We all know that the success of your business relies on you to make your customers happy and successful, and you want them to know how much you care. Sometimes, we might do things that make our customers annoyed or even angry, even if we don’t mean to.
However, once a customer gives you their money, they need to be assured that you will offer quick and satisfactory customer service and deliver on the commitments made during the sales process.
HubSpot has outlined some of the eye-opening statistics on the impact of customer service on both vendors and clients.
- 90% of Americans use customer service as a factor in deciding whether or not to do business with a company.
- The #1 reason customers switch to a new brand is feeling unappreciated.
- 49% of American consumers switched companies last year due to poor customer service.
- 78% of customers have backed out of purchase due to poor customer experience.
- 33% of customers are most frustrated by having to wait on hold. 33% are most frustrated by having to repeat themselves to multiple support reps.
- A customer is 4x more likely to switch to a competitor if the problem they are having is service-based.
Given that, there are many reasons that lead to frustrating customer experience.
Top 5 Conditions That Lead to an Annoying Customer Experience
1. Long Wait Times
For most customers, the most annoying part of customer service is long wait times. Similarly, request turnaround time is the most important factor in support as businesses risk customer churn if they do not respond in a timely manner.
Here is a classic example of a bad response time that tested the patience of a customer.
In this case the customer is understandably frustrated by their inability to get the vendor to reply to their attempt to cancel. This was only exacerbated by their insistence that they had followed protocol to cancel. Even after leaving their review they couldn’t get in touch with anyone as seen in the reply:
SOURCE
2. Misleading Commitments
The situation can get worse if you respond to the customer complaint with a misleading commitment. Salespeople who make promises to close a sale that are then not honored in the contract represent dishonest and unethical practices which nearly always result in a customer choosing not to renew. Still, you see these practices proliferate within SaaS and the data industry in particular.
A client from one of the biggest brands in the data industry had raised a complaint about misleading commitments they received from their sales rep and was frustrated with the way they handled their case.
3. Being Passed Around
Another study that asked customers what annoys them most saw 37% of respondents mention “being passed around.”
That is, being transferred from one support agent to another agent or department. If you’ve ever had this done to you, you know how frustrating it is. This has happened to our clients before they switched to SalesIntel.
A lot of our clients had a bad experience with a publicly-traded B2B data provider. They were stuck in an auto-renewal contract with them and were finding it difficult to cancel. (Read the complete story)
4. Perceived Rudeness
We all hate it when people are rude to us, but what we rarely think about is that sometimes, the way that we say things might come off as rude, even if we don’t mean it that way. That is why using the right tone in customer service becomes so important.
This often happens with brands with a larger client base who are more concerned with closing new revenue than retaining their current customers. This often manifests itself in not addressing the clients’ queries in the right way at the right time, leading to a customer who is likely to churn.
5. Bad Upsells
Upselling can be great for both the customer and the vendor. Customers get an opportunity to use the product and can better see how additional features would further benefit them without having to commit to everything all at once. Obviously, generating more revenue from an existing customer is hugely beneficial to a vendor. So done properly, upsells and cross-sells can benefit all parties..
Upselling to an angry customer can make him even more pissed-off when the upsell doesn’t actually add value to the customer’s life. Even more, pushing for an upsell while there are outstanding issues simply adds insult to injury. Timing is everything in upselling.
Customer Service in the Data Industry – Virtuous or Vicious Cycle?
There are many B2B data providers that put profits first and customers last. The vicious cycle not only ignores customer needs, it explicitly exploits them. It puts profits ahead of people and follows the overlord philosophy of controlling clients and the product tightly and locks them in, not with great service, but with restrictive policies, and financial disincentives that leave customers feeling stuck and frustrated.
50% of customers have left a brand for a competitor who was able to stay more relevant and better satisfy their needs.
Switch to SalesIntel’s Virtuous Circle
Good customer service isn’t always about knowing the right answer. Often, it’s about finding the right answer so that your customer doesn’t have to.
There are many areas (almost all areas that should matter to a client) where SalesIntel has proved to be the best ZoomInfo alternative.
Our Customer Success Managers are quick and committed to delivering exemplary service. We ensure that our team has the human and technical resources they need to do an outstanding job. We believe that being average at the customer service does not lead to business success. In line with the change in customer expectations for immediate assistance, our team is always up to deliver a quick turnaround time.
Our much appreciated Research-on-Demand service helps our customers in rare situations where if we don’t have the data they need, customers can provide us with a list of companies, names, and titles and we will go find and human verify the information they need.
All the feedback earned by our team is a source of pride for us and it is one of many reasons for our customers to stick with SalesIntel (without any enforced auto-renewal policy).
SalesIntel strives to maintain transparency where its customers are made aware of the minutest details before the contract is signed. No hidden charges, no fine print, no auto-renewals, nothing.
A big brand doesn’t necessarily mean big value. Switch to a data provider that creates value for your business to grow big. Switch to superior B2B data quality, quantity, and service for your business.
