Brian Tong explains why customer service matters for retention and walks through four ways to improve it: meet customers on their channel, integrate service with CRM data, route cases to the right agent, and let teams collaborate on cases together.
What's up, everybody? I'm Brian Tong, your guide to all things Salesforce, and this is Salesforce Explained. It's the series where we talk Salesforce and technology without the jargon or all the buzzwords. So make sure to subscribe to the Salesforce channel and turn on those notifications so you never miss an episode. Okay, today we're talking about all things customer service. And if you've seen an episode before, you know we're gonna cover everything from what it is to breaking down strategies that make customer service more productive and more efficient by while saving your business money. So, hey, let's get into it now. First up, what is customer service? And to answer this, we're gonna start with a pop quiz. But don't stress. It's just one question. All right? True or false? Customer service starts after you make a sale. Now, you got a 50% chance of getting this one right. Okay? Think about it. And the answer is false. Yes. Customer service isn't just what you do when there's a problem. It's the support you offer for your customers both before and after they buy and use your products and services. Now, today's customers expect anytime, anywhere, support on whatever channels they like. And Salesforce makes it easy and efficient to deliver service to them. So why is customer service so important? Well, one word. Retention. Yeah, happy customers are more likely to stick around and do more business with you. And repeat customers are always a great thing. You know, it's less expensive to keep current customers than assign new ones. And customer retention is a win win. Now, great customer service keeps your customers coming back for more, which helps your brand's reputation. And after all, people like to talk. Like, wouldn't you rather have folks raving over how great your customer service is than the alternative? Now, the opposite of retention is called churn, which is when your customers decide not to do business with you anymore. And it's definitely something you'll want to try to keep to a minimum, because wowing customers is. Is a whole lot easier with a customer service platform that doesn't just serve their needs, but can also exceed customer expectations. Now, here are four tips on how you can offer great customer service. Tip number one, serve customers on the channel they prefer to use. Now, it's super important to meet your customers where they want support, whether it's over phone, email, articles, text messaging, or even social media. So let's take a quick look at the channels customers like to use and that businesses should support. So first up, phone and voice. And believe it or not, voice Is still the top support channel out there, but it's a little different than it was back in the days of rotary phones and landlines. Remember those? I hope you do, because today voice is as much a digital channel as email or web chat. Okay, next we got email. Email is the second most used service channel after phone support. And with good reason. It's convenient and makes it easy to look at a full conversation and loop in others. But what about customers that want to help themselves? Well, that's called self service, and it's your first line of defense for offering great support. Now you could build a help center, customer portal, and an online community to help customers resolve issues that they can handle themselves. Plus, you also got chatbots, which help customers self serve by answering commonly asked questions quickly. So if the request is simple, the bot serves up the best content to resolve the customer's question, saving your business to time and that money. And for trickier cases, the chatbot puts the customer in touch with an agent for human support. Okay. Oh, did you think that was it? No, we're not done yet. Because customers can also be supported through text messaging, and businesses can log text messages for agents to easily access and keep the conversation going. So for customers that like to reach out over social media, you can connect marketing and customer service data to collaborate with when customers reach out on social with a problem. And for customers that are visual learners, you can offer visual remote assistance. So customers have the option to connect with an agent or technician through video. Whew. Okay, that's a lot of support channels to cover. You think? Well, the great news is that Salesforce has something for all your service channel needs. Remember to check out the links below to find out how Salesforce service cloud can cover all your service channel needs. Okay, now let's talk more about the key parts of great service. So tip number two, connect customer service to your broader organization. So no matter what channel they prefer, nothing's worse for a customer than having to retell their story as they get passed from agent to agent to agent trying to get a problem resolved. I have been there. You have been there. In fact, 76% of customers expect consistent interactions across department. So how do you offer consistency and continuity in customer service? Well, that's by connecting service to your customer relationship management, AKA CRM system. Now this way, when a customer reaches out, your service agent has all of the data that they need on a single screen. Demographics, order history, preferences, and a whole lot more. And they'll know who to pull in from other departments to help resolve the issue if need be. Now Salesforce they give you that 360 view of their customer with all their details including when you were marketing and selling to them. A clear 360 degree view of your customers relationships and expectations from your brand is key to making sure that they stay happy. Okay, tip number three strike a balance between quality and speed 63% of agents. That is nearly 2/3 according to my quick math. I'm smart up here. They say it's difficult to balance speed and quality with when offering customer support. Making sure the right support cases go to the right agents is the secret to getting that balance right now. Service Cloud has a super helpful feature for this called Omni Channel Routing. Yes, it sounds big, but it automatically sends a support case to the agent with the appropriate skills and availability for your customer's needs. It can also make sure that high priority cases get assigned immediately so your customers get the support that they need and asap. Okay, tip number four act as a Team now although agents often work one on one with customers, they still need the collaboration and support that comes with being part of a team. Now this is super important with the remote workforce. Salesforce embraces something called the heart of service, which means leading your service teams with empathy so they can in turn deliver the same experience to their customers. For those really tricky support cases, service teams can collaborate by doing something called case swarming. Now this approach brings agents and experts together to work through those complex cases that a single agent can't handle themselves. Now when it comes to collaborating, Slack is perfect for case swarming. Whether your team is in office or working remote, your agents can collaborate with experts and begin a swarm workflow in a new or existing Slack channel. Now we've covered the basics here, but there's a whole lot more to learn about customer service with Salesforce. So check out the links in the video description like what is Customer service? Customer Service with Salesforce, Quick look, the Customer Service Resource center, the State of Service and the Heart of Service newsletter and you can always head over to Trailhead for Hands on Learning. Remember, be sure to like subscribe and turn on your notifications. Subscribe so you never miss an episode of Salesforce Explained. And if you have more questions, drop a question in the comments below and you never know, your question might appear on the next episode. Take care and I'll see you next time.
