Customer service lies at the heart of every business. Good customer service can literally make the difference between success and failure, because so much hinges on what our customers think about us – credibility, reputation, branding, etc. Yet being able to deliver good customer service is challenging for many business owners and is often abandoned for ‘just enough’.
Unlike our High Street shop or large company equivalents, as a small business owner we’re often doing the jobs of several people – manager, bookkeeper, call handler, etc. Trying to fit in excellent customer service around the many other necessary tasks can be a bit of a nightmare. Are you doing ‘just enough’ to keep your customers happy rather than the first class service you want to deliver?
Outsourcing your customer service to a Virtual Assistant is the smart move for your business
A virtual assistant can take care of those time consuming customer service tasks enabling you to do what you do best, safe in the knowledge that your customers are happy and likely to come back for more. So let’s take a look at how a VA can take care of your customer service.
Dealing with emails is one of the most distracting and time consuming tasks for any small business owner
Many prospective and current clients prefer to email asking about products and services, order updates, etc than pick up the phone, and all too often they’re expecting a fast response. It’s unlikely you can drop everything when your inbox ‘pings’ (it’s a good idea to disable notifications, they’re so distracting!), so emails gets forgotten and eventually, new clients become lost and existing customers annoyed.
Many of the questions and concerns raised by clients will be the same, so a virtual assistant can help you create email templates and standard responses that are stored in your email and take seconds to send. To save you even more time, a virtual assistant can reply to emails on your behalf and alert you to when a client requires an urgent response or there’s something serious you need to be made aware of.
For some handy email management tips make sure you read my other blogs here. (https://banksbusinesssolutions.co.uk/category/email-management/)
An issue for many small business owners is the ‘emotional email’. You know the kind, where an unhappy customer writes a lengthy email of complaint and it causes a strong emotional reaction in you. Our first and natural response is to email straight away either telling them why they are wrong or apologising for everything – neither of which is helpful to your business. A virtual assistant is removed from the situation and able to look at things calmly and objectively, enabling them to obtain the information you really need to resolve the issue quickly and effectively without making the situation worse.
A virtual assistant can foster good customer relationships by spending the time you can’t afford to
Wouldn’t it be great to be able to send a follow up email or check in with our clients from time to time? But in reality, who can spare that time when there’s everything else to be getting on with? A virtual assistant can. From after sales customer care to building up relationships on social media and remembering to send them birthday greetings – a virtual assistant can spend focused time on your clients enabling you to reap the rewards of increased rapport and understanding.
A Virtual Assistant can free up your time to enable you deliver first class customer service
Sometimes the only person that can deliver the standard of customer service you demand in your business is you. Outsourcing other tasks to a virtual assistant, such as administration, website upkeep, etc can free your time to spend on your customers. Imagine what you could achieve with a few hours each week to focus on your customers. Taking the time to catch up with clients not only improves the rapport you have with them, but can also alert you to any changes they’re planning that could be an opportunity for your business.
No one doubts the importance of customer service when it comes to running a business, but the way in which you can deliver that service is entirely up to you and it doesn’t have to fall on your shoulders alone. Why not get in touch with me today and we can have a friendly chat about how a virtual assistant can help your business achieve more.