While working, you overhear a discussion between two of your coworkers about what makes customer service or customer experience distinct. They want your opinion, and you start to panic since you’ve no idea where they diverge from your own.
Although the two phrases are related, many service providers confuse customer experience with customer service. It is essential that you recognize the distinction between the two. Why? Because the quality of your customer service directly affects the impression you make on potential buyers.
For instance, Xfinity customer service is what mainly attracts new users and keeps existing customers in place for the leading internet service provider. That’s because it shows the users that the brand puts up a lot of effort for its customers.
Recognizing the differences while also recognizing their interconnectedness can help you provide the kind of service that boosts your customers’ opinions of your brand. Let’s dive in!
What Exactly is Customer Service?
Assisting and advocating for consumers before, during, and after a purchase is what we call “customer service.” A company’s customers can get help from actual people working for the company. Self-service features, such as a knowledge base or chatbots, can also be made available.
Providing excellent customer service involves more than just firing out one-off emails. The objective is to go out of one’s way to help customers and offer them the best possible answers to their issues. When it comes to maintaining a loyal customer base, successful companies know that providing excellent customer service is crucial.
They’re quick to respond to requests. Sixty percent of clients value speed in customer support the highest. In conversations, they maintain a sympathetic tone. Almost half of all clients prefer to interact with a helpful, pleasant representative.
They provide service in the methods most convenient for their clients. Half of all customers would rather talk to a real person than use a messaging service like Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp to talk to their loved ones.
What Is Customer Experience?
Customer satisfaction is measured by how a customer feels about their overall experience with a company. The marketing materials a potential customer sees before making a purchase, the sales process, the quality of the product or service itself, and the quality of the customer service they receive after making a purchase are all part of the customer experience.
The customer journey spans a variety of channels and is an ongoing process. The customer journey may include a visit to your company’s website, a call to customer support, a meeting with a sales representative, or the appearance of an Instagram ad for your product.
The Three Ps: People, Procedure, And Product—are What Ultimately Determine A Customer’s Satisfaction.
People: Whether a customer is calling a sales representative or speaking with a support representative, they want to talk to someone who is friendly and knowledgeable.
Process: Customers value a streamlined and memorable journey throughout the purchasing process. The improvement could be anything from a less complicated method of making a payment to faster access to service representatives.
Product: Customers are looking for simple solutions to complex issues.
Look no farther than the food delivery business Grubhub for a model of excellent CX. At the height of the epidemic, the business answered at least 80% of calls under 20 seconds, drastically cutting down on client wait times.
To further reduce contacts per order, the company has automated routine operations like client order modifications and refunds. In response to customers’ concerns about their safety, Grubhub implemented a contactless delivery option.
Differences Between Customer Experience and Customer Service
While customer service is essential, it only accounts for a fraction of the total time a consumer spends interacting with your brand. The differences between CX and customer service go deeper than just this broad categorization.
Power Over Situation
The quality of customer service provided by your organization is entirely under your watchful eye. While you do have some say in the CX, you have less sway because of the wide variety of influences on the brand’s image that you must contend with.
Support teams can evaluate their performance in terms of customer satisfaction (CSAT), customer effort (CES), and net promoter score (NPS). Customer lifetime value (CLV), customer churn rate, and customer retention rate are just a few of the other indicators organizations can use to assess CX.
Ownership
Managers and employees in the customer service department are largely responsible for assisting customers. While other team members may interact with customers, it is ultimately the support team’s responsibility to provide such assistance (and to do it effectively).
Customer experience (CX) is everyone’s job. It is the responsibility of every department in the company, from marketing and sales to product development, to ensure that every interaction a client has with the company is positive.
Keeping these distinctions in mind can help you better serve your clients and improve their overall CX as you work to create loyal, long-term partnerships.
Final Thoughts
Both customer service and customer experience are important if you want to create loyal customers. Managing both excellent service and a consistent CX for your customers can feel like an insurmountable chore, but technologies like our customer experience software can make it easier. With Zendesk, you can swiftly respond to customer inquiries over several channels and tailor each interaction throughout the customer’s journey.