A happy customer is a loyal customer. The customer service experience and relationship created during an interaction doesn’t just affect one sale – it influences repeat sales for years to come.
Want to guarantee superior service? Radically focus on those who interact with customers on a daily basis – the customer service representative. For truly great service, leaders need to give their reps the knowledge and skills they need to connect with and help customers. That’s why proper customer service training can make all the difference to delivering consistently excellent customer service.
Foundations of great customer service training
World-class customer service training programmes are unique to every company. However, there are usually three major components to any programme:
Product or service training
Every support team member needs to know their company’s products and services, inside and out. Since they’ll most likely need to answer questions and provide support around these topics, it’s important to provide a good foundation of knowledge about each.
Work environment training
This type of training is company-specific and features information regarding policies, processes and procedures. From knowing what software to use to how to escalate a customer service ticket, work environment training covers a lot of different topics.
Customer service skills training
Training a support team for customer service skills is the most crucial step for any company. Even if reps have good product and company knowledge, they can’t provide great service without being trained on the right set of skills. Some essential service skills should include:
- Communication
- Listening
- Empathy
- Patience
Free customer service training materials
So, how can leaders deliver training courses that deliver essential knowledge and improve key skills? Planning and building a customer service training programme may seem like a daunting task, but there are plenty of free resources and helpful tips to get started. Here are few of our favourites:
Customer service training manual template: Consistent and thorough customer service training is essential – even if customers already seem satisfied. A training manual makes it easier to meet and exceed customer expectations by providing reps with consistent training that quickly gives them the tools they need to succeed.
Customer service policy examples: It’s important to develop a clear, concise policy for the entire customer service team. Reps need to know how best to solve a customer’s problem or how to approach extremely unhappy customers. These guidelines will help every rep understand the policies they should follow.
Employee training plan template: Hiring new reps without an employee training plan is like asking them to climb a mountain in the dark – without a torch. It’s important to give everyone a clear understanding of what they need to learn to perform at their highest level. By using this interactive experience, leaders will quickly develop a detailed and easy-to-follow training plan.
Customer service training activities: Although customer service reps are part of a team, they can feel isolated, as they interact with customers individually. These customer service training activities make learning fun, interactive and engaging. The benefits of providing training activities are two-fold. Reps will improve their skills and come together with the rest of their team, both of which drive employee engagement.
Enabling omnichannel customer service success: Ensuring superior service lies with those who interact with your customers on a daily basis – your customer service representatives. When you give frontline reps and agents the skills, knowledge, tools and information they need, your company will reap numerous rewards. This guide breakdowns the various components of great customer service enablement for every omnichannel call centre and customer service team.
Bonus materials: Free customer service tools
Another key aspect of making sure your customer service team is well-equipped to delight your customers is using simple, free customer service tools. You can improve employee and customer experiences with an easy-to-use customer service tool. Here are a few free customer service tools to check out:
- HubSpot Service Hub gives you free shared inbox, ticketing system and live chat features
- Freshdesk provides a free central inbox tool to centralise customer service communication
- Zendesk offers a free online ticketing system
Customer service training doesn’t have to be rocket science. Using the free tools and tips listed above, leaders can build an all-star customer service team that goes from delivering good customer service to great customer service.
World-class customer service teams train with Seismic
Customer service is changing rapidly – and training is too. Give reps and agents the knowledge and best practices to delight customers and turn them into raving fans. Seismic Learning (formerly Lessonly) enables reps to learn, practice and perform like never before. Find out more, and get a demo today.