In any business, customer service and marketing should go hand in hand. Think of these aspects of your business hand in hand like peanut butter and jelly. The ultimate goal of customer service is to improve the customer experience, and a marketing strategy focused on customer retention can lead to increased sales. According to OutboundEngine, just a 5% increase in customer retention can lead to a 25% to 95% increase in profits.
That's why customer service alignment with your marketing and sales teams is so important to achieving your customer service goals. By developing collaboration between these departments, you can reduce overall marketing and prospecting costs, increase sales, and ensure the longevity of your business.
How to combine customer service and marketing
It's no secret that COVID-19 is changing the way companies do business, affecting customer service and marketing teams. Consumers have also changed their shopping habits. With many relying on online sales instead of in-person shopping, it's more important than ever for business owners and their employees to provide a great customer experience.
By aligning your customer service, marketing and sales teams with a customer service-centric approach, you can maintain and potentially grow your bottom line in today's environment. There are five ways to achieve this.
1. Strengthening of organization and communication.
For customer service and marketing strategy to align, there must be a consistent exchange of information between teams. Marketers must conduct market research on customer needs and wants, information that support representatives can then use to ask customers questions and solve problems. Account managers must have complete promotional and product documentation provided by the marketing team.
Train your staff and consider having your marketers call customer support. Use the best internal communication software and CRM software to alert all departments and coordinate actions in real time. For example, if a customer calls customer service with a marketing question, the answer may require further marketing. Once the customer has been properly informed, the sales representative may call to see if they are interested in purchasing. With a centralized database that tracks customer relationships, all team members can see the customer's progress and communicate accordingly.
2. Be competitive.
By aligning excellent marketing, promotion, and customer service goals, you build trust with your customers. Even if customers are attracted to a competitor's promotional offers, if their experience with you is consistently positive, they are more likely to be reluctant to switch brands. The more customer support they get, the less likely they are to outperform the competition. If the connection between the customer and the brand is strong, your team can also make the odd mistake and retain the customer. Remember to monitor changes in your market and competitors so that your customer service and marketing teams can make changes as needed.
3. Use the power of motivation.
When customer service and marketing teams are properly aligned, positive results are more likely to boost morale and motivate employees. Working behind the scenes can have an external impact on your business, which has an internal impact on your business and continues to create circular connections. Hard work creates happy customers, which in turn create happy employees who continue to work hard.
Use this motivation to empower employees to achieve peak performance and continue to work together to achieve business goals. Big byproducts are high profits, a positive sales culture, and low sales.
Tip: Use goal setting and tracking tools to set personal and team goals and track progress. With the metrics provided by this tool, you can see where your customer service and marketing teams are performing well and where they need to improve.
4. Repurpose your budget.
All businesses rely on marketing tactics to attract new customers and increase sales, but you should consider spending your marketing budget on strengthening relationships with existing customers. When customers have a satisfying experience, they are more likely to make repeat purchases and tell their friends and family about your products and top-notch customer service.
Increasing word of mouth and getting great customer feedback are two of the best ways to cut marketing costs. Instead of spending money on advertising campaigns, you spend money on customer service software, delivery processes, etc. You can redistribute it to improve it. This is value that benefits the customer, which in turn helps the company in the long run.
5. Be transparent.
Your business needs to be transparent from top to bottom so that the department can focus on the business goal of improving the quality of the customer. All affected groups should be aware of product release dates, promotion details and ideal customer profiles. If you're hiring a customer service or marketing agency, include it in your company update.
Transparency benefits your business by ensuring everyone is on the same page and reducing errors that can affect customer loyalty or otherwise impact your business. There is a direct relationship between employee transparency, customer loyalty and company sustainability.
The benefits of applying customer service goals to your marketing strategy
When your business focuses on customer service as part of its marketing strategy, it has a positive impact on your bottom line, reducing the cost of doing business and increasing your bottom line. In fact, Salesforce reports that 89% of customers say a good customer service experience makes them more likely to make another purchase. [ See the Salesforce CRM overview to learn how the platform can improve your customer relationships .]
There are many other benefits your business can achieve by combining customer service and marketing.
Competitive advantage
Great customer service gives you a competitive advantage by getting consumers to spend their money with you and motivating others to do the same. Nelson James, co-founder of Signs.com, has experienced this firsthand.
"Customer service is an important part of our marketing efforts at Signs.com," he said. “We work hard to provide quality customer service that sets us apart from our competitors. In addition to our great products, our customer service is the number one reason people choose us and the main reason people keep coming back."
Nice review
Good customer service can motivate someone to write an online review, and lots of positive reviews provide credibility for a company.
"Most of our customer feedback is based on how our customer service team treats customers, and we pay close attention to what people say," said James. "Good ratings help to strengthen the trust of our customers. "Positive customer service experiences create loyal and satisfied customers who promote our services and encourage referrals."
FYI: According to Reputation X, 86% of potential customers fail to convert reviews to one or two stars. A company with a better brand reputation, which is largely influenced by the quality of customer service, will attract more customers.
Smoother collaboration
Some companies face conflicts between sales and marketing departments. But collaboration becomes easier when everyone has a common goal of prioritizing customer service. Your overall marketing strategy should encourage cross-departmental collaboration, and that's exactly what you'll get when you include customer service as a marketing strategy.
"Providing the best customer service is one of our most important marketing efforts, and it pays off," said James. “Good customer service gives us unique sales propositions, repeat business, increased trust, branding and word of mouth. Sounds like good marketing to me. "
Greater engagement with social media
Today's businesses need a social media presence, but experienced social media managers shouldn't just focus on clicks and impressions. That's because your company's social media accounts are more than just advertisements. If your marketers are also willing to address customer service issues that arise through social media, you can build stronger relationships with your customers. You can use social media to build customer loyalty simply by listening and responding to messages about your business. A business that engages with its consumers through social media increases customer loyalty.
deeper understanding
Developing customer personas is an important part of any marketing effort. However, instead of guessing about your ideal customer, you can look at customer experiences and buying habits to find out who buys from your company and why. Gain a deeper understanding of your customers' needs, interests and pain points. Armed with this knowledge, you can create content and products that engage your target customers and sell from a more informed place.
How can you improve customer service?
Too often, companies think they're offering fantastic support when in reality they're falling into a customer service trap that can destroy their brand. Fortunately, businesses can do a few simple things to improve customer service.
- Use business process management to streamline operations and increase efficiency so you have more time to focus on customer service.
- Offer only the products your customers want and need.
- Give customers access to digital tools to shop online.
- Be reliable, friendly and respectful, and show a genuine interest in your conversations with customers.
- Do what you say you will do - with employees and customers.
- Use social media as a customer service tool.
- Listen to what your customers are saying about you online and respond to compliments and complaints in the right tone.
Do you know? When you offer quality customer service, you can charge more for your products and services without sacrificing brand loyalty or repeat purchases.
Customer Service Case Study: How USAA Sets the Bar for Success
As a provider of banking and insurance products to military personnel and their families, USAA has always been at the forefront of customer service. This comes from a 2021 Verint consumer survey that found USAA to have the highest customer satisfaction and Net Promoter Score among insurance companies. Both metrics indicate that the company offers an excellent customer experience and is more likely to be recommended by satisfied customers.
USAA's success stems from a customer-centric model where customers are treated like family and customers are not paid. Therefore, their product offerings reflect the needs of their "family members" in various life situations, rather than the insurance and financial products found elsewhere. Behind the scenes, the company emphasizes employee engagement to keep employees engaged and ensure departments work together to provide customers with the service they deserve. This is a winning strategy.
Greg Shuey contributed to this article. Source interviews were conducted for earlier versions of this article.