methods of communication

Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#2

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Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#2

Be Consistent

Customers who feel that they have an active role in and control of a service-provider interaction often feel more important and valued. Improved interpersonal communication can lead to higher levels of customer satisfaction and retention and reduced stress for you and your co-workers.

Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#2: Be Consistent Take advantage of the following strategy to build stronger relationships with your internal and external customers by being consistent.

People tend to like what is familiar. If customers come to know that they can depend on you and your organization to regularly provide timely, factual information, they will likely be more loyal. Provide information and updates to customers on a regular basis, not just when it is convenient for you. This is especially true when you are working on a problem or service breakdown. Remember that they do not know what you know. For example, if you are gathering information or need more time than expected, come back to the customer with periodic updates to give him or her a status check. Do not wait until the time or date that you were expected to resolve the issue to contact the customer; Otherwise, they are likely to be very upset.

For specific strategies on more effective communication with your customers, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success and Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures.

Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#1

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Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#1

Gather Information

Customers who feel that they have an active role in and control of a service-provider interaction often feel more important and valued. Improved interpersonal communication can lead to higher levels of customer satisfaction and retention and reduced stress for you and your co-workers.

Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#1: Gather Information Take advantage of the following strategy to build stronger relationships with your internal and external customers by gathering information.

Ask for customer input whenever possible. By knowing more about their needs, wants and expectations, you will be better able to provide services and products that satisfy them. Use communication strategies in publications, books and on the Internet to gather valuable information from people who you encounter on a daily basis.

For specific strategies on more effective communication with your customers, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success and Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures.

About Robert W. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

The key to successfully making money as an author and/or self-publisher is to brand yourself and your company and to make yourself and your book(s) a household name. Part of this is face-to-face interaction with people at trade shows, library events, book readings, book store signings, blogging or guest blogging on a topic related to their book(s). Another strategy involves writing articles and other materials that show up online and are found when people search for a given topic related to a topic about which the author has written.

If you need help building an author platform, branding yourself and your book(s) or generating recognition for what you do, Make Money Writing Books will help. Bob’s popular book addresses a multitude of ideas and strategies that you can use to help sell more books and create residual and passive income streams. The tips outlined in the book are focused to help authors but apply to virtually any professional trying to increase personal and product recognition and visibility.

Customer Service Representative – Active Listening Tips

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Customer Service Representative - Active Listening Tips

Customer Service Representative – Active Listening Tips

Before you can effectively listen to your customers or clients as a customer service representative you must first prepare to listen. That is because active listening is a learned skill and is different from the passive action of simply hearing sounds. Not only do you need to take the opportunity to attend training sessions on how to become an active listener, but you must also focus your attention when listening and practice the skill on a regular basis in order to improve.

The following are some simple strategies you can use to increase the chances for a more positive interaction with your customers when talking to them face-to-face or over the telephone.

Eliminate physical barriers to effective communication. This means stop distracting actions. This includes using technology, taking notes (not related to the customer that you are serving), talking to others, or attending to other tasks.

Block mental barriers to communication. Many times you may have things going on in your brain that can cause you to not focus your complete attention on the person in front of you or on the telephone. Examples of this are biases against a person or group, preconceived ideas about what someone is saying or someone who reminds you of similar prior situations or people, anger, irritation, or physical and personal issues that distract from the job at hand. If you cannot appropriately attend to a customer or situation, excuse yourself and ask someone else to step in for you.

Focus on the customer and project a positive service attitude. Do this through your facial (e.g. smiling), non-verbal cues (e.g. posture and gestures) and verbal responses (e.g. tone, inflection, and pitch) while listening attentively to what they are saying.

Summarize your understanding frequently during a conversation. This is paraphrasing and involves repeating the customer’s message back to them in your own words. For example, once a customer has described why he or she came by or called, you might say something like, “So Mister Brown, if I understand you correctly, the issue is … Is that correct?” This approach lets the customer know that you were actually listening and helps ensure that you take the appropriate action or respond correctly. Just be careful to alternate your responses so that you do not use the same approach over several times. That would make you sound like a parrot and could actually irritate the customer.

Ask appropriate questions to clarify and get feedback from the customer. Closed-ended questions are good for affirmations that you understood something correctly or to get agreement or permission, but do little to involve your customer in a conversation. For example, “You would like to exchange this red scarf for one that has red in it but also has some more supple colors as well. Is that correct?” Closed-ended questions typically start with an action verb (e.g. do, did, can, should, or will) and normally lead to a short answer or yes/no response.

To engage your customers in more open dialogue, you might use open-ended questions. For example, “What would the perfect scarf look like to you Ms. Harrison?” This type of question allows the customer to take control of the conversation. It also can provide a subconscious feeling of empowerment, control, and decision-making. Such feelings can lead to less opportunity for dissatisfaction or change of mind later because the customer made the purchase decision and may not feel that you forced something on them that they did not want or like. Open-ended questions normally start with words like what, how, and why.

For more effective customer service tips, strategies and techniques for active listening, verbal and non-verbal communication with customers and other skills to help improve customer relationships, meet customer needs, wants and expectations and create a more customer-centric organization, get copies of How to Be a Great Call Center Representative, Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures and Customer Service Skills for Success. The latter book is the top-selling customer service textbook in the U.S.

Use Positive Verbal Communication to Avoid Customer Relationship Breakdowns

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Use Positive Verbal Communication to Avoid Customer Relationship Breakdowns

Use Positive Verbal Communication to

Avoid Customer Relationship Breakdowns

Customer service representatives and their organizations spend a lot of time, effort and money creative a positive service culture designed to attract, nurture and retain customers. Because of this, it only makes sense that when you are interacting with your internal and external customers that you take the time to think before you speak in order to avoid saying something or asking a question that might be misunderstood or cause offense.

Sometimes the simplest things can cause problems, especially if someone is already irritated. To avoid creating a negative situation or escalating customer emotions when things are already amiss, choose your wording and the questions you ask carefully.

For example, consider the following technique for positively phrasing questions. Find a way to rephrase any question that you would normally start with “Why?” The reason is that this word cannot be inflected in a way that doesn’t come across as potentially abrasive, intrusive, or meddlesome. Don’t believe it? Get a recorder and attempt to ask the question “WHY?” in a variety of ways with different voice inflection without sounding harsh, challenging or skeptical.

As with many experiences you have stored in your brain, the origin of negative feelings toward the word why likely stem from childhood. Do you remember when you wanted to do something as a child and were told no? The next word that probably came out of your mouth (in a whiney voice) was “Why?” This was a verbal challenge to the person who was telling you that you couldn’t do anything. And the response you probably heard was “Because I said so” or “Because I’m the mommy (or daddy), that’s why.” Most likely, you didn’t like that type of response then, and neither did your customers when they were children. The result of this early experience is that when we hear the word why as a question, it can sound like a challenge and can prompt a negative emotional reaction (blame a flashback to memories for this). To prevent this from occurring, reword your “Why” questions or others that might be perceived as arrogant, rude or challenging.

Instead of                                    Try

Why do you feel that way?           What makes you feel that way?

Why don’t you like . . . ?               What is it that you don’t like about . . . ?

Why do you need that feature?  How is that feature going to be beneficial to you?

Why do you want that color?      What other colors have you considered?

For additional customer service tips, ideas and strategies on how to more effectively communicate with external customers or co-workers (internal customers) and how to create and maintain a positive service culture, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

Customer Service Representatives Have to Power to Help or Hurt Their Organization

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Customer Service Representatives Have to Power to Help or Hurt Their Organization

Customer Service Representatives Have

to Power to Help or Hurt Their Organization

You may have heard that one person can make a difference in the world. Well, one customer service representative can make a difference in the level of success that is achieved by an organization.

Think about the fact that if you are in a position where you are the first person with whom a customer or potential customer comes in contact, you have the power to create a positive image in that person’s mind. You are the face of your organization in such instances. What you do or say from the time you greet the customer until the transaction ends will cement an image in their mind. Through your professional presence, knowledge, verbal and non-verbal cues and attitude towards service, you can create an experience that will have the customer thinking either, “Wow, this is a person/company that I want to visit again” or “Where did they get that person? I’ll never do business with this organization again.” If the latter occurs, your organization has a problem because research continues to show that dissatisfied customers will tell many other people about a negative service experience. This less than favorable word-of-mouth publicity can bring disaster in the form of lost business. And, don’t forget that it is your current and new customers who provide the revenue that pays for your salary, benefits, training, and much more, so you have a vested interested in ensuring that each interaction is positive.

The important thing to remember about customer needs wants and expectations are that if you do not deliver what they believe to be exceptional customer service, they will simply go to another organization that will. By using professional customer service skills, such as listening, sending and receiving positive non-verbal communication, and verbally communicating in a positive manner, you can determine how to best serve your customers.

For more information, customer service tips and ideas on how to deliver the best possible customer service to a very diverse customer world, get a copy of my book Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures.

Delivering Positive Customer Service in a Global Work Environment

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Delivering Positive Customer Service in a Global Work Environment

What is a Positive Global Customer Service? It is recognizing that you are dealing with unique individuals at each contact point with a customer or potential customer and taking the time to listen effectively, respond appropriately and address their needs. It is also taking ownership and responsibility for your environment and customer interactions by being prepared and doing whatever it takes to help guarantee a successful outcome when dealing with internal and external customers. Most customer service representatives understand this and go out of their way to deliver the best customer service possible.

It is crucial for customer service representatives and every other organizational employee to develop a customer-centric attitude (e.g. answering the phone professionally, returning calls and email within a timely manner, remembering little details shared by customers and referring back to them during a conversation, or going out of your way to help resolve an issue when service breaks down) if the organization hopes to be successful. This means continually demonstrating good customer service skills and upgrading your knowledge and skills on a regular basis.Delivering Positive Customer Service in a Global Work Environment

In a diverse world, providing positive global customer service also means applying what Dr. Tony Alessandra calls the Platinum Rule (“Do until others as they want to be done unto them”) in one of his books. In other words, instead of or treating people like you want to be treated, get to know them. Find out what they like, dislike, expect, value, believe and want, then attempt to satisfy them to the best of your ability. If you cannot provide what they need, consider getting someone else to assist who can better understand and address actual needs.

From a service perspective, when customers believe that service providers are knowledgeable about various aspects of diversity and value others, they are likely to reward the organization with their business. Not only will they typically remain loyal to an organization that they like, but they will usually spread the word about their positive experiences. This equates to more revenue generated for the organization, which can then afford to increase salaries, expand and enhance their facilities and operations, provide training and benefits. It can also better market and fend off competition more effectively.

On the other hand, if customers believe that they are being treated indifferently and that service providers do not understand or care about their particular needs, they will potentially desert the organization and encourage their friends to do likewise. This means the potential loss of revenue and all its associated benefits.

For more information about delivering positive global service to a diverse customer base as well as hundreds of customer service tips for delivering excellent customer service, get a copy of my book Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures.

How To Communicate Effectively With Customers – The Value of Effective Articulation

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How To Communicate Effectively With Customers - The Value of Effective Articulation

How To Communicate Effectively With Customers

– The Value of Effective Articulation

You cannot control how well your customers communicate with you during a given interaction, but you can effectively control the way you speak during customer communications.

Speaking clearly and concisely is crucial during customer interactions. Articulation, enunciation, or pronunciation of words refers to the clarity of your word usage. If you tend to slur words (“Whadju say?” “I hafta go whitja”) or cut off endings (goin’, doin’, gettin’, bein’), you can distort the meaning or frustrate listeners. This is especially true when communicating with customers who do not speak English well and with customers who view speech ability as indicative of educational achievement or your ability to assist them effectively.

If you have a problem articulating well, practice by gripping a pencil horizontally between your teeth, reading sentences aloud, and forcing yourself to enunciate each word clearly. Over time, you will find that you slow down and form words more precisely.

Be alert to the manner in which you deliver information to your customers since good communication skills are so important to building strong customer relationships you should. To get more ideas on the importance of communicating effectively when interacting with your customers, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

The Power of Non-Verbal Communication Skills in Customer Service

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The Power of Non Verbal Communication Skills in Customer Service

The Power of Non-Verbal Communication Skills in Customer Service

Like other customer service skills, nonverbal communication is a strong component of interactions between a customer service representative and current or potential customers. For example, nodding of the head is often used (and overused) by many customer service professionals people to signal agreement or to indicate that they are listening to a customer during a conversation.

An important thing to be careful about when you are dealing with your customers is that when you use nonverbal cues, and when you are watching others who are doing so, you should occasionally pause to ask a question for clarification. For example, stop and ask for, or provide, feedback through a paraphrased message. A question such as, “So what do you think of what I just said?” will quickly tell you whether the other person is listening and accurately understanding your meaning. Their answer will also make it clear if the other person is simply politely smiling and nodding—but not understanding. The latter sometimes happens when there are cultural differences or when someone speaks a native language other than yours.

If you are a woman, one other point related to nonverbal communication cues is to be careful not to overuse the nodding technique. Some research has shown that many North American women often nod and smile more than men during a conversation. Doing so excessively might damage your credibility or effectiveness, especially when you are speaking to a man. The interpretation may be that you agree or that you have no opinion, whether you do or not.

For more information customer service tips on the effective use of non-verbal communication skills between customer service representatives and their customers, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success and Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures.

Effective Verbal Communication Can Lead To Customer Satisfaction and Customer Retention

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Effective Verbal Communication Can Lead To Customer Satisfaction and Customer Retention

You may have heard that the expression is sometimes not what you, but how you say it that makes a difference. Nothing is truer when you are dealing with a multi-cultural, diverse customer base.

Effective Verbal Communication Can Lead To Customer Satisfaction and Customer RetentionIn many situations, when customer service breaks down it can often be attributed to what a customer service representative does or does not effectively say verbally or non verbally. In some cases, the lapse may be due to an unconscious message (e.g. non-verbal gesture, body movement, signal, or eye contact) that was interpreted differently than intended. In other instances, it might be an incorrect tone, word or inflection added to a message that was received incorrectly by the customer.

Whatever the reason(s) for such failures in communication, it is crucial that anyone dealing with internal and external customers is prepared for potential interactions that might go wrong. The easiest means of doing so is to enhance customer service and communication skills and to become educated related to approaches to verbal and communication practices in various cultures.

If this topic is of interest to you and you want to get ideas and strategies related to communicating effectively with diverse customers, get copies of my books Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures and Customer Service Skills for Success.

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Three Positive Non-Verbal Communication Cues for Customer Service Representatives

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Three Positive Non Verbal Communication Cues for Customer Service Representatives

Three Positive Non-verbal Communication Cues

for Customer Service Representatives

Many customer service representatives struggle to gain and maintain strong relationships with their customers. Often, this is due to their inability to effectively communicate face-to-face with others. In many instances, they do not even realize that their nonverbal communication style is sending the wrong message, especially their nonverbal communication cues.

Since numerous nonverbal communication studies have found that the unspoken messages sent with the body, face, and hands often overshadow the words that people use, it is crucial for service providers to master the art of body language.

The following are three positive nonverbal communication areas on which you might focus to improve if you want to enhance communication and relationships with customers:

Direct eye contact (based on culture) – In Westernized cultures, making eye contact as an important means of communicating sincerity, interest, honesty, and other factors is taught early in life to children. When interacting with others, use intermittent (do not stare) direct eye contact in conjunction with periodic smiling and other positive non-verbal cues to show that you are friendly and have the other person’s interest in mind.

One important thing to keep in mind about eye contact is that it often varies in different cultures and sub-groups (e.g. Caucasians, African-Americans, women, and men). Do some research on other cultures and groups to see how eye contact is perceived and adjust your communication style accordingly when dealing with customers with those backgrounds. Monitor your customer’s reaction to your cues and modify as necessary and do not make assumptions. If someone reacts and you are not sure why to ask them to clarify.

Smiles – Often perceived as the universal language, smiling can communicate openness, friendliness, interest, and other aspects relevant to sound relationships. Use smiling when appropriate during conversations (e.g. upon meeting, when the conversation is going in a positive direction, or when the other person smiles) and you may see your bond with others start to form.

Facing the customer – Too often in today’s busy workplace, a customer service representative is busy multi-tasking when a customer approaches. As a result, they might have their head down or be facing in another direction while focusing on something else. To build and maintain good customer-provider relationships, stop what you are doing and give undivided attention to the person in front of you in order to help build brand and customer loyalty.

For additional ideas and strategies for effectively using non-verbal cues, get a copy of Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures.

About Robert C. Lucas is an expert with Non-Verbal Communication Cues

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

 

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