Great customer service is really important if you want your craft business to continue to grow and thrive. Without customers you wouldn’t have a business. Providing excellent customer service will keep your customers coming back, will attract new customers and will ultimately lead to more sales.
Go Above and Beyond
The businesses that go above and beyond for their customers stand out from their competitors. Take the time to do that little extra something that truly shows your customers that you care. This could mean including small freebies in orders, providing discounts when something goes wrong or getting to know them more personally.
Just meeting customer expectations isn’t enough these days if you’re looking to one-up your competitors. Exceeding their expectations and showing them that customers come first is a great way to encourage them to come back and shop again.
Respond Quickly
Don’t let messages sit in your inbox. If a customer is trying to contact you with a question, try to respond as quickly as possible. As a rule of thumb, try not to wait longer than 24 hours to respond to a customer. Sometimes the weekends or holidays can hinder that, but try your hardest to not let any messages sit for longer than a day.
In order to respond quickly, you’ll need to make sure that you’re always available. Have multiple ways for customers to contact you whether that’s through email, phone, live chat or social media. Sometimes customers only prefer one way of communication, and this will allow you to be able to ensure that they can reach you effectively so that you can respond quickly. If you aren’t able to respond quickly, you may want to consider hiring a customer service representative to help you out.
Be Friendly and Listen
It can be hard to be friendly to customers who may not be so friendly to you. Greet your customers with a smile and be polite and respectful. Pay attention to what they need and offer as much help as you possibly can. Try to bring as much kindness and empathy to your customers as possible without sounding aggressive or angry, even if that is the mood they bring to you.
Since most customers and business owners don’t see each other face-to-face these days, it can be easy to misinterpret communication online. Be sure to try to convey more through your written messages by using emojis when possible or proper punctuation to help prevent miscommunication. Also, always be sure to say thank you as customers will remember your gratitude.
Follow Up with Customers
It’s a good idea to follow up with customers to ensure that your products and services met their expectations. You can do this in the form of a quick survey or you can send them a message to reconnect with them and hear what they have to say about the product or service you provided.
Once you get feedback from customers, be sure you actually use that feedback to improve. Take the time to review the feedback, and make changes to your business as necessary. Consistently following up with customers can help you to not only improve your customer service but also your business model.
Fix Your Mistakes and Don’t Break Promises
When you make a mistake, it’s important to own it. Sometimes even when you aren’t to blame for a mistake, it’s vital to do everything in your power to make things right for your customer. Show them empathy when things don’t go as planned so that they know you care. When something is actually your fault, not fixing it you can cause your business to end up with a bad reputation that you might not ever be able to recover from.
Always honor your promises to customers as well. If you tell them that you’ll follow up with them the next day, then don’t forget to contact them. If you know it will take a while to look into an issue, then make sure you give yourself plenty of time to resolve it instead of telling your customer the opposite.
These are just a handful of ways to provide great customer service. It’s important that you do this from the start, and that you try your best to always put you customers first. Customer service should always be a priority for your business because a bad reputation can result in lost current and future customers. Customers are the reason you have a business so be sure that you take excellent care of them.
