Enjoy the extra holiday business without a customer service crisis.
The holiday season is one of the busiest times of the year for many industries, usually bringing increased customer demand and higher service volumes.
If the stress and added workload are getting to you, you don’t have to live like this. Plan a strategy to create more flexible customer support during this period. You can enjoy the extra holiday business without a customer service crisis.
Creating a Resilient Customer Support Strategy
Forbes published a list of advice on this subject, but it seems their experts live in a different world than the rest of us. Their advice on handling the holiday season is to ‘focus on warmth’ or ‘show interest in the customer.’ Our team would argue that all this is table stakes- we are in the business of creating customer satisfaction. Of course, we want the customer to feel great!
The real question is how to go beyond the ordinary during a peak period.
Prepping for the holidays starts with reviewing customer service trends from previous years to identify potential challenges and opportunities for improvement
These steps will help you prepare:
- Review past customer service volumes: What is your regular volume of customer interactions, and how far will it spike during the holidays? What did it look like last year and beyond? What can you predict for this year?
- Review past mistakes: If it all went wrong last year, then why? What were the triggers? Can you determine what happened and what caused the problem? If so, build this into your year’s planning to avoid a repeat.
- Build capacity now: If you have several customer service teams operating across different accounts, cross-train your people. Make sure they can switch from a quiet account to supporting a busy retail account. Build a bench you can draw on if needed.
- Go digital: Explore self-service options and digital channels that can allow you to engage with customers with minimal extra effort from your customer service team – what can the customer do before they need to call?
- Boost the team: Whether you need temporary support or permanent team members, begin hiring and training well ahead of peak shopping periods, such as Black Friday.
Even as you get busy during the holiday season, there must always be minimum service standards. You must always help your customers if they need help. You must t help customers when they need it and be available when expected, even if this means 24/7 for some companies.
It’s never too early to prepare for increased holiday demand. By planning ahead and building flexibility into your customer service operations, you can reduce the risk of service disruptions and maintain a positive customer experience throughout the season.
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