wait when they make contact via messaging app? What can be accomplished within the app? Can purchases be completed? What happens when a customer has to switch devices or interrupt their transaction?
Customer service blogs are a one-stop shop for the distilled information necessary for staying on top of the customer experience. Stats, infographics and key insights are all served up for easy consumption. The big picture painted by blogs provides the what of various customer service trends and strategies, while the details provide the why and how.
Reason #3: Keeping up with customer service technology and tools
No matter how good sales or customer service employees are, they can’t do it all on their own. Nor should they, considering the quality of customer service tools and technologies that are widely available today.
However, no one has time to stay on top of all the emerging technologies and tools, identifying the ones that are actually worthwhile and learning how to implement, configure and use them for best results…except for an expert writing a blog on exactly those topics, of course. A good place to start is nanorep’s customer service blog. As a leading provider of digital customer service tools, nanorep’s blog expertly covers customer service tools and technology and how they integrate into successful customer service strategies, as well as a wide variety of subjects all relating to improving customer experience.
Reason #4: Learning by example
Industry leaders are industry leaders for a reason. There is much to be gained from the examples set by companies big, small and in-between when it comes to creating the kind of customer experience that stands out as truly exceptional, and when customer happiness is at stake, there is no shame in stealing effective customer service steps and strategies straight out of someone else’s playbook. These lessons are all there to learn on leading customer service blogs.
Conversely, there is also much to be learned from case studies on challenges faced by other brands and the solutions they found. Reading about these issues can be very illuminating for your team.
Reason #5: It establishes customer service as a company-wide priority
A focus on exemplary customer service isn’t something that’s limited to customer service representatives or salespeople. For a brand to provide a truly customer-centric experience, it has to be a part of the brand’s culture – that means departments ranging from marketing to programming to research and development all have to be cognizant of what it takes to keep customers happy and loyal.
Encouraging the consumption of leading customer service blogs by all employees, not just customer service employees, helps set the tone for the customer-first and customer-centric culture of the brand and empowers the employees on the front lines of the battle for increased customer lifetime value.