People crave human connections. They want personalized experiences and genuine interactions. They want to be valued as individuals rather than just transactions. The best way to provide the connections that people want and to show that you value them is to get personal.
And what we mean by that, is to deliver personal customer service.
Not sure how to do that? In this article, we’ll walk you through exactly what personal customer service is, why it’s important, and how to provide it for your customers.
What is personal customer service?
Personal customer service is all about building genuine relationships and connections with your customers. It means providing service that goes beyond a standard script or one-size-fits-all solution. You need to understand customer’s needs, address their concerns, and make sure they feel seen and valued by your business. Essentially, it’s creating an individualized experience for each person that interacts with your business.
Personal customer service includes several key principles:
- Individual attention: Instead of treating customers as faceless tickets, treat them as individuals. Acknowledge any past interactions and specific requirements.
- Empathy and understanding: Don’t just solve problems but also understand the customer’s perspective. This requires empathy and active listening to their concerns.
- Proactive engagement: Rather than just reacting to customer questions, be proactive. Anticipate needs and reach out to customers to offer help before they even ask for it. Respond to questions quickly to improve customers’ experience with your business.
- Consistency: Even though it’s personalized, personal customer service is consistent. Adhere to your brand’s values and quality standards while adapting to individual customer needs.
Related: 10 Customer Service Best Practices For Every Business
Benefits of Personal Customer Service
Personalized customer service has numerous benefits for businesses that are ready to invest in creating genuine relationships with their customers. Here are a few of those benefits:
Increase Your Loyal Customers
“Just having satisfied customers isn’t good enough anymore. If you really want a booming business, you have to create raving fans.” – Ken Blanchard
Ken Blanchard is right, and one of the key ways to create raving fans is to provide personal customer service. In fact, businesses that provide good personalization have a 1.5 times higher customer loyalty rate than those that don’t. (Deloitte)
Delivering personal customer service helps customers feel like your business genuinely cares about their problems. As a result, they are more likely to become loyal customers. Loyal customers are not only repeat buyers but often become raving fans who spread positive word-of-mouth referrals.
Customers who come to you through word of mouth are solid customers who have already been sold on your business. These customers don’t have doubts about your company because they heard about you from people they trust.
Gain a Better Business Reputation
Businesses that prioritize personalization are often seen as more customer-centric and attentive. This positive perception makes customers rust and believe your company more.
As more people trust and like your company, your brand becomes known for being dedicated to making customers happy. This brings in more customers and solidifies your position in the market.
If your brand is known for its excellent personal customer service, you also have a buffer against potential negative publicity for possible mistakes. Customers are more forgiving of businesses they have positive relationships with. If issues arise, they are more likely to give your brand the benefit of the doubt because they understand you’re committed to resolving their problems.
Improve Your Customer Retention
Customers who don’t get support become someone else’s customers. Personal customer support helps you keep your customers, your customers, because it helps them feel valued. Customers who feel valued are less likely to switch to competitors and are more likely to stay with your business long-term.
According to studies, personalization also yields 20% higher customer satisfaction rates. (Mckinsey). Satisfied customers are far less likely to be captured by your competitors. Instead, they stay with your business and become strong advocates.
Ultimately, the effort put into providing personal customer support translates into a stronger, longer-lasting customer base that helps your business thrive.
How Do You Provide Personal Customer Service?
Delivering personal customer service requires a shift in mindset and approach. The following are some strategies to help you provide this level of service.
Create Deeper Conversations
Go beyond transactional exchanges and create deeper conversations with customers so you can really get to know them. Ask open-ended questions and engage in conversations that tell you more about the customer. Encourage them to share more about their needs and the issue(s) they’re contacting you about. Pay close attention to what your customers are saying. Reflect on their concerns and address them in your responses.
A good way to think about your communication with customers is to imagine they’re your best friend. Listen to all their concerns with empathy. Then, focus on finding a solution to their problem.
The better you understand your customers, the stronger your relationship with them will become. When customers have a strong connection with your business, they’re less likely to leave.
Form Personal Relationships
No one likes the call-center type of customer service: generic, anonymous, and templated. That’s why building actual connections and relationships with customers is so important.
Remember customers’ names, past interactions, and any relevant details that can be used to personalize future interactions. It’s easier to give personal customer service when you know this information and have built a connection with the customer.
Additionally, send personalized follow-up messages to customers to show appreciation for their business or to recap the support you provided. Investing time in nurturing these relationships leads to long-term customer loyalty.
To further form personal relationships, make sure all customer support reps introduce themselves, whether on a call, in a text, or an email. Have them add a little bit of their personality into the conversations they have with customers. Customers like to know who they are talking with. It also gives your customer service team more accountability when customers know who they are.
Listen to Feedback
Encourage customers to share their thoughts and actually listen to what they have to say. Create channels for customers to share their thoughts and concerns and, most importantly, take action on their feedback. Customers’ trust in your business increases when their input is valued and acted upon.
Gathering feedback and taking action can transform even the most demanding customers into your biggest fans, strengthening the connection between your business and its loyal customers.
Use Skipio
Skipio, an automated text marketing tool, helps you easily provide personal customer service.
Connect faster and in the most convenient way by adding Skipio’s webchat, Web2Txt, to your site. You’ll close more support tickets because you’ll be able to immediately send personalized text messages to every customer.
With Skipio, you can also set up automated messages to quickly and efficiently handle common customer questions and outreach. And you can still keep messages personalized by using the merge field feature, which lets you import customer information such as their first name. This allows you to always personalize every message, no matter how many people you’re texting.
Schedule a demo today to learn more about Skipio’s features and how to use text messaging to start personalizing your customer support.
