Is your customer service training sabotaging your sales training?

Objectives

The single worst thing you can do in customer service training.

How poor (or no) customer service training can substantially diminish sales training ROI.

How to align sales and service training around a customer-centric mindset and approach.

A values-based process that helps customer service reps relate and empathize with customers, even when they’re having a bad day.

40%of consumers have a high willingness and ability to

shift spend, “Today’s customers reward or punish companies based on a single experience — a single moment in time…

with an additional 25%building that mindset.

– recent Forrester report

This behavior was once a Millennial trademark,

but it’s now in play for older generations.

It has become normal. And it can

turn a P&L into a leaky bucket…– recent Forrester report

Great sales are no longer enough by themselves…..

– recent Forrester report

One poor experience can trigger an immediate —

and possibly prolonged — shift in spend to a competitor,

forcing companies to increase revenue per customer or growth of the customer base to remain flat.

POLLWhy do you think organizations spend more money on customer centric sales training than they do on customer centric service training?

a. It’s easier to prove ROI with the sales training

b. Customer service is easy and anyone should be able to do it

c. We hire good people in customer people, so they don’t need it

d. We spend equal money on both sales and customer service training

e. Other (write your reason in the chat area)

Cost of a lost customer

Cost to gain a new customer

Additional stress on the sales team

Creating a divide between sales and service teams

Company morale

Finger pointing

Brand reputation

Business impact of poor customer service

The Impact on Sales Reps...

Attrition Rates directly impact your sales team.

If your customer attrition rate is 20% your sales team has to produce 120% of last years salesjust to break even with last year’s sales.

POLLWhat percentage of their time are your salespeople spending addressing customer service issues?

a. Less than 10%

b. Between 10% - 20%

c. Between 20% - 30%

d. Over 30%

Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)

How much does the average customer spend with you annually? $ 100,000.00

How many years does an average customer use products and services like yours? X 4

= $400,000.00

How many referrals will you lose annually through a dissatisfied customer? (guess) X 4

(this number will be the number of lost referrals plus the customer you lost. If you lose 3 referrals you will put a 4 in this space)

Your potential Cost For Poor Customer Service = $1,600,000.00

Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)™

Studies show that the average dissatisfied customer will tell 10 people about their experience.

George Washington University Study

The band uploaded a song onto YouTube that chronicled a real-life experience of how a $3,500 Taylor guitar was broken during a trip on United Airlines in 2008.

David Carroll Band – July 6, 2009

How Many People Did They Reach?

Day 1

150,000

Day 2

500,000

5 weeks

5 million

9 months

10,233,487

Vie

ws

Four days after its launching [on YouTube], the first million people had watched “United Breaks Guitars.”

United stock went down 10%, shedding $180 million in value

It’s Now A Book…

Not everyone can write a song and put it on YouTube, but everyone’s friends can share negative experiences. In our culture today, likes and shares of negative stories on social media far outweigh the likes and shares of good stories.

Negative Stories Outweigh the Positive…

Three Comments

And One Share

How Many People Did I Reach?

The Next Morning!

How Many People Did I Reach?

Zero Shares and

Zero Comments

How Many People Did I Reach?

What Does This Tell Us?

People like to read bad news...

People will talk more about bad news.

People will share negative posts more often than they will positive ones.

Customer Service Excellence Is More Important Than Ever Before!

Sales training is becoming more and more focused on the customer and problem solving,

yet customer service training is still very

product focused.

The Problem

The traditional customer service experience…

Irritates more than helps

Is more self-serving vs. customer serving

The Solution

Stop training people to read scripts

Start training people how to engage the customer in effective conversations

The Problem with Problem Solving

Typical problem solving usually involves:

rigid steps the customer has to go through

forcing customers to repeat the same thing if they get transferred to a different CSR

Lack of emotional intelligence (which can be taught)

Product-focused, not relational (“soft skills”)

The Problem with Problem Solving

Doesn’t bring the customer into the process, even mistreats or marginalizes the customer

POLL

Have you been irritated at more than one customer service rep in the past 12 months?

You Need A Values-Based Process

The only way to create a customer-centric culture is through a process; ideas alone seldom impact and sustain behavior change.

It must create Behavior Change and Consistency of Behavior

Integrity Service Customer Communication System

G-VAL-HI

Greet people

Value people

Ask how to help people

Listen to people

Help people

Invite people back

G

V

A

L

H

I

Common Problem Solving Formula

It doesn’t tell the CSR what to say, but how to solve the problem.

Solve the problem to the Customer’s Satisfaction.

Internal vs External Customers

The Harvard Business Review’s “The Service Profit Chain” study proves the importance of treating the internal customer as well as you treat the external customer.

POLL

1. focused on engaging the external customer?

or

2. focused on engaging the internal customer?

When money is spent on Customer Service training, is the training more …

Bridging the Gap

Bridge the gap between Customer Service and Sales

Both customer-facing and touch the customer; Yet often treated as completely separate entities...

Invest Wisely…

Putting money into sales training without a focus on service training will always have limited success.

““

Perception is Reality

Too often salespeople believe spend months to win a customer over from the competition only to have customer service lose the new customer with one poor interaction.

Role of Trust Between Sales and Service Teams

What is the cost of overburdening your best people?

Are you equipping ALL your CS people to engage and problem solve?

Can’t solve it just by “hiring great people”

Great people can’t overcome a ‘script’

Diminishes their personality and capabilities when you hand them a script vs. a process for how to engage the customer

Don’t manipulate…..relate

Values-based, concrete process that helps your people do what they do best:

More often

More consistently

More effectively

Greet people

Value people

Ask how to help people

Listen to people

Help people

Invite people back

G

V

A

L

H

I

CSR and Sales Burnout

When you don’t empower your people effectively to engage customers and solve problems, you will eventually burn them out.

The Customer Goes First

Ask information the customer wants to give/needs vs. information the company needs…

Processes Should Empower

By focusing on HOW to

engage the customer

By giving the customer a common experience every time they call customer service

The Role of Coaching

Sustaining customer service training has to be a process that’s coachable

Where do reps get stuck?

How can managers support/improve the process?

Next Steps

Identify your greatest leverage points!

1. Complete an 11 question assessment to determine how your team is performing in the key areas from this webinar.

2. Report customized to this group –and to your organization.

3. Check your inbox!

615-385-2246

www.integritysolutions.com

Thank You!