When you run an online business, it can be easy to neglect your customers and not offer them the best possible customer service experience.
When you have a physical store, this is much easier to manage as you are meeting your customers face to face each day. Online, things are a bit different and this affects the entire experience. Many online businesses have gone on to fail due to their lack of consideration for their customers and the experience that they have online.
In this article, we are going to look at some of the reasons why customer service is so important for online businesses. This will include everything from the fact that it is easier to retain customers than acquire them to the lack of human contact. Find out more below and use our tips to make some real changes.
Retention Is Cheaper Than Acquisition
One of the main reasons why customer service is so important for online businesses is that retaining customers is much cheaper than acquiring them. Finding new customers who are willing to buy from your brand for the first time is not only expensive but is also time-consuming. If you are able to keep existing customers coming back for more, you can save yourself a lot of money and make more at the same time.
If you do want to keep your customers coming back, you need to offer high levels of customer service. If they know that you will be there to answer your questions when they need you, they will return and keep your profit coming in. Make this a priority and you’ll see just how effective it is over time.
Keeping Them Updated
Keeping your customers updated is really important if you want them to hear about any new products, services or changes to your policies. Without a high-level of customer service, you won’t be able to keep them updated and give them the information that they need. When you have a physical store, you can update your customers in person and have posters around the store to inform them of any sales. This is a lot trickier online and so your customer service will need to take over.
If you do run an online business and are struggling to keep your customers updated, there are a few ways that you can achieve this. We recommend checking out some free email newsletter templates that can be used to send out information. You can also have your customer service team be active on your social media channels as this can be quite effective as well.
They Have More Options
When a customer comes onto your website and is thinking about making a purchase, they might have a question to ask. If your customer service team is available through live chat, phone call or email, they could use these channels to figure out the answer and proceed with their purchase. If your customer service doesn’t quite hit the mark, your customers might find themselves on a competitor’s site.
This is very important for those who are running online businesses as it is slightly different from how things work in a physical store. Yes, a customer could leave your store and find another, but they are less likely to if they have made the effort to visit. Online, they can easily click onto another site and get the response they need. This is why customer service is so important for online businesses.
Losing Face-To-Face Contact
Another reason why customer service is so important for online businesses is that there is a lack of human contact. This can affect the overall customer experience as they are not being given advice and getting the full experience that your business has to offer. The face-to-face contact that you get in a physical store can be what makes or breaks a sale, but this is very difficult to achieve online.
The only real way to match the kind of service that you would get in a physical store is to offer a lot of customer support to your customers. You can use live chat as this typically is received well and can help to encourage customers to go through with the purchase. While you can’t quite match the human contact, the live chat can create the illusion that the customer is speaking to a store representative.
Word of Mouth
Finally, you will find that online businesses can really benefit from high levels of customer service because the internet is such a powerful place. If you are solely operating online, then you are probably relying on your website and social channels to bring in traffic. So, what happens if you don’t offer a high level of customer service and a customer shares the story on their social channels? This word of mouth can really affect your business and the last thing you’ll want is to see your business trending on Twitter with screenshots of bad customer service.
Word of mouth is so important for online businesses so make sure to re-evaluate your customer service online. Do what you can to give your customers the best possible experience.
Conclusions
Online businesses have a bit of extra work to do when it comes to customer service as things aren’t as easy as they would be in-store. While many customers who visit physical stores can have bad experiences, the human interaction can help to soften the blow. Not getting the answers that you need from a business online can be frustrating, especially if they are not responding to your emails.
If you are running an online business, you need to make sure that you are offering the highest levels of customer service possible. If you can, introduce some new policies and don’t forget to keep your customers updated when you do. Use your customer service team to amplify how great your business is in 2020.
