Many businesses would agree that customer service is extremely important, and determines the growth of their business. You might think that customer service is pretty straight forward, but the truth is that customer service trends change year on year, so you need to be committed to staying up to date. Tools, systems, and processes all help to convert your strategies into customer satisfaction - here, we’ll talk about how you can provide better customer service for 2019.
The success of your business is always determined by the experience of your end users. User experience is extremely important if you want to grow your business and have people continue to visit your site. A massive 88% of people would not return to a business website after a bad experience. Case studies have shown that a UX design could boost conversion rates by up to 400%!
Focusing on providing a great user experience directly correlates with customer service. You are meeting their needs without hassle, and ensuring your site is a joy to use. Something you might want to look into to make this happen is a Managed IT service. This can reduce downtime, keep your customer’s information safe, and have many other benefits on how you run your business.
Customer Health Monitoring
Customer health monitoring allows companies to become seriously proactive. It’s no use waiting around for customers to contact you. Monitoring interactions every customer has and assessing the sentiment behind them can let customers know about problems before they even notice. This will make the difference between a good customer service experience and a great one.
Artificial Intelligence
Good news - AI is becoming much less artificial. Modern software means that the true power of AI can be leveraged, and that they aren't just a basic ploy to lure customers in. They will aid human agents in working smarter and more efficiently, rather than becoming a real replacement.
Things like sentiment analysis, predictive chat, and distress scoring are all examples of what AI can do alongside a human customer service rep.
Ticket Deflection Solutions
Deflecting tickets will increase in priority. Customer service teams are trying out new solutions that should reduce the amount of routine interactions that they process. Customers will easily be able to answer their own issues without needing to submit a ticket, as real time solutions like suggested links can be given in live chat based on what the customer has written about the problem.
Personalization
Personalization is something companies have been doing for a while, but many of them do not go as in depth as they could. However, personalization is now being applied at the entire company level by many companies. Customer service teams now have direct visibility into company accounts, and this means that they can add information including things like customer size, languages that they speak, hours and holidays, preferred service method, and more. Agents can see this and are able to further personalize the service provided to them. Personalized offers and services will help to develop loyalty, and add value to the customer. Their experience will be so much better as they feel more understood and valued by the company. You will understand your customer’s interests, use their name when speaking to them, and know what they need inside out. When they get a great personalized service like this, they are more likely to come back to you, as well as recommend you to friends and family.
Mobile First
Of course, mobile isn't going away anytime soon. It can transform your entire business if used correctly. Always think mobile first and you will ensure you are reaching your entire market. Many people will use a mobile device to search or get help before a PC, so think about how you can help people who are contacting you on their phones. Not only that, they should be able to browse your offerings without having to scroll and pinch until their fingers are sore. Simple things like this will make all the difference to the customer experience.
Customer Success
Customer service is not just about giving scripted responses. It’s about doing everything a business possibly can to ensure a customer feels like they have been successful with that business. Customer success is the key phrase that all representatives should be keeping in mind. A more customer focused business can lead to reduced churn and more positive third-party feedback.
Customer service is ever evolving. Incorporate these methods in 2019 and you will notice great results!
Struggling to make an impact on your target audience? It can definitely be an uphill battle. It might feel as if you’ll never be heard over the loud racket of your bigger competitors. However, we’re going to look at some ways in which your business could start to turn heads.
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Improve your digital marketing strategy.
One of the most important aspects of advertising a business in the modern world is digital marketing. You probably know this already, but you might be struggling to make an impact online. The traditional business world might have been competitive, but the online business world takes things to another level. What does it take to get people to notice you on the internet? Well, you need great content so your company’s website and social media pages rank well online. Perhaps you even have a YouTube page that you use to share videos of your goods and services. You might want to do some research to figure out how to rank YouTube videos on Google. That would definitely help your business to rank its videos highly on search result pages. SEO might seem overwhelming, but there are lots of online resources that can help you.
Encourage your customers to spread the word.
You also need to use your existing customer base if you want to make an impact on your target audience. You can only advertise your business so much. If potential clients don’t want to hear it, then it might be time for a new tactic. Instead of shoving adverts in the faces of consumers, you should present them with impressive reviews. But it’s not always easy to get your customers to spread the word. Even if they like your products and services, they might not want to spend their time leaving reviews for you online. After all, they’d be doing you a favour.
That’s why you need to give your clients an incentive to spread the word. They part with their money for the high-quality goods and services you provide. What are you going to provide if they tell their friends and family about your business? Perhaps you could start a referral scheme. If customers get discounts and freebies for referring your company to their friends and family members, then they’ll definitely be much more likely to do so. You could even consider running a competition; people could gain entry by sharing a post of yours on social media. That’d be a good way to spread the word. Sometimes, you just have to catch the attention of your existing customer base to get them to draw in other potential customers in the market.
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Research them.
If you want to make an impact on your target audience, then you need to research them. Market research is absolutely essential to understanding your demographic. This might sound like an obvious piece of advice, but it’s obviously a fact that some businesses take on board more than others. If you want your company to deliver a product which sets it apart from other brands in the marketplace, then you need to figure out what consumers are missing. What’s wrong with the industry? What could be improved? If you can answer those questions, then your company is going to stand out from the crowd.
And you’ll find the answers to those questions from research. Researching the competition is a good start; it’ll highlight what is or isn’t working for other businesses in the industry. But the goal isn’t to copy other successful corporations in your particular marketplace. If you follow in the footsteps of others, then you’ll struggle to differentiate your company from your rivals. You need to get to know your target audience better than your competitors know them. Talk to existing and potential customers. Invite feedback online. Ask them what changes they desire. That’s how you’ll start to spot issues which exist in the industry. In turn, you’ll be able to develop solutions which fill gaps in the market. And that’s when the target audience will start to notice you. That’s when you’ll start to make an impact on them.
Invest in yourself.
You also need to invest in yourself if you want to make an impact on your target audience. It’s a competitive marketplace, as we’ve discussed throughout this article. If your competitors are constantly growing, then you need to do the same. This is crucial if you want to ensure that you keep appealing to the target market. Otherwise, they’ll lose interest and flock to your rivals. Just make sure you invest well. Cut down wasteful spending, firstly. You could move from paper to digital means to save money, for example. Additionally, you need to make your investments count. If you want to increase productivity, then outsource instead of constantly hiring new workers. It’ll save you time and money.
Aspirant Graphic Designers are not required to have a professional degree to create astonishing designs. What matters the most is a great mind to work as a graphic designer and some technical knowledge. Thus, it does not matter whether you have a professional degree or not. Here are some tips if one wishes to work as a graphic designer.
Add Flavour through the Color Palette
Colors have a major role in enhancing the design. Using different color patterns as per the requirement can have a positive impact on the audience. You can choose a color palette of your own choice by using Color Hunt and Colors. They allow you to choose your color palette just by adding the hex code for the colors required. These sites are popular among Graphic Designers in Chennai.
Don't get entangled with the Fonts.
Making a design understandable for the audience is the main objective as a designer. Using various fonts in a single design can extract beauty and aesthetics from it. You can go for one or two typefaces, which makes it pleasing to the eye of the audience and can be understood easily. Messing up with different fonts for different content can pose a threat to the design.
Use Your Creativity
Being a designer requires innate creativity. Thus, bring out all your creativity to your design and at the same time keeping a distance from trending design patterns. Furthermore, explore all the design tools and options available with you at a given time. All of this can be achieved by using good color patterns, having a simple approach to the text and majorly as per your style rather than having a look at others.
The Composition as a Focal Point
Any design or image is created to reveal a story behind it. Arrange your content as well as images used in the graphic design to allow the audience to have a clear look at it. The composition can be altered using different elements of graphic design like the proper placing of text, using colors to add warmth and adding large text.
Stick to simplicity
Simplicity in designing terms means using basic elements and not creating a mess by adding irrelevant matter. Non-designers often fear of leaving blank spaces which forces them to add irrelevant content.
In fact, leaving some white space can enhance the beauty of the design. Mobile companies follow this pattern while crafting banners for advertising. Graphic Designers in Chennai focus on using blank space to enrich their company’s design. Rather, they are specially taught about the worth of having blank space in graphic design. This way, attention is mostly on the generated content.
Contrast: A Key to Every Lock
Contrast is an unavoidable element in graphic design. It creates an indelible impact over the audience for it reflects either positive or negative theme behind the design. Contrasting designs can be generated using filters or following basic color patterns, like a bright background is followed by dark font or using Canva and Moose to add contrast.
Have Symmetry to the Design
Symmetrical work is often pleasing to see and is a great option to adorn your graphic design. You can adjust the elements in the design in a symmetrical pattern. It brings balance to the elements laid out in the design.
Ensure Consistency with the Images
While creating a graphic, it is required to be consistent with the quality frames, colors, and proportions used. It ensures that the theme behind the design is highlighted.
Hermit Chawla is a Marketing Manager at Sprak Design. He would love to share thoughts on Top Graphic Design, Lifestyle Design, Branding Firm, Exhibition design etc..
When your business is ticking along nicely, hitting targets, bringing in a profit, is this the time to sit back and be satisfied with what you’ve achieved? Do this for a minute or two if you must but when things are going that well then it’s exactly the right time to take your company upwards and on-wards and into the next phase of its growth.
Resting on your laurels simply isn’t an option in this hyper competitive market, so think carefully about what your business growth plans are. Are you looking to expand in size, in capacity or have you got an income-based figure in mind that you’re striving to reach?
When you’ve been given some breathing space, turn that time towards some creative thinking and some serious business planning. In this blog we take a look at some sure fire ways of growing your business, taking you to the next level.
Image from Pexels
Expand Outwards
What does this mean to you? It might be that taking on more members of staff is how you envision your growth, or maybe you’re looking to move to bigger premises to give your existing team more space to do more of what they already do so well
Perhaps expansion means opening a new office, or outlet in another part of town or a different city altogether. Your expansion plans are only limited by your imagination.
Let’s look at expanding your team. The first step towards creating this area of growth is deciding on what role or roles you’re hoping to introduce. To do this, you’ll need to create a simple list of all the work and tasks that need fulfilling. You may well find that, as the list grows, there is room to create several jobs out of this list.
Once you’ve created a list of tasks and found a suitable job title, you need to think about the skills you’d be looking for in an individual to fill that role.
Think specific. Great communication is good, but too vague. Who will they be communicating with? Is it a customer facing or internal role? You want to narrow down the skillset of your ideal candidate in order to save time and effort filtering out candidates who can’t demonstrate the specific skills you’re looking for.
Expanding Capacity
Quite simply, can you do more? Can you produce more of the goods you make or offer more hours towards the services you offer? Many entrepreneurs will answer yes to either question because they want it to be true. While this is ambitious, it might not be realistic. Growth in this area must be planned for or it will come crashing down as you struggle to meet the demands you have created.
Growth like this requires careful planning so get that started. Dust off those old business plans and see which areas require updating in order to allow your business to start meeting its potential. It’s time to start setting new, more ambitious goals but having the plans in place to allow that to happen and not jumping in feet first.
If, up until now, your marketing has been rather more of an organic affair with customers finding you on social media or through word of mouth, then it might be time to up your game.
You might want to hire in a marketing guru to your team, someone who can kick start a proactive, intentional marketing plan with tangible objectives and outcomes. If you’re not looking to recruit someone internal, then think about hiring a consultant or taking on an agency through Agency Loft, for example.
You might ask them to draw you up marketing plan, concentrate solely on your social media or take on a direct mailing activity as a one-off. Whatever it is you ask them to do, make it specific to your own business plan and build your growth around the success of this task.
Prepare to Succeed
If you think all this talk of growth is just lip service then chances are you’ll be caught on the back foot when you do see actual, real success in your business. So many business owners strive for growth and success but are taken aback when it actually happens. Don’t get put in that position, have faith in the work you do and its capacity to take your business further and further.
You’ll want to ensure that you have everything you need in place to succeed. You’ll need to have your team, IT specialist or consultant take your tech for a thorough test drive. Can your website, your ordering and payment systems handle an increase in traffic and sales? Take a look at your software too. Is that old but steady accounting software really still up to the job or is some investment needed to keep your finances in better shape?
Get your team trained up to use any new software and confident in their abilities to deal with an influx of customers. Share your business plans, share your expected growth rates and have them fully up to speed, able to help you fulfil your business objectives.
Running your own business is exciting, terrifying and ultimately very rewarding. When things go right, they go really right but the mistakes and the disasters are on your head too. Give yourself and your business a fighting chance of staying ahead of growth by getting your planning and preparations done in plenty of time.
Recruit new staff that fit exactly the roles that need to be filled. Helping you to pick up the work that you don’t have the time or the skills to do yourself and supporting other team members.
Have your existing team trained up and ready to work with you, prepared to help you take your business to the next level.
When things are going well then now is the time to plan how you’re going to take your business from good to exceptional. You and your business deserve it and there’s no time to lose so get planning for growth today.
As a business owner, one of the things you are continually striving to do is to increase the exposure of your business to new and existing customers. Whether you have a small business or you’re a well-established firm with a large client base, there are always fresh and innovative ways of showing off your company. But how do you increase your visibility in the business world, especially when it’s likely that there’s plenty of competitors in your industry? Check out our tips for getting your business noticed.
Photo by William Iven on Unsplash
Increase your online visibility
Everybody who is anyone is online, and in this day and age, you should be too! Even as a business, it is crucial to establish a prominent online presence, and not just to keep up with the times! Being online can significantly expand your business, as well as increasing your online visibility. Take a look at these tips on how to use the world wide web to get your business noticed.
Build up your social media following. You can do this in many ways, including using online tools to build social media, but it’s important to remember that a small amount of dedicated and engaged followers is much better than a massive following with many inactive accounts.
Post regularly to keep your followers interested in your business. It can be anything from a block of text, a picture, a video, or even a song. Anything that is related to your business will keep interest piqued.
Use your social media platforms to link to your website. Clicks through to your website increase the chance of sales or collaboration.
Keep your website updated with regular posts about your company and content that’s going to be useful to your customers. For example, if you’re a mechanic, post content about car care and the latest car news to keep people coming back for more.
Use SEO (search engine optimization) throughout your website to help organic visitors land on your website. Remember to think about keywords that are relevant and related to your business and use them in your posts. If you’re not confident in using SEO correctly, you can hire the professionals to give you a hand. Just make sure that you do your research on how to pick an SEO provider.
Doing all of this can and will increase your online visibility. Since pretty much everyone is now online, an online presence = a more visible business.
Use free publicity
A common misconception about publicity is that to have it, you must know journalists. This isn’t strictly true. The truth is, there are millions of journalists that are looking for new pieces of information to share with the world, and if you give them that information, it’s likely to be a quid pro quo situation. A great way of finding journalists that can offer this for you is by looking for magazines within your niche and contacting the editors and also contributors of similar brands. More often than not, you’ll find that there will be plenty of journalists that want the first inside scoop on your business news. Use free publicity to get your business noticed more!
Run a competition
Everybody loves a freebie, so running a competition to win a grand prize will certainly pique interest. Use your social media profiles and your website to promote your competition. This will encourage people to share your posts for a chance to win the competition. Not only that, you’re likely to gain new followers and also see an increased amount of user engagement on your online content. This is another prime example of a quid pro quo situation - you give your existing and potential customers something for nothing, and in turn, your exposure continues to grow. Some businesses use competitions as a strategy to keep exposure levels high, so it might be something to keep in mind for the future too.
Don’t copy your competition
One mistake that similar businesses often make is trying to out-do each other with their strategies. While there’s nothing wrong with competition in business, the mistake they’re making is using the same kinds of strategies. Set your own strategy and take a different approach at how you run things and you’ll soon see that you’re sticking out much further than your competition.
Show that you’re not just another corporate company
Whether you’re a big business or not, companies that aren’t approachable or ‘customer friendly’ will often lose out on customers more than those who are. While it’s important to remain professional with your business, you should also try and adopt a ‘friendly’ approach to your customers. One that makes each of your customers feel like they’ve truly been taken care of, rather than just being passed to another member of the team. Making your company likable by supporting charities and not being afraid to have fun with your business will make you stand out from the crowd.
Follow a trend
You’re probably familiar with many internet trends such as ‘flossing’ or the ‘ice bucket challenge’ - use these to your advantage! Not only will you be supporting a worthy cause as a business, but you’ll also be harnessing the power of trends to expose your business and get yourself noticed! Alternatively, use the power of the internet to create your own direction and reap the benefits of exposure from that too.
As you can see, getting your business noticed isn’t as difficult as you might think, and you don’t always have to use conventional methods such as networking and word of mouth. Try out these unusual yet useful tips and see for yourself how much more attention you’ll receive as a business!
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