Customer Service Training In 3 Quick Steps

Effective customer service training can be done in three quick steps. Once your employees have completed the training course you’ve formulated for them, your business is sure to immediately enjoy increased revenues as well a bigger and more loyal customer base.

Step 1: Prepare materials and tools for customer service training. Be as detailed and specific as you can when composing materials for customer service training. It is imperative that your employees understand how you perceive good customer service to be. Give them concrete examples of acceptable and unacceptable behavior. Provide them with a list of dos and don’ts to remember.

Secondly, help them understand why offering good customer service is important to the business and how it will ultimately affect them as well. Employees will be more motivated to improve their customer service skills if they believe that doing so is beneficial to them as well.

Prepare scripts regarding SOP for common customer service issues. This will ascertain that your customer service team will be able to deliver a speedy and uniform response to your clients. Determine your desired response schedule and make sure that the training materials are designed to help them comply with the desired response time. Last but not the least, make sure that you provide them a clear outline of authority and escalation.

Step 2 Take all the time you need to train your staff. If you have to outsource your customer service function temporarily then go ahead and do so. Paying experts to work for you is certainly better than risk alienating your customers with insufficiently trained individuals.

Focus on one lesson at a time and don’t progress to another level until you’re sure that they’ve mastered their lessons. Hold periodical tests to ensure that they continue to retain knowledge of previous lessons.

Let them make a gradual approach to their new set of responsibilities. Have them start with something small and relatively easy like handling routine customer service calls. Always clarify their job duties and the level of authority they’re working with before allowing them to interact with customers.

Last but not the least, remind them to consult your FAQ section before delving in to more complicated processes of resolution.

Step Three Monitor the progress and performance of your customer service team. Subject your employees to scheduled and spontaneous simulation calls to give you a chance to evaluate their response in critical situations. Make sure that you provide them feedback afterwards, identifying their strengths and weaknesses and offering suggestions for improvements.

Develop an incentive program to further motivate your employees. Make sure, however, that your program does not in any way encourage your employees to act opposite to your customers’ interests, as was the case with AOL a few years ago.

In evaluating your employees’ customer service abilities, take equal note of the quantitative and qualitative aspects of their performance. For the quantitative side, consider specifying a quota for the minimum number of calls resolved every month. For the qualitative side, consider the feedback provided by caller.

Last but not the least, always be prepared to make changes with how you run your customer service team. As they’re the ones directly interacting your customers, your team - and its policies - must be flexible in order to respond quickly to a caller’s needs.

Perform these three steps as suggested and your customer service training is sure to be a success!