Writing Better Customer Support Emails
Email is one of the primary medium of communication in businesses today. We exchange 100's & 1000's of emails everyday with our prospects, customers, peers, managers and so on...
But, there is always a different expression in the business while writing an email to the customer and we all know that writing an email to the customer is sometimes difficult. At the same time, we know that, writing effective email is an opportunity to build our relationship with the customer and we always try to deliver the best.
Let me share my thoughts and inputs to write better emails to the customer with all 12 things we should consider before you hit "SEND".
This might help you tryout how great things can be done through email.
1. Reading emails
It is an inevitable truth that, most of us don’t know how to read an email to respond promptly. Failing to read and understand the email is a major cause for follow up emails and bad customer experience. Reason for not reading and understanding email is, we always rush towards replying to an email with the intent to respond quickly without understanding the depth of information available and fail to share sufficient information. Here is how we can avoid this situation:
Try using the "Two-Minute Rule" (a concept from David Allen, the author of Getting Things Done). If the email takes less than two minutes to read and reply to, then take care of it right now, even if it's not a high priority. The idea behind this is that if it takes less than two minutes to action, it takes longer to read and then store the task away "to do later" than it would to just take care of the task now. For emails that will take longer than two minutes to read or respond to can be scheduled for later.
Understand the query or complaint customer is referring to and relate this with your previously answered queries and complaints to avoid incorrect or insufficient response.
Anticipate follow up questions and include response to the follow up question. Don’t just look for question marks or words like how, when, who or what. Instead read the entire email to understand what customer is expecting from you and address any follow up questions you might receive.
Pay attention to customer details such as name, location, incident or any other personal, product or service information customer referring to.
2. Avoid Follow-up emails
We all hate when we receive follow-up responses on our emails sent. Yes, that’s right, our intention while replying to any email is to make sure we do not get a response again on same email asking for more questions or details. Follow below process to avoid such responses.
Provide enough information for any question/complaint received using your experience of previously addressed emails with similar complaints.
Predict follow-up questions and draft responses using ‘If’ rule. ‘If’ rule enables you to think all possible questions which customer might ask for the question/complaint raised.
Analyze similar emails received in past, relate them with the email you are now responding to. This will help you draft an email with all possible answers/responses.
Try responding with bullet points with short and clear responses which will make the reader understand your response easily.
3. Using Canned responses/ Templates
Canned responses or Predefined templates are mostly used in replying to common questions asked by a customer to speed up the response time rather than typing the same answer repeatedly. However, this can make customers feel like they are receiving response from a robot if not customized/personalized. As you know, all bread is not baked in one oven, same should be applied to canned responses. Here are few things to think about when creating a template.
Create customizable templates with enough free text space which allows you to add custom statements as per customers language in the email.
Don’t sound robotic using words like ‘We’ ‘Our’, instead use personal statements starting with ‘I’. This will make reader know that the email received is from Human.
Always make room to use personalized statements and avoid using As-Is templates. Ability to correct/edit templates helps you improve customer experience.
Use canned response as an ingredient in the recipe you prepare. Customize your response wherever required with the details provided by the customer and make your response more delicious.
It is possible that canned responses will have more detailed response which might not require always. Remove unnecessary statements in the template if you feel it is not required. However, make sure to have predefined opening and closing lines as per the business need.
4. Using No, Because, But.
We all have to say ‘No’ to something that customer might ask as per the policy or for things which are beyond our control. This happens mostly with emails with regards to a poor product/service offered or an undeliverable feature request. The best way to handle such email is by using- No, But, Because rule. Here is how it works:
No: First thumb rule to say No is to be honest and transparent. Draft your email with an indirect ‘No’ with the actual reason (Don’t get carried away).
But: Suggest a workaround. This will help customer know that you attempted to find a solution.
Because: Explain ‘Why’ you said ‘No’ with all possible constraints.
5. Using Empathy & Sympathy
Successfully building rapport with customers over the email is difficult but using Empathy/Sympathy would serve an opportunity to build rapport in emails too. We often get confused the two words empathy and sympathy. They are usually used in similar contexts, but they aren’t the same and have different meanings. In order to keep our email precise, we should be careful not to mix either of them. In short, Empathy is the ability to identify with or understand another’s situation or feelings wherein Sympathy is a feeling of pity or sorrow for the distress of another. Here are some inputs on how and when to use Empathy & Sympathy:
Empathy:
First thumb rule; make them feel that you respect, understood their situation & acknowledge with an empathy statement.
Imagine yourself in the customer’s shoes and able to make the customer problems your own, and meet their expectations.
Few sample empathy phrases: “I can understand how frustrating it is when…”, “I realize how complicated it is to…”, “I imagine how upsetting it is to…”, I know how confusing it must be when…” & a typical “I’m so sorry to hear that…”.
Sympathy:
Sympathy is rarely an ideal response to a customer’s problem. Use sympathy only when necessary or when a customer mentions situation outside the product or services you offer.
Sample situation where you can use sympathy; Customer mentions a loss in their family, you can say ‘I am deeply saddened by your loss and I understand this is going to be a difficult time for you.’
6. Paraphrasing
It’s imperative for us to establish trust with a customer within the first few email interactions. Paraphrasing will help us to build that trust and rapport with customers effortlessly. Paraphrasing ensures customer that you have read & understood the problem. I would also say, this is a major piece in effective communication which is important in all communication mediums.
7. Addressing personal details
How do you know if the email received is from robot or human? Right, answer is personalized emails.
It is important that we use customer personal details in the email when we reply.
Look for customers name, location, history and make sure to use them in all your replies. This will help build your rapport and relationship with the customer and gives human touch.
Adding personal details in opening & closing statements is the best practice since most of us always look at the first and last statements in the email, and grasp what is required from the information in between.
8. Using Apology
Saying sorry is not an easy job. Yes, that’s right. To be more precise, saying sorry to someone sincerely is not an easy task and we all fail to do this. In business, something will go wrong, mistakes will be made and customers will be upset. When it happens, the right thing to do is own the mistake and apologize to anyone affected. In fact, a genuine apology is more effective in recovering customer trust than compensating.
Remember, effective apologies should be empathetic, specific and offered an explanation with permanent solution.
Follow the practice of face to face standard before apologizing. How to do this?
Think if the person whom you are replying to is sitting with you and would tell you the problem, would you apologies? If you feel you should apologies, go ahead and apologize in the email too followed by detailed explanation for what went wrong, how do you fix/fixed an issue with preventative measures that you would take to avoid any repetitive issues in future.
Don’t apologies for everything, there would be instances where a customer would commit a mistake which leads to an error. Would you apologies? No. Do not apologies in this case, rather understand what went wrong and educate customer.
9. Opening & Closing Statements
Opening and closing statements in an email is important to maintain professional standards. A professional email with opening and closing statement leaves the reader with a good impression of you and your business. Using these statements, you can make references to previous conversations, refer and use personal details, refer future events, repeat details related to previous conversation, offer help, provide guidelines for any future event and so on...
10. Spelling, Grammar, Punctuation
We all make customer service mistakes. Errors are an expected part of every endeavor. However, remaining blind to the faults of your customer service emails can mean a real hit. This is also a common problem in most of the customer service emails due to lack of proof reading, free text, lack of basic writing skills.
The best way to address this problem is to read articles, rewrite emails you have received, share your response with your peers and ask for feedback, copy your response in a word document to fix basic errors.
Use plain language to avoid any grammar errors. Just like any other communication channel, always present your emails in a polite and courteous manner. Be polite, calm and use simple language. Unlike face to face communication, emails present greater chances for misunderstandings. The recipient may misinterpret your lengthy sentences, capitalizations, choice of words, and punctuations.
11. Proof Reading
Always review your customer service emails before sending. Check out for grammar errors, typos, and the tone of the message and ensure that the email looks professional. Improper punctuation and overuse of punctuation marks are inappropriate in customer service emails. Always keep your text readable, and ensure you have the right attachment, code or reference number, and that the link you are sending is functional.
Especially, check for errors in addressing customer name, opening statement, solution statement and closing statement.
12. Thanking Customers
We all believe that customer is the King and there are certain times where the King makes conscious effort to think about how they can help our business and suggest ways for improvement directly or indirectly.
As a business, it’s our responsibility to show gratitude, appreciate, motivate and thank them whenever required.
This will make customers feel that they are important in our business, are valued and would remain a customer always.
A thank you note in an email template will always help letting the customer know you are glad to have them.
That’s all for now. Feel free to reach me for email samples, I’ll be glad to share few.