CUSTOMER SERVICE TRAINING 101

[Pages:222]CUSTOMER SERVICE TRAINING 101

CUSTOMER SERVICE

TRAINING 1O1

Quick and Easy Techniques That Get Great Results

Ren?e Evenson

AMACOM American Management Association

New York | Atlanta | Brussels | Chicago | Mexico City | San Francisco Shanghai | Tokyo | Toronto | Washington, D. C.

Special discounts on bulk quantities of AMACOM books are available to corporations, professional associations, and other organizations. For details, contact Special Sales Department, AMACOM, a division of American Management Association, 1601 Broadway, New York, NY 10019. Tel.: 212?903?8316. Fax: 212?903?8083. Web site:

This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering legal, accounting, or other professional service. If legal advice or other expert assistance is required, the services of a competent professional person should be sought.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Evenson, Ren?e, 1951?

Customer service training 101 : quick and easy techniques that

get great results / Ren?e Evenson.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 0-8144-7290-7

1. Customer services. 2. Customer relations. 3. Employees--

Training of. I. Title.

HF5415.5.E89 2005

658.812--dc22

2005010446

? 2005 Ren?e Evenson. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America.

This publication may not be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in whole or in part, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of AMACOM, a division of American Management Association, 1601 Broadway, New York, NY 10019.

Printing number

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Contents

Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Tips for the Trainer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Tips for the Student . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

PART I Putting Your Best Face Forward

CHAPTER 1 Taking Baby Steps:The Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 STEP 1: First Impressions Matter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 STEP 2: Courtesy Counts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 STEP 3: Attitude Is Everything . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 STEP 4: Doing the Right Thing: Ethical Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 Key Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 Practice Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 Think About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

CHAPTER 2 Tossing the Ball Back and Forth: Effective Communication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 STEP 1: Saying What You Mean and Meaning What You Say . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 STEP 2: What You Don't Say: Nonverbal Communication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 STEP 3: Putting Words Together: Grammar Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 STEP 4: Asking the Correct Questions and Answering the Questions Correctly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

v

vi

CUSTOMER SERVICE

TRAINING 101

STEP 5: When the Customer Says No . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58 STEP 6: Listening Actively . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Key Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63 Practice Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 Think About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

CHAPTER 3 Jumping in with Both Feet: Relationship Building . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

STEP 1: Establishing Rapport . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 STEP 2: Interacting Positively with Customers . . . . . . . . . 81 STEP 3: Identifying Customers' Needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 STEP 4: Making the Customer Feel Valued . . . . . . . . . . . . 85 STEP 5: Maintaining Ongoing Relationships . . . . . . . . . . 87 STEP 6: Different Strokes: Handling Different

Types of Customers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89 Key Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 Practice Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96 Think About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

PART II Putting Your Customers First

CHAPTER 4 Seeing Eye to Eye: Face-to-Face Contacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

STEP 1: Saying Hello: Greeting the Customer . . . . . . . . 109 STEP 2: Between Hello and Goodbye:

Helping the Customer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111 STEP 3: Saying Goodbye: Ending the Interaction . . . . . 113 Key Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Practice Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118 Think About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

CHAPTER 5 Saying It with a Smile: Telephone Contacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

STEP 1: Putting Your Best Ear Forward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 STEP 2: Saying Hello: The Opener . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128 STEP 3: Between Hello and Goodbye:

Helping the Customer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130 STEP 4: Saying Goodbye: The Closer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134 Key Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137 Practice Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138 Think About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

CHAPTER 6 Looking Before You Leap: E-commerce Contacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143

STEP 1: What Does the E-customer Expect? . . . . . . . . . . 147 STEP 2: Hanging the Open Sign: Being Accessible . . . . 149 STEP 3: Writing What You Mean:

E-mail Communication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151 STEP 4: Speaking Around the World:

Cross-Cultural Etiquette . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 Key Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 Practice Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156 Think About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

CHAPTER 7 Calming the Storm: Difficult Customer Contacts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

STEP 1: What Is Going on: Determine the Reason . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

STEP 2: What Caused It: Identify the Root Cause of the Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

STEP 3: What Can I Do: Rectify the Situation . . . . . . . . 173

vii

CONTENTS

viii

CUSTOMER SERVICE

TRAINING 101

STEP 4: What Can I Say: Acknowledge the Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

STEP 5: What Needs to Be Done: Fix What Needs to Be Fixed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179

Key Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183 Practice Lesson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184 Think About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188

PART III Putting It All Together

CHAPTER 8 Hitting the Ground Running: Ready, Set, Go . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

CHAPTER 9 Being the Best You Can Be: The Total Package . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 Quick Quotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

 ................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download