L - listen, focus on UNDERSTANDING their concern.
E - empathize, imagine yourself in their shoes.
A - acknowledge, tell them you understand.
P - pamper, go the extra mile to make it right.
Pretty simple. I don't know if I've ever said it before but, just help the customer. Be nice and help the customer.
:)
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Let it snow let it snow let it.....
Kinda snow but it's not cold enough to stick??? Hmmm, doesn't have that same flow as the original.
Looks like we may see some flakes this morning, for most this should have no impact, may want to leave early. Colombia may be the worse off today.
MAGAZINES.COM is business as usual today.
Looks like we may see some flakes this morning, for most this should have no impact, may want to leave early. Colombia may be the worse off today.
MAGAZINES.COM is business as usual today.
Friday, November 25, 2011
CYBER MONDAY
No more hype, the day has come. This coming Monday is......Cyber Monday.
Attendance is THE most important thing on Cyber Monday. We need to be here for our customers.
* Leave the house a little earlier. (looks like it may be a cold rainy morning)
* Eat something good and healthy for breakfast. (and do it a little bit earlier!)
* Be here, logged in and READY for customers at the start of your shift.
* Cyber Monday is a big deal to our customers, which makes it a big deal for us. I need 100% of everyone!
* Let's be just a little bit nicer to people on this, our busiest day.
Hey, your here....You may as well have a little fun and be proud of the fact that we work for a company where we actually get to help people! Where we are encouraged to BE NICE and give over the top service. The goal of many customer service call centers is to talk people into keeping things they don't want...NOT HERE! Many customer service call centers tell you to hurry up....NOT HERE!
Your job is to be nice and help people. How cool is that?
So Carpe the day and seize the Diem.
Attendance is THE most important thing on Cyber Monday. We need to be here for our customers.
* Leave the house a little earlier. (looks like it may be a cold rainy morning)
* Eat something good and healthy for breakfast. (and do it a little bit earlier!)
* Be here, logged in and READY for customers at the start of your shift.
* Cyber Monday is a big deal to our customers, which makes it a big deal for us. I need 100% of everyone!
* Let's be just a little bit nicer to people on this, our busiest day.
Hey, your here....You may as well have a little fun and be proud of the fact that we work for a company where we actually get to help people! Where we are encouraged to BE NICE and give over the top service. The goal of many customer service call centers is to talk people into keeping things they don't want...NOT HERE! Many customer service call centers tell you to hurry up....NOT HERE!
Your job is to be nice and help people. How cool is that?
So Carpe the day and seize the Diem.
Friday, November 18, 2011
The Seven Factors of Caller Tolerance
According to Brad Cleveland and Julia Mayben, authors of the book Call Center Management on Fast Forward, there are seven factors of caller tolerance. These are specifically speaking about how long people will wait and what makes some people wait longer than others.
As I mentioned a couple months ago in an email regarding our SLA (Service Level Agreement), Magazines.com goes way out of the way to make our customers happy. Many companies go with an 80/20 rule. This means they want to answer 80% of their calls in 20 seconds or less. Magazines.com has a 96/0 rule. We want 96% of our calls answered as they come in, and most days, weeks and months we make it. This is one reason we hear a TON of customers say "wow, you picked up right away." We are far away from the average company. This means that in most people's eyes we are overstaffed. The argument goes that since the average person is willing to wait 20-30 seconds without getting at all frustrated, you should make them wait that long. We don't do that.
The 7 -
1 - DEGREE OF MOTIVATION - How motivated are the callers. For us, when there is a sale on they are more willing to wait. Customers who HAVE to talk to us to cancel are willing to wait but are often not as patient. Customers with questions may wait, or they may move on to a different company.
2 - AVAILABILITY OF SUBSTITUTES - If they have many options, which they do when it comes to magazines, they are less likely to wait.
3 - COMPETITION'S SERVICE LEVEL - This is where we win BIG over our competition. Many of our competitors have longer hold times. Amazon, for an example, wont allow people to order over the phone, you have to place on the website.
4 - LEVEL OF EXPECTATIONS - Each customer has their own expectation. Some are not accepting of any hold time, some don't mind 5 minutes.
5 - TIME AVAILABLE - If you are on a lunch break and have no place to go, you are probably OK with waiting a bit longer than if you are in a hurry.
6 - WHO'S PAYING FOR THE CALL - Cell phone minutes could be adding up??? Now a days most companies have toll free numbers. But cell phone minutes could make a difference on how long someone wants to wait.
7 - HUMAN BEHAVIOR - The weather, the caller's mood and the time of day can have a bearing on caller tolerance.
These seven factors are not static, they change constantly. Even so, it is important to have a general understanding of the factors affecting our callers' tolerance.
If we are in Q and you notice someone has waited over a minute.... Do you thank them for waiting? At least acknowledge you know they have been waiting?
As I mentioned a couple months ago in an email regarding our SLA (Service Level Agreement), Magazines.com goes way out of the way to make our customers happy. Many companies go with an 80/20 rule. This means they want to answer 80% of their calls in 20 seconds or less. Magazines.com has a 96/0 rule. We want 96% of our calls answered as they come in, and most days, weeks and months we make it. This is one reason we hear a TON of customers say "wow, you picked up right away." We are far away from the average company. This means that in most people's eyes we are overstaffed. The argument goes that since the average person is willing to wait 20-30 seconds without getting at all frustrated, you should make them wait that long. We don't do that.
The 7 -
1 - DEGREE OF MOTIVATION - How motivated are the callers. For us, when there is a sale on they are more willing to wait. Customers who HAVE to talk to us to cancel are willing to wait but are often not as patient. Customers with questions may wait, or they may move on to a different company.
2 - AVAILABILITY OF SUBSTITUTES - If they have many options, which they do when it comes to magazines, they are less likely to wait.
3 - COMPETITION'S SERVICE LEVEL - This is where we win BIG over our competition. Many of our competitors have longer hold times. Amazon, for an example, wont allow people to order over the phone, you have to place on the website.
4 - LEVEL OF EXPECTATIONS - Each customer has their own expectation. Some are not accepting of any hold time, some don't mind 5 minutes.
5 - TIME AVAILABLE - If you are on a lunch break and have no place to go, you are probably OK with waiting a bit longer than if you are in a hurry.
6 - WHO'S PAYING FOR THE CALL - Cell phone minutes could be adding up??? Now a days most companies have toll free numbers. But cell phone minutes could make a difference on how long someone wants to wait.
7 - HUMAN BEHAVIOR - The weather, the caller's mood and the time of day can have a bearing on caller tolerance.
These seven factors are not static, they change constantly. Even so, it is important to have a general understanding of the factors affecting our callers' tolerance.
If we are in Q and you notice someone has waited over a minute.... Do you thank them for waiting? At least acknowledge you know they have been waiting?
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Are you a professional??
In the simplest sense of the word...YES, because you get paid for what you do.
The dictionary gives this definition.
characterized by or conforming to the technical or ethical standards of a profession (2) : exhibiting a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace
Do you conform to the technical and ethical standards we ask?
A professional puts their clients needs ahead of their own. Many people will give you many different examples of what professionalism means to them.
Ask yourself these questions -
Do you think some details customers give are unimportant?
Do you care about how your peers and customers think about you?
Do you know that your attitude and your behavior can effect others around you?
Do you know that your attitude will effect the way you approach everything in your life.
Do you take responsibility for your mistakes?
Do you accept that everyone makes errors and the best way to handle them is to admit them and move on?
AND NOW THE BIG ONE!!!
Do you know and accept that YOUR success depends on YOUR ability to be honest with YOURSELF?
This is sooo important. Professionalism is something that lives inside you, you control it or your lack of it will control you!
The dictionary gives this definition.
characterized by or conforming to the technical or ethical standards of a profession (2) : exhibiting a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace
Do you conform to the technical and ethical standards we ask?
A professional puts their clients needs ahead of their own. Many people will give you many different examples of what professionalism means to them.
Ask yourself these questions -
Do you think some details customers give are unimportant?
Do you care about how your peers and customers think about you?
Do you know that your attitude and your behavior can effect others around you?
Do you know that your attitude will effect the way you approach everything in your life.
Do you take responsibility for your mistakes?
Do you accept that everyone makes errors and the best way to handle them is to admit them and move on?
AND NOW THE BIG ONE!!!
Do you know and accept that YOUR success depends on YOUR ability to be honest with YOURSELF?
This is sooo important. Professionalism is something that lives inside you, you control it or your lack of it will control you!
Thursday, November 10, 2011
What are the MOST important things in Customer Service???
You can probably go to Barnes and Noble and find 1000 different books with 1000 different opinions. But the lists should be the same. Specific to Magazines.com and I, these are the things I think are the tops...
If you haven't known me that long you will soon find out that I firmly believe in the theory that everything I needed to know I learned in the 2nd grade, none of these things should be an Earth shattering piece of info for you.
#1 - ACTIVE Listening. There is a reason for the ACTIVE in active listening. Bottom line, you cannot help the customer if you don't understand why they are calling. You must be in tune to the 1st statement the customer says. If you are actively listening you can answer all their concerns/questions.
#2 - Give the customer the information they requested. Seems easy enough. But if you are not actively listening this is something that can be a huge detriment. I love bullet points, if a customer comes on the line and says "hey, I need some help, I have this charge I don't understand, I need to order some magazines and why does it take so long to get my mags..." I like to take things 1 at a time and get the customer their answer. "I can help you with all those things. Let's start by locating your account so we can see about this charge." Find the account, go over the charge. "Great, now that we have the charge taken care of let's get your orders going." Take care of the orders. "And finally let’s talk about why the magazines take the time that they take." The KEY to this is I let the customer know right up front that I would answer all her questions 1 at a time. If you don't do that it is quite common for the customer to believe you didn't hear everything and they may start repeating questions or becoming frustrated.
#3 - To quote one of my all-time favorite movies - Roadhouse. "Be Nice". Be nice to the customers, what did you learn about manners in the 2nd grade? Please, thank you, listen, do not speak when someone else is speaking..... These all are great customer service tools. If the customer is upset....Be nice. If they are Irate....Be nicer! If you have to call the help desk you can both....be nice!
These 3 things when done effectively will handle most every issue. MOST customers just want good service, they are trying to get something for nothing.
If you haven't known me that long you will soon find out that I firmly believe in the theory that everything I needed to know I learned in the 2nd grade, none of these things should be an Earth shattering piece of info for you.
#1 - ACTIVE Listening. There is a reason for the ACTIVE in active listening. Bottom line, you cannot help the customer if you don't understand why they are calling. You must be in tune to the 1st statement the customer says. If you are actively listening you can answer all their concerns/questions.
#2 - Give the customer the information they requested. Seems easy enough. But if you are not actively listening this is something that can be a huge detriment. I love bullet points, if a customer comes on the line and says "hey, I need some help, I have this charge I don't understand, I need to order some magazines and why does it take so long to get my mags..." I like to take things 1 at a time and get the customer their answer. "I can help you with all those things. Let's start by locating your account so we can see about this charge." Find the account, go over the charge. "Great, now that we have the charge taken care of let's get your orders going." Take care of the orders. "And finally let’s talk about why the magazines take the time that they take." The KEY to this is I let the customer know right up front that I would answer all her questions 1 at a time. If you don't do that it is quite common for the customer to believe you didn't hear everything and they may start repeating questions or becoming frustrated.
#3 - To quote one of my all-time favorite movies - Roadhouse. "Be Nice". Be nice to the customers, what did you learn about manners in the 2nd grade? Please, thank you, listen, do not speak when someone else is speaking..... These all are great customer service tools. If the customer is upset....Be nice. If they are Irate....Be nicer! If you have to call the help desk you can both....be nice!
These 3 things when done effectively will handle most every issue. MOST customers just want good service, they are trying to get something for nothing.
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