Service 101

Customer Service Excellence Quote – Tony Alessandra

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Customer Service Excellence Quote – Tony Alessandra

“Good customer service is hard to find today.” How many times have you heard that statement? As a service provider (and we all are in any organization of more than one person since we all have internal customers), your goal should be to prepare to deliver excellent customer service to everyone with whom you have contact throughout the day. Anything less is inviting a breakdown in the customer-service provider relationship and is going to ultimately cost you and your organization. By gaining the knowledge and skills needed to interact with a diverse global customer base, you can potentially set up a win-win situation for yourself and your customers.

As an author and motivational speaker, Tony Alessandra puts it:

Customer Service Excellence Quote - Tony Alessandra

“Being on par in terms of price and quality

only gets you into the game.

Service wins the game.”

Tony Alessandra

For ideas and strategies on how to create a customer-centric organization and deliver excellent customer service, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

Learn All About Robert W. ‘Bob’ Lucas Now and Understand Why He is an Authority in the Customer Service Skills Industry

Robert W. ‘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.

In my book Customer Service Skills for Success, I define customer service as “the ability of knowledgeable, capable, and enthusiastic employees to deliver products and services to their internal and external customers in a manner that satisfies identified and unidentified needs and ultimately results in positive word-of-mouth publicity and return business.”

Customer Service Skill – Listening to the Customer

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Customer Service Skill – Listening to the Customer

Successful listening is essential for any customer service representative to achieve customer service excellence. Like any other customer service skill, active listening is a learned behavior that some people perform better than others. To provide the best customer service possible you must master this skill, especially as part of telephone etiquette when dealing with customers over the telephone.

Customer Service Representative Skill- Building – Listening to the Customer

Some common characteristics possessed by most effective listeners include:

  • Empathy. Putting yourself in the customer’s place and trying to relate to the customer’s needs, wants, and concerns.
  • Understanding. The ability to listen as customers speak in order to ensure that you realize what they want, need and expect. This is essential in properly servicing the customer.
  • Patience. Taking the time to pause and listen attentively as your customer speaks. Keep in mind that it is your job to serve the customer and that not everyone communicates in the same manner. Thus, you must put forth the effort to allow your customer to share their ideas, issues or questions without interrupting in order to determine their needs.
  • Attentiveness. By focusing your attention on the customer, you can better interpret his or her message and satisfy his or her needs. Attentiveness is often displayed through nonverbal cues (e,g, nodding or cocking of the head to one side or the other, smiling, or using paralanguage).
  • Objectivity. In dealings with customers, try to avoid subjective opinions or judgments. If you have a preconceived idea about customers, their concerns or questions, the environment, or anything related to the customers, you could mishandle the situation.

The characteristics of effective and ineffective listeners are summarized below.

Characteristics of Effective and Ineffective Listeners

Many factors can indicate an effective or ineffective listener. Over the years, researchers have assigned the following characteristics to effective and ineffective listeners. As a customer service professional, strive to master the skills in the left column and work to eliminate those in the right column in order to better serve your customers.
Effective   Listeners Ineffective   Listeners
Focused Inattentive
Responsive Uncaring
Alert Distracted
Understanding Unconcerned
Caring Insensitive
Empathetic Smug/conceited
Unemotional Emotionally involved
Interested Self-centered
Patient Judgmental
Cautious Disorganized
Open Defensive

For additional ideas on listening to the customer and providing excellent customer service, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

Five Tips for Improving Communication with Your Customers

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Five Tips for Improving Communication with Your Customers

You should continually look for ways to enhance your communication skills in order to build strong interpersonal relationships with your customers and deliver the best customer service possible. Customer service representatives who spend time on self-improvement are more likely to be successful than those who do not.

Five Tips Improving Communication with Your Customers

Here are five simple techniques that you might use to increase communication success and potentially enhance customer satisfaction.

  1. Increase your vocabulary. Occasionally spend some time scrolling through a dictionary and the many books on the market related to essential words that you should know in order to be successful. Continue to add to your vocabulary and knowledge throughout your life in order to become a better communicator and service provider.
  2. Deliver personal service. Technology has increased the options and speed at which you can communicate with your customers. Even so, there is still a need to stay personally connected with them. There is no substitution for face-to-face or telephone contact with your customers. This format allows you to “read” their tone of voice and body language, which you cannot do via other technology.
  3. Stay connected. Chances are that you really cannot over-communicate with your customers, especially when problems exist. It is important that you stay in touch with customers periodically to stay in the forefront of their memory and to demonstrate that you value them. The key is to read their reactions to your efforts, and in those instances when someone might want less contact; act accordingly.
  4. Focus on the customer. When the telephone rings, mentally “shift gears” before answering. Stop doing other tasks, clear your head of other thoughts, focus on the telephone, then cheerfully and professionally answer the call.
  5. Maintain good posture. Sit up straight when speaking, since doing so reduces constriction and opens up your throat (larynx) to reduce muffling and improve voice quality.

Communication is a learned skill and does not come naturally. If you want to excel as a representative of your organization and present a professional presence, you will have to work regularly to enhance your knowledge and skills about people and the way that they communicate most effectively.

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.

Non-verbal Communication Quote – Robert W. Lucas

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Non-verbal Communication Quote – Robert W. Lucas

Customer service representatives are often the first people with whom a current or potential customer comes into contact when reaching out to an organization. Their role is to quickly and professionally use their customer service skills to assist in resolving issues or concerns or providing products and services that they are seeking. Communicating effectively with customers is the only means of gathering information from them that will allow a customer service representative to address and satisfy their needs, wants and expectations.

While verbal communication is a powerful tool for gaining customer input, their nonverbal messages often overshadow what they say and send their true emotional meaning of feelings in a give situation. If you learn to read these cues, you will often be able to more accurately deliver the best customer service possible.

Your non-verbal communication cues—the way you listen, look, move, and react—tell the person you’re communicating with whether or not you care, if you’re being truthful, and how well you’re listening. When your non-verbal signals match up with the words you’re saying, they increase trust, clarity, and rapport.

Here are some quick ways to improve your non-verbal communication asap:

  • Avoid slouching 24/7
  • Steer clear of nervous laughter when the message is serious
  • Display some animation with your hands and facial expressions to project a dynamic presence.
  • Eliminate fidgeting during a meeting
  • Establish frequent eye contact but never use a piercing stare
  • Focus on the conversation.
  • Introduce yourself with a smile
  • Offer a firm handshake
  • Listen carefully
  • Never interrupt the other speaker in a conversation

For more ideas and strategies on how to effectively read and sent non-verbal messages, get copies of Customer Service Skills for Success: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures and Customer Service Skills for Success.

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.

Positive Impressions Help To Build Customer Relationships

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Positive Impressions Help To Build Customer Relationships

Customers often judge an organization aPositive Personal Impressions Help When Building Customer Relationshipsnd the people who work for it based on the first impressions made by front line employees with whom they come into contact face-to-face or via technology.

It is crucial that you and those who serve customers take time to prepare for customer encounters and to prepare yourself to send positive messages through your appearance, voice and nonverbal cues. This will help in building strong customer relationships that can lead to increased customer satisfaction and customer retention.

Here are 5 good positive body gestures:

  1. Relax your shoulders to avoid looking tense
  2. Be pleasant and friendly
  3. Make good and strong eye contact when talking to people
  4. Lean forward slightly to get engaged in a conversation
  5. Share your body between both feet

To learn more about making positive impressions on current and potential customers, get copies 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.

Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#3

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Strengthening Communication with Customers – Tip#3

Demonstrate Openness

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#3: Demonstrate Openness

Take advantage of the following strategy to build stronger relationships with your internal and external customers by demonstrating openness.

Customers often want to see that service providers understand them on a personal level. The worst thing you can do as a service provider is to hide behind a policy or deflect responsibility when dealing with a customer issue or question. Think of how you likely react when a service provider says something like, “I can’t do that because our policy says . . . .” You probably feel the hairs rise on the back of your neck and become agitated. Your customers are no different. When interacting with them, take the time to put yourself in their place before saying something or taking an action that might create an adversarial situation.

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.

In my book Customer Service Skills for Success, I define customer service as “the ability of knowledgeable, capable, and enthusiastic employees to deliver products and services to their internal and external customers in a manner that satisfies identified and unidentified needs and ultimately results in positive word-of-mouth publicity and return business.”

Quote On Communicating Through Body Language – Harvey Wolter

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Quote About Communicating Through Body Language - Harvey Wolter

Quote On Communicating Through Body Language – Harvey Wolter

Learning to read body language (nonverbal communication) is a crucial customer service skill since the majority of the sender’s meaning in a conversation comes from the non-verbal cues that they send along with their verbal communication.

Famous Harvey Wolter Quotes

  • “You can tell a lot by someone’s body language.”
  • “It really gets your blood going in the morning.”
  • “I never take anything personally. If they don’t respond, I figure it’s because of what’s going on in their own life; they’re preoccupied. I just try to help them with what I can.”
  • “You get to know them, and all about their family, their aches and pains. Sometimes you laugh with them, sometimes you cry with them.”

For additional thought and strategies on using and reading nonverbal communication when dealing with customers, get copies of Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures and Customer Service Skills for Success.

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.

Customer Relations is Directly Tied to Keeping Your Word

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Customer Relations is Directly Tied to Keeping Your Word

Customer service training for employees must cover basic customer service skills (i.e. verbal and nonverbal communication, how to build and maintain customer relationships that can lead to customer and brand loyalty and overall customer satisfaction). It must also emphasize how to handle situations when something goes wrong and teach how to implement sound service recovery strategies.  This last topic is crucial since some customer situations can quickly escalate when people perceive that they have been lied to or that a service provider failed to meet a commitment to them.

An example of the importance and severity of what might happen if employees fail to meet commitments to a customer was provided in an article in USA Today newspaper on February 28, 2014. Four people were shot in a tax preparation business when a customer became disgruntled when her tax return was not ready as promised. Read more at http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/03/01/detroit-shooting-tax-refund/5919971/.

For more ideas and strategies on building better customer relationships and implementing service recovery strategies when customers are dissatisfied, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

Customer Relations is Directly Tied to Keeping Your Word

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.

Customer Service Quote – Robert Lucas

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Customer Service Quote – Robert Lucas

Customer Service Quote - Robert W. Lucas

 

“Effective customer service is often the deciding factor in a globally competitive world” Robert W. Lucas, Author of Please Every Customer.

National Customer Service Week was established by the International Customer Service Association (ICSA) in 1988 as a way for businesses and organizations to recognize the efforts of their customer service professionals. In 1991 President George H. Bush declared National Customer Service Week. In 2013, the theme was “United through Service”.

The idea behind the week is for organizations to celebrate service by doing things to boost employee morale and motivation through recognition and rewards for their efforts in satisfying customer needs, wants and expectations. By raising customer awareness across the organization and also reminding customers how vital they are to the individual employee and organizational success, companies can potentially enhance employee morale and increase customer and brand loyalty.

For useful resources and information on how to create a positive customer-centric environment in your organization, check out the ICSA and Alexander Communications Group websites.

For additional proven ideas and strategies on how to enhance the quality of service that you build with customers and to help aid customer and brand loyalty while increasing retention, get a copy of Care Packages for Your Customers by Barbara Glanz.

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.

POSITIVE Global Customer Service Model

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POSITIVE Global Customer Service Model – Serving Diverse Customers

The following acronym (POSITIVE) provides some strategies for creating or contributing to a positive global service environment and building strong relationships with your customers. It provides a model to move you from good customer service to the best customer service possible.

Put your best foot forward. Maintain a positive approach to situations involving customers, smile frequently, and have a “can-do” attitude. When dealing with customers and potential customers, never forget that they are your reason for employment.

Offer whatever level of assistance possible. In addressing customer needs and wants, go out of your way to uncover and resolve problems and to build a strong customer-provider relationship.

Stay abreast of current industry trends and strategies for delivering quality customer service. By upgrading your knowledge and skills regularly, you will be prepared to address any type of customer situation.

Identify true customer needs by listening to proactively. You have two ears and one mouth. Use them accordingly.

Take the time to get to know more about your customers. The more you know, the better you can provide quality service.

Invite your customers to open up and share information. Ask open-ended questions (e.g. Who, What, When, How, Why, and To What Extent) that typically lead to more detailed responses from others.

Verify understanding. When a customer provides information, ensure that you heard and understood it correctly before responding. Use closed-ended (typically start with an action verb) to gather this information.

Engage in relationship-building strategies immediately. Use strong interpersonal communication skills. Start with a smile (on your face and in your voice and words) and a professional greeting when meeting customers face-to-face, over the telephone or in an email. If something goes wrong, immediately start on a course of service recovery with a sincere apology and taking steps to “make the customer whole” again with any appropriate compensation.

Source: Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service across Cultures, Lucas. R.W., McGraw-Hill Professional, New York, NY (2011).
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Bob Lucas B.S., M.A., M.A, CPLP is principal in Robert W. Lucas Enterprises, Inc and an internationally-known author and learning and performance professional. He has written and contributed to thirty-one books and compilations. He regularly conducts creative training, train-the-trainer, customer service, interpersonal communication and management, and supervisory skills workshops. Learn more about Bob and his organization at www.robertwlucas.com and follow his blogs at www.robertwlucas.com/wordpress, www.customerserviceskillsbook.com, and www.thecreativetrainer.com. Like Bob at www.facebook.com/robertwlucasenterprises

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