A Better Answer Blog

The term has been used so often that's it's practically become a cliché: customer service.

Customer service is anything but a cliché to customers, however. In fact, companies that disregard or pay scant attention to providing excellent customer service often pay for it (literally) in lost goodwill and sales. And as any business person knows, regaining a “lost” customer is infinitely more difficult than keeping a current customer satisfied.

These are among the findings of the “Global Customer Service Barometer,” the premier study of customer attitudes that is commissioned annually on behalf of American Express (the folks who literally “ring up” evidence of customer viewpoints all year long).

More than any other insight, the study underscores five reasons why a company should invest—and invest conspicuously—in customer service and/or customer service outsourcing.

The study paints a bleak background: nearly half of U.S. consumers believe that companies generally are “helpful, but don’t do anything extra" to keep their business. Only 7 percent of consumers report that companies generally “exceed expectations” when it comes to delivering customer service.

Here are the consequences—as well as why customer service outsourcing could make sense for your business:

1. Consumers say they would spend more money with companies that provide “excellent” customer service, according to the study. And this finding is no pipe dream: about 75 percent of consumers say they have, in fact, spent more money with companies with whom they have enjoyed “a history of positive customer service experiences.”
2. Consumers view excellent customer service as an extension of a company's values and believe that these companies have “earned” their business. In other words, these customers are loyal. The reverse is true, too: consumers are more likely to "refuse" to do business with a company that provides poor customer service, the study found.
3. Consumers are highly likely to share their positive customer service experiences with others—the best PR a company can hope for. This finding gives credence to what most business owners already know: a business can grow (and flounder) on word-of-mouth alone.
4. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, consumers are even more likely to share their poor customer service experiences with others. This is perhaps the most lethal "weapon" a consumer can yield; unable to derive a successful outcome with a company, these dissatisfied consumers try to spare others the same experience. Their preferred "weapon" of choice: social media, with greater frequency.
5. Consumers are unlikely to complete a sales transaction with companies that provide poor customer service. Put another way, poor customer service leads to lost sales. Fifty-five percent of U.S. consumers said that in the past year, they "have not completed a business transaction or not made an intended purchase because of poor customer service.” This is a telling finding, for it also says that consumers had wanted to complete a transaction until poor customer service prompted them to go elsewhere.

Poor customer service costs a business in other less quantifiable ways too, especially in terms of staff time. A whopping 71 percent of U.S. consumers report that unsatisfactory customer service leads them to "insist on speaking with a supervisor," when they often "lose their temper" and/or use profanity.

The study makes it abundantly clear: providing superior customer service pays off in big ways, small ways and all ways. Your company may still be like many others insofar as it's devoted to the mission but lacks the resources. That's when A Better Answer call centers can provide the remedy—and make superior customer service a reality in your world.