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Customer Insider, Abuja, Gwagwalada, Abuja (2026)

09/02/2018

10 Ways To Improve Customer Service And Increase Sales Performance By Hassan Monsoor

Customer service is the golden key to any successful business – if you don’t have it, act fast and make it a priority. Customer service has evolved over the past years; instead of just one-on-one private interaction in person or via phone call, it is now evolved around social media as well. Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instconsumer purchase for consumers to connect with their favorite brands almost instantly, making customer service much crucial than ever before. Want to improve your customer service and increase sales performance? The following will help you gain insight on what to do in order to improve your customer service and increase your sales performance:

1. Clarify Your Mission and Break the Mission into Specific Goals

Begin by understanding your business niche. What do you do best? Who needs what you do? How do you best approach these prospects? These are some questions you might want to stop and think about before you start diving in.

Once you have figured this part out, it’s now time to think about your weekly, monthly, and yearly goals. Start off by setting results goals to measure your progress, and track them closely. Increase your activity and measure the results.

2. Solicit Feedback From Customers

Receiving feedback from your customers is essential in order to improve your business overall. Find out ways to solicit feedback, for instance, as a business request telephone numbers or email addresses to text or email surveys to them. Regardless of the manner, the important thing is identifying whether your business is meeting or exceeding your customer’s expectations. Use the comments you receive to increase your sales by improving your products or service.

3. Respond Quickly

The most efficient aspect of social media is that it works fast and is easy to use. It allows brands to quickly connect with their consumers via any of their platforms. Consumers are now also turning to Twitter or Facebook to voice their experiences online – and expect to receive a response from their favorite companies within a 24-48 hour gap.

4. Cross-Sell at Every Turn

A great way to increase sales without the added cost of a separate marketing campaign is to make sure your sales reps are cross-selling at every turn. Cross-selling is the act of offering new products and services along with those in which the customer may have expressed an initial interest. So for instance, if consumer purchase a camera and the salesperson offers her/him a camera bag to go along with this purchase, the salesperson is acting in a cross-sell activity. The more you add on, the more sales you receive. It’s crucial to have trained your sales and customer service agents this type of skill because it is an effective way to increase sales.

5. Provide Educational and Appropriate Knowledge

Customer service should not only be about being responsive, but you should also be offering customers with knowledge related to your brand. For instance, if you are a dental office, you can use your Twitter account to easily connect with your patients, while using your Facebook account to post dental tips or educational blog posts. Sharing knowledge can help to provide value to customers and give them a place to go if they need advice.

6. Create Referrals Through an Incentive

Customers love incentives – so the perfect way to gain referrals is to have your customers refer your business to their friends and family and in return receive an incentive. A study who analyzed a bank referral reward program showed that new customers who were referred to the bank by existing ones were 18 percent more likely to stay with the bank and generated 16 percent more in profits.

7. Take the Time to Train Your Front-Line Staff

The heart of your customer service operation should rest with your front-line staff. These employees are the face of your business and if trained well, it gives your business the opportunity to define how your customers perceive your company’s products and services. You want to make sure these employees are skills at conflict resolution, are empowered to exceed your customer’s expectations and have the kind of winning personalities that your business’s patrons are unlikely to forget.

8. Take the Responsibility But Not the Credit

You’re the team leader of your business; your company looks to you for direction and supports your effort. In order to build a strong support team willing to go the extra mile when you need it, you need to appreciate your team by giving them credit for everything that goes right, and take the blame when it goes wrong.

9. Go the Extra Mile

As a successful business, going an extra mile for your customers is vital. Going that extra mile can change a stressful or ordinary experience into a positive and remembering one, highlighting the brand’s ability to not only empathize with its customers but to also enact real change that positively affects them as well. Showing that you care about your customers allows your customers to appreciate your services and want to continue to build a relationship with you.

10. Take Advantage of Negative Feedback

It’s no secret that nobody likes to hear the negative comments about themselves or their business – but instead of getting hurt, take it as a great opportunity to turn your customer’s experience around. Nobody runs a perfect business with the perfect customers, receiving any kind of feedback helps you and your company to learn and grow as you go. Addressing a complaint or bad experience shows customers that their voices are being heard and that each individual is a valued customer. Increasing engagement and value can increase customer loyalty, resulting in continued engagement and sales.

Use these 10 tips in order to achieve your goals this year. In today’s society, the quality of customer service can effectively enhance a brand’s image. Don’t neglect great customer service – be a better brand and cultivate strong customer-client relations in order for greater exposure and increase in sales.

24/01/2017

12 Questions To Help You Audit Your Customer Service Strategy.

Marketing programs within established organisations, small or large, continue to focus on attracting new customers, while the need and desire of current customers are often times neglected.

What this approach fails to benefit from is the tremendous value of satisfying and retaining existing customers.

A way to measure the significant value or retaining existing customers is to measure the churn rate, defection rate and the lifetime value of a customer for a given year.

Existing customers have a tremendous value, they know your business approach and it policies, they are familiar with your products and services, they buy frequently without requiring a sales pitch. They will not tolerate a decline in your quality, but they will consider new products or services offerings more easily (Cross selling).

Our existing internal customers(co-workers) are especially important. We must work to maintain our internal customer relationships.

Internal customers are often taken for granted. Because they are the people we work with, it is difficult and sometimes impossible to find new internal customers.

Internal customers may not be able to stop doing business with you but they can become difficult to work with, therefore making it difficult to achieve organisational goals and objectives by frustrating others.

How then do you tell if you need to improve your Customer(internal and external) Retention programs.

If you can't provide answers to these 12 Questions, it time to go back to the drawing board and Re- strategize.

1. Is customer satisfaction your primary management objective?
2. Is customer satisfaction assessed and measured regularly?
3. Is there a constant effort to enhance customer satisfaction?
4. Do you measure quality standards and communication results with your employees?
5. Do you train and retrain your customer service providers?
6. Do you have an employee turn over problem?
7. How much do you spend to keep current customers?
8. What is your current cost of acquiring a customers?
9. What is your average annual customer Naira value?
10. What is your current customer defection rate?
11. How do you get lost customers back?
12. Do you constantly deliver what you promise to your Customers?

These 12 questions will keep your business in check now and always.

Feel free to drop in the comment box your views and questions.

16/01/2017

TOP TEN TRENDS IN THE CS AND CX WORLD 3

Here are the remaining of the 10 top trends in 2017

Trend #5: Can your business introduce, complete a sale and provide support without directing a customer to use a PC?

I was going through a statistics after this year’s black Friday and cyber Monday, and the statistics shows that one third of all the purchase made were transacted over the phone, making black Friday the first day ever to generate over a billion dollar in sales from mobile devices with $1.2billion, which is a 33% increase over 2015 according to Adobe digital insight.

Research also shows that one third of millennial have researched a product online via mobile device and almost the same number have purchased product online from a mobile device.
Does that ring a bell?
Mobile (ity) cannot be an afterthought or an option.

Trend #6: Customer Service and marketing by text is on the rise. While mobile applications are having their heyday with over 13Million app users.

Text messaging is quietly waiting for marketers and customer relationship managers to re-imagine it value, and they surely will soon, because texting has some undeniable benefits that makes it consumers friendly.

Quite a number of people said, they refuse to sign up or subscribe to a program, news letter and event because of the inconveniences and long process of registration.

One third of millennial say they would contact a company more frequently if they could complete the process by text.

More people register and respond to event that provide them the option of registering by texting.
Even today more transaction are completed via GTB *737 # short code, because of its simplicity and convenience. No internet wahala. lol

As company’s gain a better understanding of how to use social media for customer service, texting for customer service will increase also.

Trend #7: Co-production via chat bots: Chatbots will provide new opportunity for self service, as more and more companies will (and are already) employ chatbot in Nigeria to customize user experience.

Today chat deliver a direct easy channel for communicating with brand while making logical guesses about what a customer want to do based on their previous actions and based on their response. You can check out how to create Facebook's cahtbot and use it to you advantage.

Trend #8: fast, faster fastest: customers don’t want their time wasted, customers wants a business that respond to them quickly.

Numerous survey have revealed poor result for response time to customers comment, complain and support question o social media and email.

To stand out, you have to respond to your customer faster than before that is why Trend #7 is on the raise.

Be proactive, be sensitive, spot problem and fix them even befor the customer notice and complain. Always be at alert.

Trend #9: Ease Of Doing Business: How easy and convenient are you to do business with? As they know that good service is table stakes.

Remember your competitors are trying to eliminate you by outdoing you customer service.

Take advantage of tech, use it to your advantage to make doing business convenient and easy for you customers.

Always consider 3 A’s
Accessibility, Availability and Accountability

Trend #10: He that listen and pays attention loves his life, so is business. Always listen to what your customers are saying, get feedback and adjust where necessary. In order to be effective and relevant, you need to develop good listening skills.

Without proper information a proper service cannot be provided.

It’s only the person that listens to customers that can lead in today’s market place.

Customers are always telling you what they want directly or indirectly.

Customer service is about building stronger human connection, consistently put people, strategies and process in place that makes your customer feel number one.

Any size and type of business having this in place is sure to win in today’s market.

Those who refuse to learn and improve will definitely one day become redundant and not relevant to the industry.

Catch up with trend or you will be eliminated
Hope you find this useful

10/01/2017

TOP TEN TRENDS IN THE CS AND CX WORLD 2

Here are 3 more trends to help you strategize on how to remain competitive and relevant to your customers

Trend #2: WHO EVER GET CLOSER TO CUSTOMER THE MOST WINS. Value and customer interaction will top price as the determinant of market leaders. Market leader’s market leaders are determined by superiority of products at lowest possible price, but I tell you, market leaders will now be determined by which business or company manages it RELATIONSHIP with customer the best.

Trend #3: CUSTOM(IZE) CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE (CCE): Technology has made it easier than ever to track customer preferences and history. Customers are demanding customer service and experience on their own terms.

Do well to position for this. Don’t just provide or create a general CS and CX for all your customers, they are different and should be treated differently; their needs are not all the same. Trend #4 will help you do that effectively.

Trend #4: CUSTOMER DATA: There is need to gather and store up data, it will and day pay off and today is that day. To deliver an exceptional CCE, you need to start gathering data if you have not been doing so. DATA IS GOLD

Don’t just gather data and dump it, use it to you advantage
Purchase data (history), is one data you can use to calculate the value of your customer

Demographic data is another data you can use to create a custom CS and CX, and also for marketing the right product to the right age, s*x, location, skills jobs and the likes.

Catch up with trend or you will be eliminated

Hope you find this useful

09/01/2017

: 687words

TOP TEN TRENDS IN THE CS AND CX WORLD

I will start my post this year with what is going to trend in my niche, which will give me clarity and inform my audience on what to expect in the customer service (CS) and customer experience (CX)world.
Happy New year

I took time off since late last year to do a study and a research on what is going to trend in my industry, and how technology is changing the CS and CX world, and what I found where mind blowing .

Within the next 2 weeks from today, I will be sharing what I have learnt, some suggestions and strategies on how to position and stay relevant with these trends and CS/CX technologies.

CS and CX are more important than ever, data are been released every day to prove this.

Improving your CS and CX should no longer be an option but a PRIORITY in your business. No business can afford to be left behind in times of customer service. It is cheaper to move than to be left behind

If your thought and mindset cannot catch up with time, you will be eliminated

The question is, what can business leader and CMOs do to stay ontop, stay competitive and be relevant?

There is greater need to pay close attention to what is trending in the CS and CX world in other to remain in the game or be kicked out.
I suggest you add each one of these trends to your business goals if you have not.

1. Artificial intelligence (AI): AI is taking the forefront today on how businesses and companies create and deliver exceptional customer experience to their customers.

Today we see more numbers of machines’ interacting with humans, as more and more companies and even small businesses today are embracing this tech.
These mechines help humans make a better decision and make the customers happy.

Now imagine you wanted to buy your son or daughter a bicycle, you quickly did a Google search and you found a nearby store logged on to their website. A chat box popped up welcoming and asking you what you are interested in and the conversation goes thus:
Business: Hello welcome
What can I help you find today
Customer: I’m looking to buy my son/daughter a bicycle
Business: How old is your daughter?
Customer: She is 13
Business: Does she enjoy bike riding?
Customer: Yes, she rides almost daily
Business: Do you have a particular bike in mind?
Customer: No
Business: where is she going to ride this bike?
Customer: There are some trails near by
Business: It appears she will like a mountain or trail bike. Do you have a brand in mind?
Customer: No
Business: Then let me suggest some different once

And on the it goes until you help the customer make the right purchase, you can even go ahead to ask the customer how much does he/she budget for a bike so as to suggest bike within their budget.

IS AI TAKING OVER THE HUMAN FUNCTIONS?

No, but it is changing their roles and functions by streamlining the jobs of humans.

In many cases AI works hand in hand with humans to do the work better, smarter and faster

AI can think and operate like humans today but none of it can replace human thinking.

These among other bleeding edge technologies does not only increase revenue, but it also provide unexpected value to the customer and assist businesses in making work and experience more productive and easy.

There are other technologies like Internet of Things (IoT), Virtual Realities (VR) and other mainstream tech like SMS, and Social media, I will someday share with you how they are changing the CS and CX world.

To stay completive, hunt for new customers and be relevant in today’s business world you need to be flexible to change and start thinking AI

Those who refuse to learn and improve will definitely one day become redundant and not relevant to the industry.

Catch up with trend or you will be eliminated

Hope you find this useful

22/12/2016

THE NEXT BATTLE GROUND OF BUSINESS

Market leaders are determined by superiority of product at the lowest price, but I tell you in 2017, market leader will be decided not just based on which company has the superior product at the lowest price, but by which company manages its relationship with customers the best. “Customer Relationship Management”

How company’s relates with their customers BEFORE, DURING AND AFTER sales will dictate the next market leader and future success of the company.

The department that has stood out in every business or company is the SALES AND MARKETING department, which is the battle ground in every business.
That is quality plus price drives sales

But I tell you that will no longer hold because of technology
Quality, price and EXPERIENCE will be the major driving force behind sales.
Customer service/experience department will be the next battle ground for business.

EQUIPPING YOUR COMPANY FOR THIS BATTLE

The key weapon in your arsenal is TECHNOLOGY that is your Tsar Bomba, with other deadly weapons ranging from the mainstream technology (i.e. social media, mobile and cloud) to the more bleeding edge technology (i.e. artificial intelligence, virtual reality and the internet of things). I will explain these briefly in the comment box.

Technology is progressing at a rate that is surprisingly impressive, customers are exploring and embracing these new technology with enthusiasm that sometimes exceed business’s ability to deliver.
Customers are anxious to experiment with new technological options with the hope that they will be of benefit to them in some ways. One possible reason why customers are embracing these new technologies is that they are user friendly in many cases.
One benefit of technological trend is that excellence standard is raised and the speed at which business is conducted is increased.

For Startups the smart thing to do is start with customers in mind, And for companies, the smart thing to do is develop a strategy that meets today’s customer’s needs.
Today, millions of people are never or almost never offline, and majority of digital media contents are contents are consumed through mobile devices (phones are tabs).

21st century customers expect technology to have real impact on their daily lives, by the way they feel before during and after doing business with your company.
Today’s Customers want company they do business with to embrace technology just as they have embraced it in their personal lives.

Customer does not just want good products and prices they also want smart business process that gives them the best experience and support.

Customers want technology powered experience

More customers are likely to change brand next year if companies don’t meet their need

How will your company use emerging technology to meet and exceed customer’s expectations?

I am available to work with your team to WOW your customers come 2017

Remember content will bring them, but experience will keep them
Be exceptional or be unintentionally left behind

20/12/2016

15 Reasons Why You Should Never Take Customer Experience(CX) For Granted

Do you know that unhappy customers are likely to leave, and when they do, they take a piece of your business with them?

Well Yes they do

Well, You should also known that customer happiness positively impacts revenue.

That is more reason why you should focus on transforming customer experience to meet modern expectations.
You should also known that an exceptional CX is a major competitive advantage that drives Sales.

Here are 15 reasons and their sources why CX Matters. Numbers don't lie they say

1. 67% of consumers list bad customer experience as
one of the primary reasons for churning. ( Kolsky)
2. 39% of consumers avoid vendors for over 2 years
after having a negative experience. ( Zendesk )
3. 95% of consumers have taken action as a result of a bad experience… ( Zendesk )
4. … and of those consumers, 85% wanted to warn
others about doing business with the company. (Zendesk )
5. 50% of consumers would use a company more
frequently after a positive customer experience.
( NewVoice )
6. 58% of consumers will never use a company again
after a negative experience. ( NewVoice )
7. 86% of consumers are willing to pay up to 25% more for a better customer experience. ( RightNow)
8. 24% of consumers continue to seek out vendors for 2+ years after a positive experience. (Zendesk )
9. 95% of consumers share bad experiences with other people. ( Zendesk )
10. 23% of customers who had a good customer
experience told 10+ people. ( Harvard Business
Review )
11. 30% of customers share positive reviews via social media. ( Zendesk )
12. 63% of consumers read negative reviews via social media. (Zendesk)
13. By 2020, customer experience will overtake productand price as the key brand differentiator. (Walker Info)
14. 89% of marketing leaders expect to compete
primarily on the basis of customer experience by
2016, compared to just 36% four years ago. (Gartner)
15. 50% of product investment projects will be redirected to customer experience innovations by 2017 (Gartner)

Let me help you create an exceptional customer experience.

Be exceptional or be unintentionally left behind

19/12/2016

Cheap Easy And Most Effective Marketing

One of the most effective and least expensive way to market a business is through EXCEPTIONAL CUSTOMER SERVICE.

Word-of-Mouth (WoM) promotion is one sure way to advertise and market a business, every business should take advantage of that. And it takes only a truly satisfied happy customer to do that.

23% of customers who had good customer experience told 10 + people... Harvard Business Review
95% of customers share bad experiences with other people... Zendesk

Obviously customers are the basic requirement that makes a transaction complete in business.
As M. Gandhi said
"A Customer is the most important visitor in our premises.
He is not dependent on us,
we are dependent on him,
he is not an interruption in our work,
he is the purpose of it,
he is not an outsider in our business,
he is part of it,
we are not doing him a favour by serving him,
he is doing us a favour by giving us the opportunity to do so"

The importance of customer service is at an all time high.

CUSTOMER SERVICE IS THE NEW MARKETING.

Businesses are realising that providing a product or service alone is not enough in today's COMPETITIVE ECONOMIC which sales expert Paul Foh described as "super crowded fiercely competitive and intensely infidel. A water full of sharks seeking for blood or any sign of weakness to attack your market share. How do you stand out in business or work and consistently make money"

21st century customers are more sophisticated and knowledgeable than they were years ago.
They are more informed about a product and how it should perform.

They also known that if they are dissatisfied with the service they get, they know that someone else sell or will provide better service.

With few clicks on their phones they will get a competition down the street.
Customers have a bigger voice than ever before with social media.
Your competition are all ears open waiting for your customers voice ( to attack).

"The experience your customer get from doing business with you is what remains with them after they have left, not the service "

Content will bring them but experience will keep them

Be exceptional or be unintentionally left behind.

Let me help you create an exceptional customer relationship strategy for your business, that will leave your Customer with the best experience, that will not only bring you repeat sells, but also make them share their experiences with colleagues, family and friends.

06/12/2016

Your Customer Service And Your Customer.

With each day passing-bye, you see a handful of bad customer service especially in the banking sector and health sector.

Why banking and health sector? Is it because Health and Wealth has a direct relationship?

Everyday you see dissatisfied customers in these sectors because of the need for money and medical attention.

I am sure even you reading this have experienced some sort of bad customer service in either of the two sectors.

Why is it that the customer service representative and department treat customers with disdain and levity?

How do customer get the best experience from service providers?

I will suggest customers should be given an assessment sheet at the end of each quarter or year to assessment their service providers based on how they have been treated in the cause of doing business with the organisation.
That is the essence of name tags.

If employees know that remaining on the job is dependent on the customers assessment of them, they will seat up and do the needful.
Customers are kings, and should be treated like one.

In 2017, there will be lot of movement of customers from one business to another because of poor service.

Customer experience(CX) will be the next secret to attract and retain customers.

21st century customers are knowledgeable customers, they know what a good customer service is and they will ask for it, if they can't get it, they will take their business elsewhere.

Remember, customers are the once paying the salary of the gate man to the manager.

Any business that wants to thrive will have to be ready to deliver EXCEPTIONAL customer experience in 2017.

Is not just about service but experience.

Employers need to train and retrain their employees on this come 2017

It's an investment with hug return
It's important you recognise just how much customer happiness impact on revenue.

Unhappy customers are likely to leave, and when they do, they take a piece of your business with them.

.

I'm Simon John Umaru
A certified customer relationship expert.
[email protected]

02/12/2016

Your Customer Service And Your Customer

For those sending out season greetings and gifts appreciating their customers for their loyalty.

How not to mess up the season greetings and gifts appreciation for blatant promo or marketing.

It's another holiday season and businesses are appreciating their customers for choosing them to do business with.

Some businesses often see this period as an opportunity to sale more with a discount coupon attached to gifts.

NEVER do that.

Don't send seasons greetings card/gift of appreciation with a discount coupon.

When sending holiday gift make sure it's all about your appreciation for the customer and not another marketing tactics.

Remember there are other holidays like new year, valentine and thanksgiving, you can attach a discount coupon to them.

Let it not be about collecting from your customers all the time.
Let it be that your sincerely care and appreciate them for their loyalty.

It's takes max 15mins and cost minimum 1500 naira to send a card to your loyal customer.
What you spend on your Customer is determined by their value.

Content will bring them, but experience will keep them

24/11/2016

YOUR CUSTOMER SERVICE AND YOUR CUSTOMER

"GIVING YOUR CUSTOMERS OPTIONS"

By offering one solution without option to the customer you are telling your customer " Here it is. Take it or leave it"

In the course of an average week, you will probably face one or two challenges in your business.

What do you do?
Will you replace it?
Will you repair it?
Will you refund the customers money?

These are some of the situation we found ourselves today.

Think about what your reaction will be, when someone gives you only one option in a given situation.

How does that make you feel?
You feel like an outsider looking in, because you are not part of the process.

It's advisable to give customer the option of more than one solution. Giving the customer option makes them part of the resolution process and tend to create a positive experience and customer satisfaction.

By giving customers options, you express concern and compassion. You have shown sincere desire to help by offering several options.
By doing so you are addressing the customer individual needs and preferences.

Always give your customers options. It could be payment option, product option, delivery options and any other options you can give them that is peculiar to you business.

Customers feel happy and satisfied when they have options to explore.

Customer Insider

09/02/2018

24/01/2017

16/01/2017

10/01/2017

09/01/2017

22/12/2016

20/12/2016

19/12/2016

06/12/2016

02/12/2016

24/11/2016

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