When a company is new to delivering customer service on the Social Web it is very common to have issues in getting started. The customer service team goes through different policies and iterations to get it right. In this five part series, I want to discuss considerations for empowering your agents to deliver great customer service on the Social Web.
Training
The number one issue will be training your customer service agents. Customer service on the Social Web can be completely different from talking to customers on the phone and solving their problems. Traditional channels like the phone are transactional, while Social Web interactions are conversational. Traditional channels are one to one and the Social Web is one to many. The impact of bad customer service is much greater on the Social Web. Training agents for the Social Web constitutes three key elements.
- Company specific training - Training has to encompass adopting company specific knowledge of products, services, policies, systems, etc. to delivering customer service on the Social Web. For this purpose it is important to look at each of the key areas and identify the changes required for the Social Web scenario. This can be achieved by answering questions such as, "how does a particular area of customer service change if the question comes from Facebook or Twitter?"
- Social Web specific training - Each customer service agent should be trained on the basics of social networks, The company's Social Media presence, expected etiquette, the tone of the conversation that the company is standardizing on - which may depend on the target audience and finally the tools the company is using to manage Social Web interactions. In addition, the training should focus on optimizing the customer experience of each social network. The content format related issues for different mediums should also be highlighted in the training so that the answer is optimized to a specific medium. The Social Web culture is all for sharing, which can help the company reach other people through their customers. Hence, in formulating the answer for any question, the potential to share can be viewed as a means of maximizing exposure. Another key facet of the Social Web is its one-to-many nature. In this case, when a customer has a problem and posted it on Facebook or Twitter, we might see reactions like 'I also have the same problem'. The customer service agents need to be trained on how to identify similar problems and address them effectively in a public setting.
- Collaboration training - Many questions on the Social Web may pertain to different departments and the person covering may not know the answers to all questions. If the company is global, then the questions may be related to a particular geography such as Europe or Asia though the Facebook or Twitter accounts may be handled by the US team. This problem will be much higher as the company size grows and the customer engagement grows. To head off this potential challenge, the customer service agents need to be trained on how to collaborate with other service groups, other departments such as marketing and sometimes other external parties such as partners, vendors and suppliers (for example, a company might outsource field inspection or installation of its goods to its service providers). Timing is critical for such collaboration and the onus of tracking and following up will continue to remain on the customer service agent who is tasked to be the face of the company on the Social Web. The training needs to revolve around a clear understanding of who to work with for different types of questions, setting proper expectations, setting follow-up reminders using productivity tools such as Microsoft Outlook and finally, escalation paths if there is no response from their colleagues.
In the subsequent blog posts, we will focus on the following four considerations:
- Process
- Approval Policies
- Quality monitoring and coaching
- Measuring and rewarding
Regards,
Srinivas Penumaka
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