Customer service is important because it inspires customer loyalty and makes employees’ jobs easier. Retailers can grow revenues between 4% and 8% above their market by prioritizing better customer service experiences. Customer loyalty can increase customer retention rates by just 5% and profits by between 25% and 95%. This is just some of the data that show customer support’s effect on your bottom line. With all of this in mind, let’s look at some ways customer support affects your revenue.
A customer orders some kitchen appliances from Lowe’s online. Three days later, she finds that Lowe’s declined her credit card even though she had a zero balance and excellent credit. It took her more than four hours to get through to Lowe’s customer service and resolve the problem, but she vowed never to order appliances from Lowe’s again. They lost a big ticket, high-value customer because of bad customer service.
For an order of this size, Lowe’s should have called the customer directly to ensure the order wasn’t fraud and to get the order approved, but that would cost time which Lowe’s doesn’t have.
Retailers must provide outstanding customer service to earn consumers hard-earned dollars. A company with excellent customer service has a team that does more than answer questions and solve customer issues. Providing excellent customer service can save—and make—a lot of money for a business.
Customers don’t just hope that brands will deliver superb customer service — they expect it. What’s more, their expectations are rising. Today, more than 65% of people expect more from customer service than they did three to five years ago.
Fail to provide customers with a superior customer service experience, and they will go elsewhere — even if it means paying more for a similar product. Almost three-quarters of consumers say they have spent more to shop with a company that delivers superior customer service.
Your customer service team communicates with customers daily, which means that they are directly responsible for representing your brand’s mission and values. Excellent customer service can result in positive reviews and word-of-mouth recommendations for your business, leading to new business. A positive public persona can strengthen how people see your company, products, or services.
Excellent customer service is even more important when consumers are stingy with their spending. Right now customers have a lot of choices as to where they spend their money, and if you don’t provide excellent customer service, you’ll lose out.
Fifteen years ago, McKinsey found that more than two-thirds of all buying experiences are based upon how customers feel a specific business treats them. When looking at how to improve your business’s CX, understand how your customers’ emotions influence their buying decisions and behavior. If your business can create a comprehensive strategy to improve customer service, it can more easily turn a customer’s negative emotions and perceptions of your business into positive ones.
Retailers have to work harder to earn customer loyalty. This means adding people to serve the customer rather than just stocking shelves. It means that when a consumer calls your customer service line, they should not have to wait more than a few minutes or wait for a callback.
Unless retailers wake up, they’re going to complain about business rather than doing what is necessary to keep customers.
