How to lead customer relationships

Have you ever had to change your habits? I bet you know that it’s hard because you have to replace a routine thoughts and actions with new ones – with big, an extra effort. On top of that you won’t get super results overnight, so you’ll also need to be patient and disciplined. As customer relationships make no difference with digital channels fueling change frequency, it’s time to re-arrange the way you handle each conversation that you have.

From reactive to a proactive approach

Having worked many years in customer facing roles, I’ve always heard the same old refrain: ‘the customer asks – you just have to respond.‘ While such an approach have been worked pretty well for some decades, today it’s become obsolete because it doesn’t pay off from:

A customer’s standpoint – in fact they want to know at the soonest the information they’re looking for, or when are you going fixing their issue. Therefore, even they don’t explicitly tell you, they want you to guide them throughout the conversation, because they’re tired of having to constantly prod support agents to get a full response. Today they just expect companies, not just their customer service, to be proactive.
Company’s perspective – if your customer support team is just reactive they lose the grip onto the conversation, as per duration thus efficiency and productivity. Carrying out digital conversations assessments on behalf of my client companies I often get evidence of such a distortions: An example? Live chat conversations that could have been handled in 7 minutes but they lasted 12 or even more, due to a passive / reactive support agent’s approach.

💡 Since the above two factors are linked one another, it’s up to you making the first move. So show the customer that you are proactive through your words (during conversations) and actions (constantly reviewing and improving internal processes and procedures). In nutshell, make your and you customer’s live easier mutually saving time and efforts. Below some inspirational goals you may want to achieve.

Are you ready for this shift?

It’s in your interest driving conversations, optimizing them on each digital support channel. That’s crucial if you really want to consolidate customer relationships in the long run, serving golden assists for your commercial areas – Marketing and Sales. So how are you getting your team properly up-skilled? What main challenges you’re currently facing?