Tips for Providing Good Customer Service During a Crisis

Providing good customer service during a crisis is not easy.

Customers get more emotional and stressed for all the obvious reasons, and it can often get amplified when dealing with customer or money related issues.

We have compiled here some tips to help you and your company provide better customer service even on turbulent times like these.

1. Relate to the customer’s pain

Customer service reps often deal with many similar issues and situations, and it is not always easy to give an emphatic response after hearing the same story time after time.

In addition – some of the customer service representatives might also have a hard time during the crisis, which might make them more self centered.

In every interaction with the customer, try to find the spot with which you can relate, and express empathy.

If you feel like you can not find this spot – it is useful to have some generic emphatic sentences prepared beforehand, and use them as genuinely as you can.

2. Really listen to the customer

On stressful times, the customers needs might be different from usual.

Some customers just need the reassurance that their order, product or service are still functioning as they should.

Some customers might want to express frustration even though they know there is nothing you can do to change the situation.

A customer service rep should try to listen to the customer and react in a patient and emphatic manner, even if the issue at hand seems trivial or even annoying.

3. Focus on what you can do

It is probably one of the oldest saying in customer service methodologies, but on crisis times it is even more important: “focus on what you can do, not what you can’t.”

If a product is unavailable or an order is delayed – don’t just tell the customer that this is the way it is, but try to find the things you can do for him.

Giving customers more control on shipment tracking, adding coupons to a delayed order or staying in constant contact with the customer – these are just a few examples for things you can do for the customer, that could make him or her feel better, and more satisfied with your brand.

Be creative, and involve other customer service staff and management in the process of building a solutions bank for customers.