In today’s competitive marketplace, the success of your small business isn’t just about making sales – it’s about what happens after. Exceptional customer service solidifies loyalty and transforms satisfied customers into vocal advocates for your brand.
Delivering outstanding service can be challenging, especially with limited resources and rising customer expectations, such as the demand for support across their preferred channels. Whether you’re managing a dedicated team or working solo, leveraging new technologies like AI and automation can revolutionise how you serve customers, ensuring every interaction delights.
Add a Personal Touch to Every Customer Interaction
Personalisation is at the heart of exceptional service but it can be hard to remember faces, names and essential client details when your processes are manual. Fortunately, all of this data doesn’t have to be stored in your head. CRM tools like Salesforce Service store and analyse information like customer preferences and past interactions, so even small teams can tailor communications and make sure to remember the little things that make a big impact. From acknowledging a birthday to recalling a past conversation, these personal touches make every customer feel valued and encourage repeat business.
Turn Problems into Valuable Interactions
Swift and effective issue resolution is essential to maintain and even bolster a customer’s trust and confidence in your product or service. Today’s customers expect quick, professional service whether they’re dealing with a global brand or a local shop. Automated case management and real-time analytics may sound complex but out-of-the-box tools now allow small businesses to streamline issue resolution without IT support.
With the help of data and AI, you can connect customers with the right person to solve their problems and even uncover tactful opportunities for cross-selling and upselling to turn your service into a revenue centre. AI-generated upgrade recommendations, mobile quoting for field service workers and on-the-spot payment capabilities mean your service team can turn every customer interaction into a growth avenue.
The Customer Journey Takes Centre Stage
Customers today want to interact with your business from their platform of choice, whether by chatbot, email, phone call or even WhatsApp. While it may sound like a handful to manage service interactions across multiple channels, you can actually speed up resolution times and reduce costs by opting for an omnichannel service strategy and integrating each channel with your CRM.
The smart use of channels can also encourage self-service. 85% of customers seek to self-serve when they first land on the help or support page, so it makes sense to present them with knowledge articles and AI-powered search so they can solve their problems on the spot. Self-service also has the benefit of reducing the load on your service team and bringing down costs.
Preempting Customer Needs with AI-Powered Service
Outstanding service doesn’t just react to problems – it anticipates them. With predictive analytics and AI, small businesses can proactively understand customer needs and issues before they even type them into a chatbot or describe them to an agent over the phone. This proactive approach shows your dedication to customer care, reduces resolution times and establishes your reputation as an attentive and innovative business.
AI-powered service can also help small businesses adapt their products to meet customer desires. Keegan Baker, Founder and CEO of Audata, explains how Salesforce Service has changed their approach to product development. “It has really changed our product planning as we can go in and see what features people are talking about and make data-driven decisions about what to implement next,” says Bakker.
Exceptional Experiences from Sales to Service
Small business success isn’t defined by a sale; it’s achieved through sustained excellence in customer service. Exceptional service sets your business apart, turning customers into advocates and driving repeat business.
Join the workshop, Empowering Growth & Efficiency for SMB Service Teams, at Commbank Smallbiz Week to discover how AI-powered CRM can transform interaction into an opportunity to impress, delight, and build a loyal customer base.
