If a customer has a problem with an organization, the chances that they’ll do business with it again drop drastically. In addition, the person might report this bad experience to friends and acquaintances, damaging the brand’s image. This is why you always need to keep an eye on possible customer service failures.

Good customer service is key to the success of any business. After all, it’s through good interaction that new sales opportunities and endorsements to friends arise.

Expanding your customer service structure and believing that your business is free of problems isn’t enough. Actually, you need to properly train these professionals so that they don’t make mistakes that could jeopardize your results.

Below are 7 customer service failures that you need to avoid!

1. Ignoring important communication channels

Do you still see the phone as your primary means of reaching customers? Well, perhaps it’s time to update your concepts. After all, several digital resources have already replaced the phone as a primary communication channel in many markets.

Thus, one of the customer service failures you need to avoid is precisely ignoring important other channels, such as social media, the messages sent through your website and even email marketing replies.

In order to prevent this issue, simply broaden your customer service team’s area of operation. Make sure that your professionals are monitoring all of your communication channels and not only the most traditional ones.

2. Not personalize your customer service

People like to feel they are valued when they interact with companies. If they feel that they’re treated just like another number, they’re unlikely to create an affectionate relationship with that brand.

Be aware of this possible customer service failure, which is forgetting to personalize your contact. To do so, it’s necessary to take into account your audience’s profile and use appropriate discourse.

You can go beyond and encourage your team to use information about customers in order to provide better service. For example, a regular customer might feel valued if the customer service provider refers to the fact they know them. 

3. Dispense with quality after-sales

Avoid dedicating all of your efforts only to capture new customers, since the after-sales must also be valued in your strategy. Available customer service channels are essential tools to enhance this aspect.

One of the customer service failures consists of not valuing the after-sales, not training your team to deal with cases such as defects, exchanges, questions and even recommending new purchases.

With quality after-sales, the chances of making new sales from old customers is a lot  higher. In other words, you can boost your results with this and build customer loyalty.

4. Not solve your customer’s problem

In many cases, customers reach out to your service with a problem to be solved. Therefore, your business’ role is to offer the solution that they need. Is this happening consistently?

This is business 101, but still not properly understood by many companies of various sizes. Focusing on solving problems is essential in order to provide a quality experience to customers.

The path to doing so lies in developing empathy and looking at the issue from the customer’s point of view. In addition, your service team needs to have the necessary autonomy to analyze each case and offer the correct solutions.

5. Dismissing the feedback received

Getting feedback is a great way to always stay on a path towards improvement. However, this is only possible when there is real effort involved in listening to this feedback and acting on it.

Do you have channels where your audience can send their opinions about your customer service? Great. The next step is to create the habit of analyzing this feedback and finding ways to improve the failures that were pointed out.

No customer service is fail-proof. So, what will help you achieve a higher level of quality is counting on your audience’s perception to help you along this path.

6. Not keep up with trends and innovations in your field

Technology is in full development in various areas, including customer service. Nowadays, we rely on possibilities that were unimaginable a few years ago, such as the case of chatbots.

One customer service failure is ignoring the trends in this area. You need to be tuned into searching for innovations that can improve your work. Those who are unable to do so are bound to always be surpassed by their competitors who have an eye on innovation.

7. Forgetting to monitor customer satisfaction level

Do you know how your customer satisfaction lveel is? One of the most serious service failures consists of not monitoring this rate, and thus, not being able to implement improvement strategies.

This can be done quite simply: Just ask your audience to rate the service they received, including electronically.

From there on, you need to assess the scores received over time and try to detect trends. Is there satisfaction growth? Did it drop? Whatever the result, it should be the starting point for your strategy.

Improve your customer service by avoiding serious mistakes

Now that you’re familiar with the main customer service failures you should avoid in your business, it’s time to implement an action plan focused on ensuring they don’t occur.

Consider your own track record and try to detect possible bottlenecks that allow problems to occur, in addition to including other professionals in this work in order to rely on a plurality of opinions and ideas.

Now that you know how to avoid the most common customer service failures, how about learning how to improve your relationship with customers? Read about how to offer excellent customer service here on the blog!