Unit 1 Introduction to Customer Service IGNOU BBARIL BRL 105 Customer Service Management

Unit 1 Introduction to Customer Service, IGNOU BBARIL BRL 105 Customer Service Management

Important topics in Customer Service Management

• What is Customer Service Management
• Importance of Customer Service Management (Important)
• Types of Customer Service Management
• Why is Improving Customer Service Management important?
• Quality of Customer Service
• Parameter That helps in Good Customer Service
• Barrier to Customer Service
• Single Bagger And Double Bagger (Very Important)
• Good or Bad Customer Service (Very Important)
• Effective Customer Service

What is Customer Service Management?

Customer service refer to the Meeting the needs and expectation of customer which means the facility which helps the customer in meeting the need and expectation to improve their overall experience. It is one of the important sector in Retail organisation. Every organisation who want to maintain long term Relationship, will work on customer service department. When we talk about customer service it’s means Normal Customer Service and Good Customer Service.

Definition of Customer Service: Customer service is the set of activities which were designed to enhance the overall level of Customer satisfaction. It is refer to the feeling that customer expected after using of product or services.

Key Points of Customer Service:

• Customer Service means creating the positive experience and memorable for every customer.
• Customer Service also called Client Service or Consumer Service
• According to the Lalonde and Zinser, Customer service is the activities between Customer and the corporate which enhance consumers needs an increase sales by use of product or service.
• Taking care of customer needs and enchancing what is expected adding value and integrity to all organisation.

After managing of these customer service and provided them in a systematic way comes under the Customer Service Management.

Importance of Customer Service

Their are several advantages of Customer Services, but some of the main importance that customer service highlights are Helps in retaining customer, Boost employee retention, Proactively Address Customer Issues, Boost Lifetime customer value, Advantage in Retail Competition, References to other customer. Helps Retaining Customer: With friendly exchange or return policy creates enhancing experience for customer hence retail organisation gain loyal customer. Boost Employee Retention: Retailer who treats their customer well, may enjoy employee retention. As employee will always works with company who behave customer well hence create positive environment. Proactively Address Customer Issues: Good customer service will always proactively achieve Customer issues, so we can reached to the customer before the problem arises. With the help of CRM (Customer Resource Management) retailer easily gives solution to their problem on the basis of taste preference. Boost Customer Lifetime Value: Life Time value refer to the expected amount retailer assume from the customer over their life. In increase the revenue of company. Advantage in Retail Competition: All the Companies in retail industry may supply almost similar product but still they have create different image on customer minds. so with the help of good service we can build the image of outlet hence easily beats the competition. References: With the good customer service, it improve customer experience hence improve positive word of mouth reference.

Types of Customer Service Quality

• Good Customer Service: Services that meet customer need but still need some improvement.
• Best Customer Service: The service that are at final level for customer satisfaction.
• Average Customer Service: The service that meet customer need to some extend but not fully. Their are some gap between satisfaction.
• Exceptional Customer Service: The service unexpected by customer. for example in a shop their is policy of 15 day return of purchased clothes but he accept your return clothes after 15 day without having proper billing and tags comes under exceptional customer service.
• Poor Customer Service: The service that does not meet customer need.
• No Feedback on quality of Customer Service: In some case when customer does not share his experience on the quality of service provide. In this service may be good or may be bad.

Why is Improving Customer Service Management important?

Increase Profitability of the company: According to Research 86% of Customer pay more for better customer service. This lead to increase of 80% of Company profitability. So we have to work on quality of Service Increase loyalty: Provide good Customer service gain customer loyalty. The factor that influenced loyalty are Product quality, variety, service, after sales service, assortment and Pricing etc. If we regularly work on increasing the customer experience than loyalty towards the store increases. For Future vision we will also work on quick and contactless Payment option.

Quality of Customer Service

For providing the quality Customer service to customer we should always have to keep in mind about Emotional intelligent, Attentive listening, Full of alternative, Timely, Personalised Service and Inspiring.

Emotionally Intelligent: A customer service must be great, when service department of retail knows what to do when things goes wrong. As Service team must ensure to equip right amount of emotional intelligence on particular issues. The service member have to deal day and night with different customer, so they must know to adapt or easily change their emotional state. Attentive listening: The main issues arise in retail because of not attentive listening of customer preferences and issues. If we listening the requirement of customer carefully then other problem not arise. Full of Alternative: As customer knows their importance to the retailer so their are different channel of communication for customers to convey their query. Timely: All the service will be excellent when service is provided to customer on time, which means that service is faster and quick with complete information on customer queries. Personalised Service: With the increase in awareness of customer service concept. The expectation of customer increases which lead to providing of personalised service to customer. Inspire: The work environment are helpful for staff, so they inspire customers to trust them.

Parameter of Customer Service

Attentive listening: Salesperson must focus on Customers explanation not on what is suitable for them. Their is difference between listening and hearing. Listening comes in active nature and hearing comes in passive nature. Clarity in Communication: Salesperson should clearly Communicate to customer, avoiding technical terms, use simple language and choose language (English/ Hindi ) on the basis of their comfort. Positive Attitude: The salesperson should be optimistic, create positive environment for customer to purchase. Feeling of confident: The sales person should have full knowledge of product so that customer feel confident for the product that they are going to purchase. Make the customer feel comfortable: Proper interaction with the customer so that they feel comfortable. Customer convenience: It consists of all the activities that are convenient for customer for ex hygiene, cleanliness, positive environment etc.

Barrier of Customer service

Some of the barrier we have to keep in mind while providing customer service to consumer are : laziness, poor time management, poor communication skills, unhelpful attitude, lack of training and lack of products knowledge.

Laziness: Sometimes Salesperson should avoid customer interaction because of laziness, which create negative image in mind of customer. Poor time management: Because of poor time management by salesperson, customer have to wait unnecessarily for long time which led to loosing of that customer. Poor communication Skills: As because of poor communication skills by salesperson, their is no proper interaction with customer this lead to decline of customer experience. Lack of training: Not having proper knowledge of products or services, will not solve the query of customer hence become the barrier for Customer service. Unhelpful attitude: These unhelpful attitude shown by Salesperson will reduce the satisfaction of the customer.

Single Bagger and Double Bagger

Before understanding of Bagger we should first understand the meaning of Bagger. Bagger are basically that persons who puts customer shopping into the bag. And on the basis of attitude towards work these are further classified into Single Bagger and Double Bagger.

Single Bagger: Single Bagger have a negative attitude towards their work, these are those person who limits their own development as well as others. Certain characteristics of Single Bagger are lack of commitment, always use single bag without even care of whether it is secure or not, all the groceries stuffed in the bag randomly.

Double Bagger: Double Bagger are those person who develops themselves as well as others too. They have positive attitude towards their work. Certain characteristics of double bagger are they use extra bag as a secure and they sort all the groceries effeciently in sortful manner. They have extra time and energy to give smileful remark to customer and also finds time for proper parking of vehicles outside supermarket.

Good Customer Service or Bad Customer Service

Difference between good customer service and bad customer services are:

• In Good Customer Service Salesperson attend and answers the query of each and every customer while in Bad Customer Service Salesperson will not able to provide the answers on queries of customer like Product quality, Price, comparison etc.
• In Good Customer Service the checkout in the outlets are super easy and cashier have friendly nature with speeding in bills while in Bad customer services cashier are non smiling, emotionless approach and speeding in bills are slow.
• Their is proper display of merchandise in store as per the planogram in Good Customer Service meanwhile in Bad Customer Service the product is not display in store as per the planogram so this create a chaotic in different season.
• All the store are cleaned, well maintained and hygiene so that customer feel safe but in bad customer service their is hygiene issues and uncleaned store.
• If fill rates in the store is 90% than it’s comes under good customer service but if store fill rate is less than 70% then customer will miss some product which they intend to buy.

Effective Customer Service

For providing the effective customer service the retailer have to keep in mind of several things such as

• Maintain a positive attitude
• Respond Quickly to customer
• Complete knowledge of product
• Creative way for solving queries
• Actively Listening of Customer

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