Does customer service create a formidable sales channel?

In the last few years, customer service and customer experience have changed to the core. If you ask the top management today in any internet company what is the top priority of the business, the answer would be “Customer Experience” by a long margin. What do you think has happened in the last decade that has led to this change in priorities?

• Internet Access
• Social Media

We now live in an era of intelligent handheld devices capable of doing almost everything a computer can do. Because of this, the way people communicate has changed. Now there is a 24*7 connectivity to all your surroundings, which has dramatically affected consumers’ interaction with businesses. Social Media, on the other hand, has made it very easy to interact with end-users, even for very, very big companies.

In the case of SimplyGuest, there were two touchpoints to manage customer experience.

• Pre-booking website visitors
• Post booking tenants living

Over a while, we made sure that our post-sales services were prompt, and we solved 99% of issues within 24 to 48 hours of it being raised. The peculiar thing about long-term rental is that the trust has to be maintained for 365 days, and any single lap takes the experience on a downward spiral which is not the case in short-term stays at the hotel. We delivered constant solutions to all issues raised and maintained trust has ensured that 40% of our monthly sales come from owner/guest’s referrals.

Over the last few years, before the pandemic, it has become a formidable sales channel. We called it operations team revenue because it generated out of smooth operations and the team’s excellent customer service rather than sales. Cost center operations at SimplyGuest is a revenue center, and it continues to grow itself. Hence we kept investing in strengthening operations and customer support teams. The recurring ROI that it provided, thus reducing the customer acquisition cost (CAC), made it an essential piece of the puzzle to become sustainable.

So the long-term strategy was to attain an excellent customer experience. Again, the lifecycle focus is essential, as customers may well be interacting with your brand long before they ever make a purchase and for a long time afterward.

The message from a lot of research in this field is clear. You can demonstrate a clear and immediate ROI with CX, and it has long-term impacts on business. Some things to note if you focus on making your company customer first with a prime focus on customer experience.

• Objectives of all customer-facing teams should be aligned
• Cross-functional teams are needed for each objective
• Customer journey mapping is critical and hence decides action based on touchpoint.
• Plan pre and post-purchase touchpoints and experiences.
• Software is good, but people interactions are the key to a successful experience. So use software to enhance them and not depend on them. AI is not the answer. It’s a means to an end.

I hope this helps you create a customer-first organization with a customer experience at its core.