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With so many choices available, selecting the right customer service system for your business isn’t easy. Each member of your leadership team may want different things in the system, but at the end of the day the technology you decide to go with should be the best one for helping your customers.
Here are some of the top things to look for in a customer service system so you can find one that fits your business…
Make sure the system matches your industry – Too often, companies are wowed by salespeople and big names when choosing a system. Don’t let this happen to you. If you’re a B2B company, don’t waste time evaluating solutions built for the B2C industry. Instead, focus on finding a customer support system that is built to handle complex B2B relationships to ensure you can resolve customer issues faster. You’ll find that choosing the right system will not only make your life easier but it will also improve customer satisfaction.
Select a system that lets customers communicate how they want to – The days of offering only phone and email support are in the past and is why even smaller companies are utilizing a system to meet the needs of their customers. Even in the B2B industry, live chat is becoming a requirement and many customers prefer to use chat for getting a quick answer to a simple question. Taking it a step further, more companies are also now utilizing visual support solutions such as screen sharing than in years past. Customers can show an agent their issue in real-time and receive a resolution to the problem right away without having to trade emails and screenshots for hours or even days.
Prioritize internal collaboration when looking for a system – Playing phone tag with customers can be challenging enough, so why would you want to do this internally? Instead, opt for a system that lets employees create private actions on tickets so they can discuss how to resolve the issue within the online system where all the details are located. Leveraging technology in this manner saves time and enables everyone to be on the same page regarding the issue. Should the customer reach out to see if the issue has been resolved yet, any agent can quickly refer to the system to see the resolution status and progress being made towards fixing the issue.
Choose a customer service system you can grow with – You don’t want to spend the time and effort to re-platform your system a year from now because you selected a standalone ticket management solution just to save a few bucks. Instead, choose a customer service system that has a multitude of necessary features from the start. Ideally, your system will provide both ticket management and self-service so that the content created for your self-service portal can be easily referenced in tickets. If you can find a system that also offers live chat without an additional integration (and cost) that’s even better.
To summarize, there are several things to evaluate when looking for a customer service system that fits your business. Choose a system built for your industry that features robust capabilities you can utilize right away as well as grow into. In addition, listen to both your customers and employees before selecting a system to ensure whatever you choose meets their unique needs. Choosing the wrong system can create chaos with your customers, but choosing the right one can help in making customer service a competitive advantage and a strength within your company.
