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How May I Help You?

December 11, 2008 by Efficient Entrepreneur  
Filed under Busi-Tips, News
This article is about 700 words long, and will take about 4 to 7 minutes to read.

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“How May I Help You?” — and mean it.

All too often (especially on the web) the term “customer service” has become a meaningless catchphrase. After all, dealing with an angry customer that has walked up to the sales counter in your shop is a lot more personal than getting an angry email from a frustrated or confused customer. I’m sure you’ve noticed this email phenomenon on a personal level. People are surprisingly more open (or more brazen) in emails and on instant messaging than in person, face-to-face. This has led to way too many business leaders using the shield of the web to ridicule, criticize and ignore customers. There are only a few sites where individual merchants really seem to be held responsible for their actions, and that’s the BigBox sites like eBay and Amazon.

If you want to compete successfully as a stand-alone business on the web, then you need to embrace the phrase “the customer is always right” Even when they aren’t. Find a way. US customers have been spoiled. If you ever really want to see how unbelievably spoiled we’ve gotten with regard to returns and exchanges, stand by the WalMart return counter for a few hours. I’ve seen them accept returns for packages that were clearly opened and mangled without a second thought.

Our culture is evolving to prefer less face-to-face interactions. People just want to find what they’re looking for online, order it and move on with their life. This has been true even for industries that the experts were claiming would never find themselves competing with the internet like clothing, books and furniture. So in the land of the faceless shopping experience, how do you stand out?

Two ways:

1. Excellent customer service–rating and review sites pop up on a regular basis, and complainers tend to get pretty loud. Not to mention the profitability of a loyal customer and good word-of-mouth.

2. Trust–Faceless transactions, although getting popular, still make people nervous. Assuage their fears with strong industry knowledge, clear business policies and a clear concern for their needs and wants.

Just because the web is faceless doesn’t mean you can’t build strong customer relationships. Increase your popularity status using social bookmarking tools. If you’re website caters to a specific niche group, set up a forum, blog or your very own social network to let your visitors connect with each other. Add a direct contact option for customer service, like a chat box, for the immediate gratification younger customers crave. And then there’s always the most popular and traditional option, newsletters. To build trust, add an SSL certificate to ensure secure ordering and sign up for one of the premier security authorities available on the net.

Also consider connecting with your customers or site visitors on a more personal level. Letting your customers feel that they are part of a small close-knit community and that your focus is primarily to provide them with a service. Magicians have a tight-knit community and many have built strong online relationships with each other through forums and blogs. One magic shop, InfinityMagic.com has the owner’s picture and short welcome message right on the home page in order to build his store’s customer base around his reputation elsewhere in the magic community. When MJM Magic first started, the site’s owner and his wife regularly participated on their site’s forum. This level of interaction made the entire customer base develop a personal stake in the store. The buzz on the forum exploded with the wife of the couple running the shop was about to go into labor. Imagine if your customer’s were not only loyal customers but also rooting for your store to succeed!

As you build your new online empire, always keep in mind the aspects that make the local mom-and-pop shop flourish and apply them to your own website.

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