Customer service is not something you simply offer over the phone, through correspondence, or when you are assisting customers in person. Nowadays, customer service is increasingly offered through a wide variety of means. If you want your business to be known by the superior quality of its customer service then you better start improving your website and making it as user-friendly as possible.
FAQs
People are comforted by its presence alone. The fact that you have a FAQ page is usually more than enough for people to feel safe and confident about giving your e-commerce store a try. If they encounter trouble while shopping online, they know that you have at least a FAQ section which can help them with their dilemma.
When designing your FAQ page, you should be sure to keep the following things in mind.
- Be specific with your questions but be comprehensive with your answers.
- Provide step-by-step answers or enumerate them whenever possible. Bulleted points are also frequently preferred by customers compared to answers written in long and rambling paragraphs.
- Categorize your questions. Use as many tags as you can.
- Give people the option to hide answers from view to minimize the time consumed when a page is loading or when you are scrolling up or down.
- Look for a system that will allow you to add, remove, or edit Q and As easily and quickly.
Contact Form
When FAQs do not answer a customer's burning question, you must provide them with a web-based contact form they can use right away. Your website form should contain at least the following field tabs.
- Complete name
- Complete address of current home or location
- Complete phone numbers
- Type of question or issue (provide a list of categories for users to choose from)
- Date and time
- Product purchased or product you want
- Captcha verification to prove that your contact form is not being used by a bot or any A.I. program
- Reference number
As much as possible, contact forms should not limit the number of characters or words that your customer would use when answering. If possible, you should also require your customers to confirm their knowledge and consent about your answers being recorded or stored for reference purposes. Lastly, remember to configure your website or feedback system to come up with a notification alert that thanks customers for taking the time to contact you. Mention the average amount of time you will need as well to respond to inquiries or concerns.
Online Chatting
Sometimes, even web contact forms are not enough. What you need is someone who can discuss your concerns, and for that you will likely need a program to allow for live chats online. You will typically need a software program for this. When searching for one, make sure that it can perform the following functions.
- Have a priority system that will let your agents answer calls on a first-call, first-served basis.
- Automatically record the discussion you have, regardless as to whether it was done by text or by voice call.
- Provide a chatting platform that allows you to attach or receive files when needed.
- Have no time limits for how long each session lasts.
Feedback
Good customer service isn't always about waiting for people to come to you with their concerns and figuring out a way to fix it. If you really want to impress your clients with your customer service then you should be proactive and find out what they may have problems with at present.
- Always include social media buttons with every action you perform on your website. Activities in social media usually mean your market finds your products or strategies favourable.
- Conduct polls and surveys to figure out what people have to say.
- Contact them by email and see if you can get them to provide you with additional data about what they want from your business.
Rules are meant to be broken. As such, companies with the best customer service don't mind making exemptions from time to time if it would mean a huge deal to their customers. They're willing to take in refunds and returns if it's the only way to prevent any negative press.
As you can see, all these customer service improvements are better designed and integrated by a professional web designer. Otherwise, they may not work the way you envisioned them to.
