What is customer service?

Customer service is the help and guidance an organisation offers people who buy or use their products or services. These days, customer service also includes the software and processes used to assist customers across the different channels people use to engage with a brand, such as website, social media, telephone, live chat, AI and chatbots, email, and in-person.

Using this omnichannel approach, to meet customers where they are, is the bedrock of modern customer service, underpinned by AI-powered automation and insight. Alongside these great strides in connectivity and technology, customers still want to feel seen and understood by a business.

Often, interactions with customer service teams stem from something going awry, so keeping the human-centric focus is vital to customer service success.

Why is delivering great customer service important?

Good customer service is often the difference between a sale and a fail. Today, a brilliant product isn’t enough without a solid underpinning of great customer service. Consumers have a symphony of options out there, so why should they choose you and your business? The big CX question of our age. Thankfully, you’re always onto a winner when you improve customer service.

In fact, excellent customer service can impact your ROI in a big way. Zendesk CX Trends Report 2024 showed that 75% of consumers will spend more with a company that provides good CX. And the more you commit to finding ways to improve customer service, the better. As Forrester asserts, pivoting to a customer-first approach over the longer term can result in a 700% ROI over 12 years. And that’s just one of many key statistics that highlight the importance of delivering great CX.

Key areas for enhancing customer service

A three-pillar approach focusing on customers, agents, and operations is an effective starting point on the journey to improve customer service.

1. Understand the customer’s needs

Customers are people like you and me, with wants and needs as individual as fingerprints. Today’s customer service software can already gather feedback, streamline workflows and processes, and personalise support in many ways that make the customer journey more seamless. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. A more data-rich world offers unparalleled insight into demographics, purchase history, and common pain points that affect your customers. Analysing this can help you improve your customer service by beginning to anticipate customers’ needs, queries, and problem zones - even responding with solutions before they even realise.

2. Create a customer profile

Developing a detailed customer profile that outlines your typical customer’s characteristics, preferences, and buying behaviour is a useful way to leverage your data trove. This persona will shape your communication style, services offered, and marketing strategy. Clearly understanding your dream target audience allows you to provide a keenly personalised and relevant customer service experience.

3. Practise active listening and empathy

Keep your ear to the ground with active listening. Pay attention to customers’ concerns, ask questions, and acknowledge their feelings - both good and bad. Agents need to be at their most human, using empathy to pop themselves in the customer’s shoes and understand their frustrations to resolve them amicably.

4. Harness AI to assist your agents

AI is here and ready to make all things customer service flow seamlessly. Integrate AI tools into your CX process, and you can get chatbots to do much of the heavy lifting, assisting customers, handling increasingly complex tasks, and qualifying leads. This frees up your human agents to focus on trickier issues and provide personalised support, improving overall efficiency and customer satisfaction.

5. Monitor service quality

Constant testing of the waters works wonders. Improve customer service by implementing a customer service quality assurance (QA) programme that evaluates agent interactions and identifies areas for improvement.

Cutting-edge workforce management (WFM) software is made to manage your QA, compiling and reviewing as it goes. Ongoing QA can involve listening back to call recordings, monitoring social media mentions, and analysing customer feedback surveys. Such QA data can highlight success stories or problem areas that might need some work and tracked against KPI and CSAT levels.

6. Allocate resources to customer service training

Invest in ongoing training programmes for your customer service team. Up their customer service skills by equipping them with the knowledge, skills, and tools they need to handle diverse customer situations effectively.

Continuous improvement needs buy-in from both agents and management because ownership and investment in training works best when both sides are onboard. By continually developing your team’s capabilities, you ensure they can confidently navigate any scenario.

7. Establish a framework for measuring team performance

Make it measurable by defining key performance indicators (KPIs) and tracking your customer service team’s effectiveness - both strengths and weaknesses. Regularly monitor metrics such as customer satisfaction ratings, resolution times, first contact resolution rates, and agent call volume. Use this data to set performance goals and tailor training programmes for targeted improvement.

8. Encourage team collaboration

Good teamwork oils the wheels of customer service. Create a collaborative setting so customer service agents can share best practices, troubleshoot issues and learn from each other. Think about judgement-free team get-togethers, knowledge-sharing platforms, and peer-to-peer recognition programmes to unlock the collective expertise of your team.

9. Develop a customer service strategy

Create clear customer service objectives that outline your approach to customer service and shared goals to improve customer service. This strategy should set out your service channels, communication guidelines, and expected response times. A well-defined strategy ensures everyone on the team is pulling in the same direction, i.e. providing exceptional customer service from every angle.

10. Create a customer loyalty programme

Building relationships is key to improving customer service. Loyalty programmes can feature discounts, exclusive benefits, and priority service to top customers, incentivising repeat purchases and encouraging positive word-of-mouth marketing. By developing a loyalty programme that rewards customers for their continued commitment to your brand, you cement stronger customer ties over time.

11. Personalise customer interactions

These days, generic won’t cut it - personalised customer service has to go far beyond formulaic hellos and goodbyes. Comprehensive customer service software equips agents with the customer data they need to personalise interactions. This enables them to address customers by name, reference past purchases, and even make bespoke recommendations. It’s all about creating connections and showing customers they’re valued as individuals.

12. Define your SLAs (service-level agreements)

Establish clear service-level agreements (SLAs) that outline the standard response times and resolution rates for your customer service channels. This sets out what customers can expect and ensures your team prioritises resolving issues efficiently. Regularly reviewing and adjusting SLAs based on performance data helps maintain optimal service levels.

13. Offer omnichannel support

Everywhere all at once is the plan. Omnichannel customer service reaches people across various channels such as phone, email, live chat, and social media. Meeting your customer on their preferred platform is one of the best ways to improve customer service, leading to shorter resolution times and higher satisfaction ratings.

14. Monitor response times

Upping the speed of engagement and resolution is a great way to improve customer service. The latest workforce engagement management (WEM) software can track response times across all channels, helping you identify bottlenecks and areas for improvement.

15. Automate workflows

AI and automated customer service go hand in electronic hand. Automating repetitive tasks - like intelligent triage, ticket routing, and ticket tagging - into a coherent workflow frees up your agents. Perfect for humans dealing with complex issues - not to mention providing tailored support and improving both customer service efficiency and customer happiness.

16. Set up a knowledge base

Self-service works brilliantly for customers and companies alike. Rolling out a knowledge base that contains answers to frequently asked questions, troubleshooting guides and product tutorials is one sure-fire way to improve your customer service. Customers are empowered to fix issues themselves, reducing the potential workload pressure on busy customer service teams and agents.

17. Implement customer feedback systems

Only by listening to what your customers have to say can you improve customer satisfaction metrics like CSAT. Automated surveys, social media listening, and post-transaction ratings can all offer insight into how to continuously improve customer service. Often, although sometimes tricky to hear, negative feedback can be tremendously useful for continuous improvement, and sharing positive feedback is excellent for boosting morale.

18. Roll out 24/7 AI agents or chatbots

Our hectic lives often leave little room for admin, and customers can begrudge time-consuming resolutions, so introducing AI-powered chatbots or virtual assistants offering 24/7 customer support is a great idea. AI agents are essential to meet exploding interaction volumes, and exceed customer expectations. Unlike clunky bots of the past, AI agents and chatbots can independently understand customer needs and provide end-to-end resolutions, regardless of complexity.

AI agents are emerging as the first point of contact in AI-first CX, designed to work autonomously or alongside human agents, bringing next-level sophistication and user-friendliness. CX leaders who harness the power of AI will see improvements in personalisation, efficiency, and customer satisfaction. And, AI is only going to keep getting better and better, with even greater features in the future.

19. Create a customer-focused culture

When thinking about how to improve customer service, try recalibrating your structure so that customer focus becomes the central pillar of your business. It’s a core value that should motivate your team to deliver amazing customer service experiences. Make sure to recognise and reward those that stand out. Because happy agents make happy customers.

20. Stay updated on the latest trends

Customer service experience is a living, breathing thing, evolving as our taste and behaviour shifts. Improve your customer service by keeping on top of any emerging technologies, changing customer channels, and CX best practice - constantly evaluating where you stand now and where you need to be.