Customer Service the Prime Directive

Customer service is the act of supporting and advocating for customers in their discovery, use, optimization, and troubleshooting of a product or service. It's also the processes that support the teams making good customer service happen. 

The goal of customer service is to foster better customer relationships. Customer service shouldn't just be a department, it should be the entire company. Good customer service costs less than bad customer service. The more advocates you have, the less you need to spend on marketing and those happy customers become your best sales force. 

Jeff Bezos says. “A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn reputation by trying to do hard things well." The COO of the Ritz-Carlton says that their cited customer service policy, which is predicated on the concept of employee empowerment, from the janitors to the chefs to chief executives is encouraged to fix any guest problem they encounter -- and they don't need to ask permission to do so. However, employees can't connect with customers to answer questions and problem-solve unless they're committed to this mission. 

Every person in business should look at this model for the impact of giving the team this autonomy. The CEO of Pepsico says that “when you assume negative intent, you're angry. If you take away that anger and assume positive intent, you will be amazed." This is applicable to customer service as it is to company culture. People trust recommendations from friends more than any other form of advertising, and they tell people about it when they have great customer experiences with a company. 

Remember, customer service shouldn't just be a department, it should be the entire company. Another area that is usually ignored by many business owners is the way phone calls are handled specially when the caller is placed On-Hold and all they hear is some cheesy music, beeps, radio, or worst yet silence when a cost-effected and cost-efficient custom low-cost On-Hold message is available. 

Since 1987 HoldMasters has been helping both Fortune 500 companies, mom and pop businesses, and home-based businesses, around the nation increase their ROI with custom On-Hold-Messages. It can up-sell and cross-sell present clients and inform prospects of your business and philosophy and helps keep the emotional connection alive. It makes a small business sound big and a big business sound friendly. 

Let HoldMasters help you when your business is on the line.