How to Manage Customers Over the Phone? Customer Management Guide

Connecting with your customers over the phone helps you develop meaningful relationships. It improves your brand reputation and reduces customer churn. Managing customers’ techniques may lead to newer revenue streams for many businesses.

However, poor telephone customer service can lead to the exact opposite. So, to help you offer your customers excellent customer service, we’ve compiled a quick guide on how you can effectively manage them over the phone. Let’s get started!

Phone Calling Is Streamlining The Whole Work Process

You cannot manage customers well over the phone if you haven’t established an efficient workflow. You need trained and skilled calling agents, adequate equipment and technology, and a well-planned system to ace customer service. 

So, let’s discuss how you can streamline your workflow.

Create Separate Departments For Common Concerns

When you put up your business number, you cannot limit your clients to contact you for specific concerns only. They will contact you for anything they like. Although that’s good for your customers, it may become exhausting.

You may receive an upsetting call after one that gives uplifting feedback. You may also receive a call about order placement after receiving a call about negative feedback.

Each time you receive a call, you’ll have no idea what to expect, making it challenging to offer good customer service. Therefore, it’s best to set up separate departments to address possible client concerns and manage customers. Some standard divisions are:

• Product Support
• Technical Support
• Customer Feedback

If you don’t have enough resources, you can use interactive voice response to get an idea about the incoming call before picking it up.

Evaluate Call Metrics & Make Necessary Changes

Familiarizing yourself with essential telephone customer service Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) can help you manage customers efficiently. Some important metrics are:

• First Call Resolution (FCR): FCR is a metric for resolving your customer’s problem in the first call. A high FCR eliminates the need for a follow-up call and increases the customer satisfaction rate.
• Average Handling Time (AHT) refers to how much time you spend addressing one customer query to manage customers’ impressions. You should aim for a low average handling time.
• Customer Satisfaction Score (CSat): It refers to the satisfaction level of your customers. To measure this, you’ll have to ask your customers if they are satisfied with your service. Give them a scale or range to rank you. Then, you can divide the count of the best ratings received by the number of surveys.

Once you understand these metrics well, you can collect the relevant data and make necessary changes to improve customer feedback management.

Also, when asking your customers to rate your service out of five, make sure you also ask them if they’d like to see any improvements.

Let’s suppose they say they’d appreciate shorter calls. You can use this information to enhance the conciseness of your speech. You can also prepare a set of direct questions and avoid the use of vague terms. 

Invest In Proper Technology

For the last 15 years, telephone customer service has developed significantly. Many new tools and technologies have been designed to make communication safer and smoother between customers and businesses. Some of the most commonly used technologies to manage customers and services are.

• Automatic Call Distributor System
• Cloud-Based Call Management
• Interactive Voice Response
• Customer Relationship Management Systems

You also have websites that let you know the helpline numbers available for your business type. Knowing what numbers are available will help you choose a helpline number that is simple and easy to remember for your customers.

We recommend incorporating the use of these technologies in your customer handling process. These will make communication with your customer much more efficient over the phone.

Improve Communication Skills

If you have an efficient mechanism for handling and managing customers through calls but zero communication skills, you still won’t be able to offer good customer service. Studies report that good communication skills are the key to sales and positive customer reviews. So here are some simple ideas to improve your communication skills quickly.

Listen & Validate Customer Concerns

Before offering solutions to manage customers’ services or asking any questions, listen to all your customers have to say. 

Once they’re done, don’t hesitate to ask questions to help you understand their situation better. Doing so will reflect your sincerity, help you cater to them better, and develop trust.

In case you receive any angry calls, ensure that you listen calmly. It makes customers feel acknowledged and allows you to flip the narrative.

Be Patient

Customer service has its pros and cons. And one of the cons is that your customers might not always treat you well. They may take up a lot of your time. Or they may not know how to communicate their concern politely.

If you prepare yourself mentally to deal with these situations patiently, you’ll be able to respond better and manage customers more efficiently.

Use Their Name

As soon as you connect, inquire about your customer’s name and use it casually throughout the conversation. 

It builds trust and creates familiarity. But don’t overuse it, and ask for the pronunciation if you’re unsure.

Avoid Putting Them On Hold

Your customer called you because they want a quick solution to their problem. It’s a bad idea to mismanage customers and keep them waiting even for a minute. 

So, it’s a good idea to avoid putting your customers on hold unless it’s inevitable.

Conclusion:

For every business, the customers are always the most valuable part. If you like to manage customers properly, these tips will help you. Many modern digital techniques have been introduced, but cold calling is still in practice. You also can build more trustworthy relationships with your consumers through cold calling.

Read Also:

• Why Customer Service Is Vital To Your Business
• 4 Strategies to Improve Your Customer Service
• Learn to Handle Increasing Customer Service Demands With Easy Tips
• How to Increase Customer Retention with Custom Packaging