As customer expectations continue to rise, delivering great customer service is getting more and more challenging for brands. Today’s customers expect transparency, speed, simplicity, personalization, and much more. The companies that cannot deliver this will get left in the dust while the ones that can keep up thrive.
Speeding up your response times is a great way to “wow” your customers and grow your customer loyalty, referrals, and profits. Below we will answer and discuss the following questions:
- Why do response times matter so much in customer service?
- How can an answering service improve response times?
- Why should I establish a clear response time with my answering service?
Why do response times matter so much in customer service?
With a reputation as one of the best answering services for over four decades, we understand why fast response times are more important than ever in customer service.
Let’s say you’re a plumber, and someone calls you about a leaky sink. Your answering service handles the call on your behalf, and per your instructions, they tell the caller that you will get back to them as soon as possible. The caller is distraught about their leaky sink and wants to know exactly when they will be receiving a call back. They threaten to call another plumber unless you give them an exact time when they will be hearing back from you.
“ASAP” is not a good enough response time for many customers, and it can cost you in a variety of ways:
- Not only do you risk losing the customer, but it’s possible that they will share their bad experience online and with their friends and family members.
- If the customer calls your phone multiple times, it will cost you more in additional answering service fees.
- Callers become upset that they haven’t heard back from your company, and they may yell at your virtual receptionists, and you and your staff, causing unnecessary stress.
Today’s world is already stressful enough. Simply establishing a specific response time and sticking to it can make a world of difference for your customers and your business.
How can an answering service improve response times?
Before we dive deeper into establishing clear response times with your answering service, let’s go over some of the ways that an answering service can help you improve them:
- 24/7 answering services can ensure that fewer calls, text messages, or live website chat messages from customers slip through the cracks.
- Our live agents are friendly, professional, and compassionate. They will greet your callers warmly and effectively communicate a clear response time.
- In the case of a true emergency, our virtual receptionists can escalate the issue and help you get back to the customer faster.
Why should I establish a clear response time with my answering service?
If you hire an answering service or virtual receptionist service to help generate more business at a lower cost, it’s important to provide the answering service with the tools to be successful. One of those tools is a clear response time.
Whether it’s the next business day, 24 hours, four hours, or 15 minutes, providing a specific callback time and honoring it goes a long way in creating trust with your customers. Earning your customers’ trust is one of the leading ways to develop a long-term client roster.
When our live agents are able to pass a specific callback response time along to the caller, the caller is less apt to call again before the expressed response time. While customers may not like the callback time, they will respect it in most cases. The result is more positive experiences for your customers.
