With that said, how can leaders of a company support their employees and set them up for success as they work remotely?

As a team leader, you are responsible for helping create the best remote work experience possible for your employees. Fortunately, you don’t have to solve these problems on your own. In this article, you’ll find five tips that managers and supervisors can use to help employees succeed in the remote workplace.

1. Put a focus on overall mental health.

Many people bear the burden of stress, uncertainty, and loneliness on their own, meaning mental health needs immediate attention from employers and the leaders within every organization. Employees value corporate initiatives specifically designed to help them manage and maintain their overall well-being, and these mental health initiatives can help improve morale, productivity, and the overall employee experience.

Such initiatives can include:

• Starting an online discussion board regarding mental health

• Coaching managers on how to approach mental wellness with their teams

• Sharing and discussing mental health resources

• Launching telehealth counseling services for employee use

• Providing employees with a stipend they can use on a gym membership or other exercise programs

MIT Sloan Management Review states, “The most effective step to battle isolation, according to our survey, is regular check-ins by managers to see how their employees are doing personally and professionally, an approach that was mentioned by one of every 10 people.” Typically, employees appreciate some kind of emotional support, especially from their superiors at a company.

Putting the resources and systems in place to support your employees’ mental health can go a long way for your company. Mental health initiatives can help improve performance and increase employee retention rates.

2. Promote transparent and consistent communication.

In a remote workplace, leaders need to be mindful that virtual communication is better than no communication, and may need to be coached on how to have effective virtual conversations with their employees. Mary Baker writes in an article for Gartner, “Two-way dialogue between managers and employees ensures that communication efforts help, rather than hurt, engagement. Gartner research shows that employees’ understanding of organizations’ decisions and their implications during change is far more important for the success of a change initiative than employees ‘liking’ the change.” Communication between leaders and their team gives employees the perspective and information they need, which then enables them to express and process their emotions in a healthy way — while also feeling more in control.

Here are a few ways that you can encourage and promote consistent communication within your team:

• Seek out feedback on a regular basis.

• Create clear and streamlined processes for formal and informal communication.

• Ask what their preferred communication style is (for example, instant messages, email, or voice calls, video calls).

• Avoid making assumptions and actively listen.

• Speak about the importance of their work.

One thing to note is that no one should expect the camera to be on during every meeting. Sometimes, being on multiple video calls throughout the day can be daunting. When you’re in-person in an office, you have breaks and are able to step away. Employees should be able to do the same while working remotely. If the camera doesn’t need to be on, don’t require it: This can allow your employees to relax a bit, even eat a snack, and help curb some of that Zoom fatigue.

3. Encourage a healthy work-life balance.

The phrase “work-life balance” has a different meaning for fully remote employees. When it comes to helping employees create and foster a healthy balance between their professional and personal lives, one of the first things you need to do as a leader is set clear, empathetic expectations.

Every employee’s situation is different, and a one-size-fits-all approach to employee engagement can be ineffective at best. When you demonstrate an understanding of your employees’ unique circumstances and embrace methods to help them work their best, such as with flexible schedules and operations, you’re more likely to cultivate a healthy work-life balance for your team.

Promoting work-life balance can be a challenge depending on the size, type, and available workforce of the company. How can a supervisor promote a healthy work-life balance when their employees are working at home?

• Encourage your team to have a dedicated workspace.

• Make sure employees are taking breaks and not overworking.

• Reinforce the fact that having a routine and specific working hours is crucial.

• Have patience: Everyone is different and expressing a little extra kindness will help your employees continue to be productive in a remote work setting.

4. Equip your employees with the tools they need to be successful.

Where do you find yourself being the most productive while working at home? Having the proper tools and an organized workspace is crucial to succeeding in a remote work environment. Depending on an employee’s role, the physical tools they need to do their jobs differ greatly. If they are on a computer all day, they may need an adjustable standing desk and high-quality second monitor. A salesperson may require more than a cell phone and a laptop loaded with sales software. As a manager, equip your employees so they have everything they need to do their job successfully.

Your team may have the technology they need to work, but does every person know how to use it effectively? Some employees may need additional training or support from other departments in order to work from home successfully. Simply sending them work equipment is not always enough, so consider the best way to teach your employees to use each piece of technology.

5. Find the proper balance between autonomy and management.

No one enjoys being micro-managed, but not everyone works best with complete autonomy. In an article for the Harvard Business Review, the writers explain, “One of the reasons the pandemic has been so stressful is because it has stripped people of their autonomy, or the extent to which they can be themselves and have discretion over their actions. Having a certain amount of autonomy has long been considered an innate psychological need, and studies have suggested that a lack of autonomy is detrimental for employee performance and well-being.” In order to rectify this problem, managers can replace more intense levels of managing with regular one-on-one check-ins.

Some supervisors think that the opposite of micromanagement — full autonomy — is the answer. This is not the case, however.

Here are three tips that you can use to help create the proper balance:

• Set up regular check-in meetings with each of your employees.

• Make it clear that you care. Ask how they are doing and what they need in order to feel supported and be successful. Act on their responses.

• Revisit and consider updating your pre-existing beliefs about employees who may have had difficulties in the past.

Leaders Can Help Remote Employees Excel

Remote work provides organizations with the opportunity to rethink existing processes and make any necessary changes that will help boost overall efficiency and improve their virtual communications. Remote work isn’t going anywhere, and with it comes new challenges — and, more importantly, new opportunities.

Companies across the globe are experimenting with innovative management practices to help ease the transition to a more physically distributed workforce. One thing that’s clear is that leaders cannot afford to wait to react. They need to proactively reach out to employees directly to help them navigate their remote work environment and be as successful as possible while doing it.

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An effective customer service management strategy is essential for the growth of a business; it sets the tone for how customers are treated. In most cases, a happy customer is a loyal customer. It doesn’t matter how great your product or service is. If a customer isn’t happy with the level of care your business offers, they’ll look for a similar product elsewhere.

How, then, do you turn well-meaning phrases like “the customer is always right” into actionable expectations for customer service? Read on to learn useful tips for the ever-changing customer service industry. This guide will help you develop a customer service management strategy that guarantees the consumer will be put at the forefront of your business.

1. Create a mission statement that defines how you make customer service a priority.

A mission statement “articulates a company’s purpose.” Once it’s written or updated, explain the statement to your employees and, when applicable, provide training on how to enforce it in their day-to-day responsibilities. A mission statement that’s written down but not an active part of how the company is run is useless; your employees need to understand its value and know how to apply it in their own roles, and your customers need to see it in action when they reach out for customer service.

Consider publishing the statement on your website and on marketing communications so your customers continue to understand your dedication to them. Discuss it in department meetings and ask your customer service team if they feel it’s easy to do their jobs with the mission statement in mind.

For inspiration, take notes from these four customer-centered mission and value statements.

• American Express: “We’re here to help our customers and their communities thrive. That means putting our service ethic to work enabling communities to prosper, and assisting when a helping hand is needed.”

• Nordstrom: “Since 1901, we’ve been committed to providing our customers with the best possible service — and to improving it every day.”

• Great Canadian Gaming Company: “Our mission is to provide outstanding experiences to our guests, rewarding opportunities for our team, and superior value to our shareholders.”

• Salesforce: “Our success depends upon our customers’ success.”

2. Ask for reviews of your current level of customer service.

You don’t know exactly what you need to work on if you’re out of touch with how your customers currently view your business. Getting current reviews is a great way to start improving your customer service strategy. For all you know, if you’ve only recently created your mission statement, you may already be enforcing some of its core values without realizing it.

By asking for reviews and feedback, you’ll save time by learning exactly what your customers are looking for, instead of trying to guess and then make amends later on. For example, if your current customers report long wait times when calling your customer care number, you may want to consider hiring more employees or switching to a phone automation service. Only when you know what your customers would like improved can you take steps to make those value-driven improvements.

3. Take your customer feedback and list the processes that impact customer service. Then improve those processes.

To use the previous example, time spent responding to customer inquiries is one process that directly impacts customer service (and it has several metrics to prove it). Other aspects of the customer experience, including time spent taking orders, delivery times, website functionality, manufacturing processes, product development, integration issues, the sales process, and more all impact customer service outside of your service department’s scope.

Your customers can often point you directly to processes that need improvement, but by creating a list of all the processes that have the biggest, most direct impact on customer satisfaction, you’ll have a good overview of areas that could use improvement. Then, get together with your customer service team to brainstorm ways to make these processes faster, more seamless, and more customer-centered.

If you get stuck during the brainstorming process, consider researching companies that are known for exceptional customer service. Use their methods to set the bar for your own processes, create a list of standards, and refer back to these expectations frequently when updating your own strategy.

4. Train your employees in customer service.

It takes experience and training to know how to handle customers, especially unsatisfied ones. And not all employees are going to come into their jobs with years of customer service experience, so they’re going to need training. Even employees with experience should receive the same level of training, both on your company’s mission statement and how you want them to handle different situations, because businesses may approach customer service differently.

Provide detailed training sessions. Those sessions may include lessons on:

• Phone, internet, and face-to-face communications

• Technology and tools

• Understanding and navigating the company website

• Real-life customer service scenarios

Also offer training refresher courses from time to time so employees don’t forget the small details in your processes, and don’t forget to ask for feedback at the end of the training sessions. Find out what employees found most or least helpful, then use their feedback to revise your training methods. Your goal is to ensure that your employees see value in their training.

5. Reward employees who provide excellent customer service.

Another way to help your employees see value in customer service training is to reward those who are successful in implementing what they’ve learned. Just about everyone likes to be acknowledged for a job well done, so don’t underestimate the power of positive feedback, acknowledgment, and appreciation.

The concept of the employee of the month goes back decades, but it’s still relevant today because, when done well, it works. People like to be recognized for their hard work and achievements. Whether it’s through an award ceremony, a picture on the wall, a company-wide email, a monetary or gift incentive, or something else, make sure to honour those who embody your company values.

Whether you choose to have an employee of the month or to implement another reward system, providing positive reinforcement for excellent customer service gives your team something to work toward and encourages them to provide quality customer care. Disney, for example, reportedly has nearly 200 different employee recognition programs. “Defined as any tangible expression of appreciation for an employee’s demonstration of the organization’s desired behaviors, recognition can be empowering, often propelling people to increasingly higher levels of engagement.”

Find ways to recognize your employees for their contributions to exceptional customer experience. You won’t regret it.

6. Incorporate technology and automation into your strategy.

There’s a ton of business technology and tools that are available that can do everything from help to improve customer service and user experiences to automate processes for business owners in order to save time and money. Companies that haven’t incorporated technology into their customer service strategies are behind the curve.

As a number of brick and mortar stores close and companies move entirely online, businesses need a way to communicate with customers over the internet. Furthermore, many businesses choose to communicate through Facebook Messenger, which also delivers real-time data on responsiveness. Social media is generally a great way to communicate and connect with customers directly online.

Customers expect to be able to contact and receive customer service 24/7. One option is to pay for someone to be available all the time; for companies that want another option, look into artificial intelligence. AI chatbots can operate 24 hours a day and can be taught to answer basic customer service inquiries.

Developing a great customer service management strategy is crucial in order to differentiate your company from your competitors and leave them behind. Take the time to evaluate your current processes and garner feedback to initiate change. Find the customer service strategy that’s right for your business, evaluate its key points, and pay attention to how the quality of your customer service impacts your sales.

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Marketing funnels and customer journeys are similar ideas, and some people new to the business may think the terms are interchangeable. However, they actually mean different things. Here’s everything you need to know about the difference between the marketing funnel and the customer journey.

The Marketing Funnel: What It Is and When You Should Use It

The marketing funnel — also known as the sales funnel — is a model of your marketing and sales process from your company’s point of view. Leads start at the top of the funnel. As they learn more about your business and get closer to making a purchase, they move down toward the bottom of the funnel. This type of model has been in use for more than 100 years, and it’s still one of the most basic concepts in business.

A customer at the top of your marketing funnel knows your business exists, but they haven’t interacted with you much or sought out additional information. In the middle is the research and consideration stage. At the bottom of the funnel, customers have done their research and they’re ready to make a purchase. Since not everyone who takes an interest in a business will end up buying something, most businesses have more prospects at the top of their funnel than the bottom — hence the term.

Some businesses like to break their marketing funnel down into smaller stages. For instance, they may include two subsections, Research and Evaluation, in the Consideration stage of their funnel. Many businesses have also started to view customer retention as an essential part of the bottom of the sales funnel.

Understanding your marketing funnel is useful to you as a business owner or marketer because it gives you a way to categorize your leads and customers based on their relationship with your business: They’ve just discovered your business, they’re interested in your product or service but not sold yet, or they’re ready to buy. Tracking the position of leads in your funnel helps you know how to keep their interest, answer their questions, and address their concerns, all of which can be instrumental in making that sale.

Most marketing funnels focus more on broad categorization than individual touchpoints. That is, the funnel divides leads into several different “baskets” based on how they’ve interacted with your business, but it doesn’t always take into account the actual touchpoints those leads have encountered. For example, one middle-of-the-funnel (MOFU) lead may have signed up for your email newsletter and interacted with your Facebook page, while another filled out your website’s contact form and visited your blog multiple times. They didn’t get to the same point in your funnel by following the same route.

The marketing funnel is presented as linear, and this is one of the main ways it’s different than a customer journey map. Since it is a generalized model, your marketing funnel is simplified out of necessity; it traces the most straightforward path a lead can take from awareness to sale. A customer’s real journey from lead to customer, however, is rarely so simple, which means you shouldn’t rely on your marketing funnel alone for insight.

Understanding the Customer Journey

The customer journey is a map of the route a customer takes from the time they first encounter your brand to the time they make a purchase. Unlike the more rigid, linear marketing funnel, the customer journey can be (and usually is) meandering and circuitous. The longer your sales cycle is, the longer your average customer’s journey will probably be.

Unlike the marketing funnel, which is concerned with a customer’s stage of interest in your business, the customer journey tracks the individual touchpoints a lead encounters before making a purchase. Every interaction — for example, visiting your website or opening a marketing email — is a touchpoint. Many people return to earlier touchpoints as they evaluate a product or service, so the customer journey often loops back on itself instead of progressing in a neat, linear way. In fact, the average lead has to encounter as many as eight touchpoints before they feel ready to make a purchase.

Tracking the customer journey can be tricky. It takes a lot of information to find out exactly what your leads are doing before they buy something from you, and it’s difficult to create a picture that’s 100 per cent accurate. But if you’ve got enough data, studying your customers’ route to purchase can be very helpful. It shows you, with a level of granularity that your marketing funnel doesn’t provide, which of your marketing efforts are connecting with people and which ones, if any, aren’t as effective.

If you have enough data, you can create a customer journey map, which is a touchpoint-based model of how your average lead interacts with your business before making a purchase. You can even create multiple maps based on distinct audience personas. Just keep in mind that different leads approach the buying process in very different ways, so it’s important not to assume that every customer will follow the exact sequence of touchpoints you model.

How to Use Customer Journey Maps and the Marketing Funnel

Customer journey maps and the marketing funnel are similar tools, and they can be used in complementary ways. Here’s what you need to know about putting these tools to work for you as a marketer or business owner.

Since your marketing funnel helps you keep tabs on how leads are interacting with your business, use it to understand what kind of information or assistance a lead likely needs at any given time. For instance, a lead at the top of your funnel (TOFU) is likely to benefit from reading your business’s FAQ or a blog post that explains your product or service. Leads at the bottom of the funnel (BOFU), on the other hand, may be ready to convert if you send them highly personalized marketing emails.

Paying attention to your marketing funnel also helps you ensure that your marketing strategy is strong and effective at every step of a customer’s journey. For instance, maybe your business needs more marketing materials aimed at leads who want to research your product. You’re more likely to notice and correct this issue if you understand what leads need at different stages of the funnel.

Tracking customer journeys, on the other hand, helps you to really get into your leads’ heads. It helps you answer important questions, like:

• How are they discovering your business?
• How are they researching your brand?
• What snags do they run into along the way?

Answering questions like these can help you design a more efficient lead nurturing process and a better customer experience.

Customer journey maps are also a good reality check for your marketing funnel. Try comparing your average customer’s journey to the model you use for your marketing funnel. Do they look similar? Does your marketing funnel’s progression make sense based on what you’ve observed real-life customers doing? If your marketing funnel needs some tweaks, use your customer journey maps to find out where the problem is.

Wrapping Up

The marketing funnel and customer journey maps are two buzzwords you likely hear a lot in the world of business and marketing. These concepts are closely linked, although they aren’t equivalent to each other. The customer journey is a detailed outline of every step a lead takes to become a paying customer, while the marketing funnel is a model that businesses use to market appropriately to leads at different stages of the buying cycle.

Even though they aren’t the same thing, your marketing funnel and your customer journey maps should tell the same story. Collect data on the touchpoints your leads encounter and use it to inform your marketing funnel. Using these tools in tandem with each other is a powerful way to target your marketing materials to the right leads while creating a smoother and more user-friendly path to purchase.

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If you need some inspiration for your company, department, or within your own career, look no further: Here are 13 of the best recent business-related tweets. At the end of the article, you’ll also find some information on tracking down and connecting with industry leaders on social media.

Business Tweets That Will Inspire You

Brené Brown

Had what felt like 50 though conversations and tumbles at work this week. Outcome: more trust, more connection, more accountability, more focus. Grateful for people who keep showing up. Even when it’s hard. Especially when it’s hard

She’s a bestselling author, a popular speaker, and a respected researcher: Brené Brown is on a mission to help people be more authentic. With this tweet, Brené reminds us that in order to grow a company, employees must be willing to have difficult conversations. These conversations can help employees and managers do better work, have a better working relationship, and feel integral to the company’s success. Companies with satisfied employees generally have happier customers, too.

David Cancel

What made a company great a decade ago will most likely be thier greates weakness today.

Disruption cannot be stopped.

Progress.

David Cancel, the CEO of Drift, a company that provides calendar software for busy businesspeople, reminds us that change is constantly happening, especially in the business and marketing world. What works one year may not work the next. Furthermore, consumers don’t just expect companies to keep up with change — they demand it. Business owners must make it a priority to stay ahead of trends in their field, and even more importantly, they must be willing to make changes within their own companies to keep up with the times. Old methods won’t work forever, and for a business to survive long-term, the people at the helm need to understand how to drive adaptation.

Gordana Biernat

Think good thoughts….

Your mind is your internal vision board. Don’t fill it with things you fear or want to avoid.”

As a writer and speaker recognized by Oprah Winfrey, Gordana Biernat helps people realize their full potential. With this tweet, she shares an excellent metaphor that conveys the power of positive thinking. Business leaders serve their customers better when they focus on moving in a positive direction. Fears and concerns run rampant in business, but acting on them isn’t what will make your company better. Envision what you want your business to look like and what makes your customers happy, then push toward those goals.

Mark Cuban

If you only do what you have to do, you will always have to do what you are told to do

Mark Cuban is a well-known businessman and investor who’s known for speaking his mind. With this tweet, we’re reminded that going the extra mile isn’t so “extra” anymore if you want to be truly successful in business. You might be able to get by if you put in the bare minimum, but you won’t grow. Whether you’re an entrepreneur or an employee, give your work everything you’ve got if you eventually want the ability to call your own shots.

Barbara Corcoran

It’s your game. Make up your own rules.

A real-estate tycoon known for investing in startups, Barbara Corcoran understands the pressures of high-stakes business. It’s common for business owners to feel like they have to follow some set of external rules to succeed. Often, this feeling is a result of working as an employee at someone else’s company. But businesswoman Corcoran wants you to remember that this feeling is just an illusion. When you work for yourself, you’re in charge. Once you embrace the reality that you can create your own rules, you’ll likely make more progress — and probably enjoy your work more, too.

James Altucher

People always want to know ONE secret to biz success. It’s not ideas. Or execution. Or IQ. Or luck. It’s likability. Practice everyday.

As a serial entrepreneur and angel investor, James Altucher shares that building a successful business isn’t easy, but there’s no reason to make it harder than it has to be. Goals, strategies, tools, and technical skills are all important to your business’ success, but so are soft skills. Generosity, a good sense of humour, and the ability to put people at ease can sometimes be among the most important business tools in your arsenal. Don’t ignore practicality, but don’t neglect the human side of your business, either.

Sarah Robb O’Hagan

I know it’s easy to slip into that anxiety that creeps up on you that you’re getting older, but seriously, it’s never too late.

Sarah Robb O’Hagan knows business. She’s the CEO of Flywhell and the former president of Equinox and Gatorade, and cut her teeth at Virgin and Nike. This tweet speaks to potential entrepreneurs who may be hesitant about reinventing their careers or starting their own companies. Age doesn’t matter when you have a great idea.

Vala Afshar

8 habits of luck people: 1 work hard, 2 complain less, 3 teach others, 4 share credit, 5 be on time, 6 be kind, 7 be teachable, 8 show gratitude

“Luck” is a bit of a misnomer, especially in the business world. Vala Afshar of Salesforce has tips for increasing your odds of getting a lucky break, and none of them involve waiting for good fortune to show up on your doorstep. In a nutshell, he advises his followers to be humble, be a team player, and give credit where it’s due. These tips are timeless and universal. They apply to any field, and they’ll be just as true in a decade as they are now.

Ash Ambirge

Just keep working on it. The secret to any success there ever was

As a consultant who helps business owners find their voice and get started online, Ash Ambirge isn’t afraid to speak her mind. This quick tweet is one of her most concise pieces of advice, and it’s true for all businesses. Satisfying customers, ensuring a great company culture, and growing a healthy business is hard. Keep chipping away at it, and you’re likely to see your hard work pay off.

Jason Fried

Q: What’s your content strategy? A: Not calling it content. Not thinking of it as content. We write when we have something to share

Content marketing is a major part of any company’s marketing strategy, and it’s only getting bigger. But creating content for its own sake won’t necessarily help your business; customers can tell when you phone it in. This tweet from Jason Fried of Basecamp nails the core of what makes a piece of content worth creating: It should be interesting, useful, or valuable. The lesson? Let your passion and your excitement, not necessarily your editorial calendar, fuel your content creation.

Marie Forleo

Someone asked: Whats’s one thing you wish you’d known sooner? Here’s my answer smallbusiness success

On its own, this tweet from entrepreneur and consultant Marie Forleo may not seem like much. However, click the link she shared and you’re taken to her video blog post on the topic of her question — and a discussion with over 500 comments. The blog and resulting comments are sure to help businesspeople feel like they’re part of a special community, and may help them find a few solutions, too.

Tony Robbins

We can adapt to anything if we make the right demands upon ourselves incrementally.

Making progress with your business — or, for that matter, progress in any area of life — can, at times, seem overwhelming or even impossible. Changes happen quickly, you may feel like you’re out of your depth, and it’s easy to get discouraged. This tweet from entrepreneur and motivational speaker Tony Robbins highlights the importance of adapting to change and growth. You don’t have to know everything right now, and you don’t have to come up with a winning strategy overnight. Push yourself a little further every day, and eventually you’ll get where you need to go.

Craig Shapiro

Don’t get good at something you don’t want to do. Solid advice from n8w’s grandpa.

Craig Shapiro, the founder and managing partner of Collaborative Fund, which invests in startups, shares this gem. If you’re not completely clear on your mission, values, or goals for your business, you risk letting your business run off course. Stay on track by asking yourself what you want to spend your days doing and what kind of contribution you want to make to the world. Then put your energy toward making that happen, and say no to the opportunities that aren’t right for you.

How to Connect with Industry Leaders on Social Media

Social media is a goldmine for useful information about your field as well as general business wisdom. If you’re not currently using Twitter and other platforms to stay connected with influencers in your field, you may be out of the loop. Luckily, this is easy to fix, and with a little research, you can find the thought leaders and accounts that pique your interest.

The one thing you shouldn’t do is dive into social media and try to keep up with everything by yourself. Twitter and other popular social media platforms can be a deluge of information, and manually sorting through it takes a lot of time and energy, especially if you’re just getting started with your social media presence.

Instead, you can use a tool that’s built for organizing social media. Social listening tools, for example, can be a major help when it comes to monitoring what people are saying about your business and your industry. They’re also a great way to find out which thought leaders in your field are worth your attention.

Once you’ve identified and followed the thought leaders in your industry, don’t be afraid to reach out to them every now and then. Twitter in particular is great for networking. Comment on tweets that interest you, or ask a question that pertains to an influencer’s area of expertise. Over time, you’ll start building a relationship. As your own reputation grows, you may even start being regarded as an influencer yourself.

Wrapping Up

If you need some inspiration for your business, spend some time on Twitter. Check out the feeds for the leaders listed above. Twitter is full of creative and driven people just like them who share knowledge and wisdom with the world, 140 characters (or more) at a time. While you’re at it, use social media to stay connected to the top players in your field, and learn from what they share with their followers online.

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Make Sure Your Staff Is Appropriately Trained

It’s key that employees are trained on how to interact with customers and attend to their needs, particularly if your business has a brick and mortar store. For example, reps may focus more on providing amazing service to their current customer while giving little attention to the customers in line. They are doing their jobs well, but multi-tasking can be crucial. This is where proper training is essential.

Even if your staff works with customers primarily over the phone, if your staff isn’t trained well, it doesn’t matter how many extra employees you hire. Your customers won’t be satisfied. Write a training manual, enact standard operating procedures, and make sure everyone goes through formal customer service training. Reps should know how to greet customers, ask the right questions to find out what the customer needs, and provide effective solutions to problems. Furthermore, make sure everyone knows how to use your customer relationship management (CRM) platform correctly to ensure consistent quality service. Spending time on training could greatly reduce your customer response time and lead to more satisfied customers.

Consider a Live Answering Service

A live answering service is a great way to increase your customer service response time. According to VoiceNation, a live answering service gives companies the confidence that they won’t miss any customer calls, which also improves customer satisfaction because customers know their needs will be addressed immediately. This ultimately leads to better customer retention rates, which is a high priority for most companies.

Use Technology to Respond to Emails Quickly

Just because email communication is less personal than other customer service options doesn’t mean you can put these requests on the back burner. Successful companies respond to email inquiries just as quickly as they do to phone calls. However, because customers send emails all the time, including in the middle of the night (or whenever they need to reach out to your customer service department), it may not be feasible for your company to respond immediately. This is where technology and automation come into play.

Consider setting up an automatic email response to answer messages received after business hours. While that solution won’t directly answer questions, customers will appreciate that their request has been acknowledged. Then, be sure to make overnight emails your priority once you get back in the office.

Another way technology can be helpful is if you use “quick replies” or “quick responses.” These are pre-written emails that cover a variety of common topics, and they can be sent immediately without much thought or effort. Determine what your common customer questions and requests are and compose thorough email responses to them. Then, when an email comes in at an inconvenient time, see if one of your pre-written messages will suffice. This will help satisfy the customer without a lot of extra effort.

Use “Self-Help” Resources

While this strategy does require time and energy up front, once it’s done it needs little maintenance. Self-help features include FAQ pages, a knowledge base, video tutorials, and community forums. All of these are ways to address customer questions and concerns without having a person present to provide answers. According to Shep Hyken, most customers don’t actually need to speak to a person — they just want the question answered. Consider putting together extensive resources that address common questions and problems. Then direct customers to these pages on your website, preferably with a direct link on your site’s “Contact Us” page.

A prominent, detailed FAQ page is another great way to provide customer support without having to hire additional manpower. The more time you put into creating one and answering as many questions as possible, the fewer customer calls and emails you’ll receive. Customers will be able to answer their own questions via the FAQ. Community forums work in much the same way, but instead of your agents providing all the answers, consumers learn from their peers. Assign one employee to monitor the forums to make sure participants are constructive and the forums run smoothly.

The Takeaway

From monitoring communities to training your customer service team, it’s important to remember that your customer response time directly impacts your net promoter score, and those two metrics affect the success of your company. Monitor both to make sure you’re providing the best possible customer service experience. Implementing these strategies can help ensure you improve your response time and increase customer satisfaction.

If you’re looking for additional ways to improve your company’s customer service, check out our eBook with five more ways you can make customer service easy for your consumers.

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Businesses must be prepared for the latest technologies, and for those that are on the horizon, in order to improve their customer service capabilities. Stronger customer service will ultimately help your company leave the competition in the dust.

5 Technologies Changing the Customer Service Landscape

One thing we have learned from customer service analysis is that very few customer problems are actually unique. There are trends, patterns, and regular problems that your customers face, and preparation could save your agents a lot of time. The key is “anticipatory technology,” or technology that is able to anticipate the common problems clients face. So whether you use live chat, a phone answering system, or some other automated way to filter your customers to a software-produced answer or to a member of your customer service team, technology can save your customers time — and, ultimately, save your company money.

Video Chat

As many businesses take to ecommerce platforms, video chat is a nice option and an excellent compromise between phone and in-person customer support. Video chat also opens up a variety of options in terms of screen sharing, product troubleshooting, visual explanations, and answering customer questions with visual aids, all of which phone support and chat do not allow.

Video Chat Takes Customer Service to the Next Level

• Gartner predicted that this year, one-third of all customer service interactions would still require the support of a human intermediary
• By 2018, 5% of customer service cases will be initiated by internet-connected devices
  • That’s up from 0.02% in 2014
• More than 100 of the 500 largest global businesses will introduce video-based chat by 2018 for customer-facing interactions
• Why is video chat gaining popularity?
  • Dramatically improves customer service
  • Increases your sales
  • Can greatly cut down on expenses
  • Employee training and collaboration improve
  • Sets your business apart from your competition

If you have a high volume of traffic to your customer service channels, you need to determine which customers will need video chat support before you refer them to that option. After all, you likely do not have the staff to support dozens of video calls a day. In the future, it is possible that call centers and phone support will also offer video chat capabilities, but it’s unlikely you need to offer that option to everyone who contacts your customer service department.

Live Chat

Chat options have almost become a no-brainer on business websites, but live chat is still not universal. Having the option of chat support allows your customers to reach out to your company in an efficient and effective way. Call wait times during high-demand circumstances can be long, and chat allows customer support to respond more quickly, to multiple people at once, and without a long wait time. This also plays into the multi-tasking nature of millennials and the internet generation: Your customers can live chat while simultaneously doing something else.

Quick Ways to Make Live Chat a Better Experience for Your Customers

• Provide customers with a transcript
• Automate parts of the conversation with prewritten messages
• Target carefully selected customers with a pop-up chat box
• Use a pre-chat survey to best route the customer
• Use a typing indicator
• Enable chat transfer
• Save chat transcripts for easy access in the future
• Integrate live chat with your CRM platform
• Provide post-chat surveys

Smart Operator Systems and AI Phone Answering Systems

For companies of all sizes, having an automated answering system or an internet-based phone system on a main business line may be the best option for your customer service department. Incoming calls are filtered to the right department and callers are automatically directed where they need to go.

Be selective about the kind of answering system you use; not all are created equal. There are some answering systems that actually learn from the questions your clients ask and get more functional over time. Other options can frustrate callers if they take too long, don’t work well with the caller’s needs, and don’t ultimately help clients do what they need to do—talk to the best customer service representative for their needs.

You essentially have two paths you can take:

1. Go with a more basic phone system that functions via a touch-tone and provides specific options or a directory
2. Get a voice recognition system that is well suited for voice commands and can get your customers where they need to go.

In either case, what you want to focus on is picking a system that will not frustrate your customers, but make them feel like the technology you are using is helpful and efficient.

Augmented Reality

First, the difference between virtual and augmented reality:

• Virtual reality: “Computer-generated environments for you to interact with and be immersed in.”
• Augmented reality: “Using technology to superimpose information on the world we see. For example, images and sounds are superimposed over what the user sees and hears.”

Augmented reality has taken off in the past year, and it will likely become an important part of business assistance in the near future. Apps like PokemonGo have gotten users more comfortable with the idea of augmented reality but, more importantly, this type of technology can benefit location-dependent businesses (e.g., retail stores), social media, mobile devices, and other media streams that impact user experience. According to ZD Net (quoting Forrester), augmented reality “will become the new normal . . . Anything short of that will seem like a black-and-white rerun of The Honeymooners on a 1950s TV.”

Two New Realities, and How They Could Be Used for Customer Service

• Augmented Reality
  • Customers can try on an outfit, then virtually manipulate its colors and patterns with gestures in a “magic mirror”
  • The digital display simulates desired changes while the customer interacts with the virtual item
• Virtual Reality
  • A customer could share what they are seeing and doing with the representative
  • It would be as if the rep were in the customer’s shoes
  • Allows the rep to better guide a customer through the troubleshooting process

In the near future, businesses can anticipate internal use of augmented reality being implemented first, with customer service technology as a prime candidate for innovative use down the road. For example, “holoportation enables support agents to project themselves in proximity to customers, providing virtualized on-site assistance—highly personalized and helping customers step-by-step until the solution to a problem is found.”

Robotic and Virtual Assistants

Old movies and television looking into the “future” predicted robotic and virtual assistants — think Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri, Microsoft’s Cortana, and Google Assistant. Today, they are quickly rising in popularity. These technologies have a lot of potential for customer service use and will likely be developed for businesses as an in-between for a human representative and a virtual stand in.

Some businesses have already started experimenting with virtual assistants. Fiserv, for example, “tested functions that allow consumers to engage with Alexa as they would a bank teller. That means using it for activities like checking account balances or asking for the latest mortgage rates.”

The Takeaway

Many customer service technologies that involve artificial intelligence, automation, and bots are already in use and help businesses large and small extend their customer service reach. While some technologies are not fully implemented yet, we can look out for them in the near future as an innovative option for handling customer service problems.

Technology will never fully be able to replace people when it comes to the customer service experience. Yes, it can assist and streamline customer service efforts, but having a human representative to speak and interact with customers is likely going to remain a best business practice.

Further, before you implement new tools as part of your customer service experience, test them! Make sure the technology you choose benefits your customer base. You also have to remember your audience. If your target consumer is tech savvy, an expert social media user, and comfortable using live chat, then having a more automated, online approach can work well. However, if you are dealing with an older audience that just wants a real person on the phone, keep that in mind when streamlining your customer service tools. This doesn’t mean that technology is not relevant to your business; you just need different tools.

Learn all the ways you can make your customer service more effective by reading our free eBook, “5 Ways to Make Service Easy for Today’s Customers.”

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The Customer Service Experience is Complex

1. Capture the inquiry, which may come in over
   1. The phone
   2. Email
   3. Chat
   4. SMS
   5. Social media platforms
   6. An interaction escalated from a discussion forum
   7. A web or speech self-service session
2. Route the inquiry to the right representative
3. Create a case that contains its details and associate it with the customer record
4. Find the answer to the inquiry
5. Communicate the answer to the customer
6. Append case notes to the case summarizing its resolution
7. Close the case

1. Improve the Lines of Communication

What is one of the best ways companies can use technology to enhance the customer experience? Improving communication. Gone are the days when customers could only reach a customer support centre on the phone between the hours of 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Today, a customer should be able to contact a business whenever they need to, and through a variety of channels such as text message, email, social media platforms, and live chat on a company’s website.

This is not to say that businesses should abandon call centres. Large numbers of people still want to speak to customer support representatives on the phone. This classic avenue shouldn’t be ignored, just supplemented with the other previously detailed options.

In general, younger generations would rather contact a business through Facebook or other social media platforms, or have their questions answered via text. An older demographic likes the familiarity of being able to speak to a real human on the telephone.

The point is that if you want your customer service department to be successful, make sure you offer a variety of options for your customers to contact company representatives to have their needs met quickly and efficiently. Regardless of your audience, having options is the only way to really test what works. One company that does this well is Macy’s: while they’re missing a live chat option, their website is a good example of making it clear that they want customers to contact them.

How to Provide Multichannel Customer Service

• Give customers the power of choice: If the customer wants to start an enquiry via email, follow up on Facebook, and send you additional data on chat, let them.
• Provide the channels your customers want and use
  • Phone
  • Email
  • Live chat
  • Help desk
  • Self-service
  • Social media
• Use your customer relationship management (CRM) platform to ensure the conversation flows no matter which method you use
• Don’t offer channels you’re not good at
• Create a centralized knowledge base
• Let reps work on multiple channels

2. Resolve Issues and Respond to Customers

What’s the best way to respond to customer feedback once you’ve received it? Erica Kuhl writes about a four-step process for turning customer feedback into action:

1. Create a single source of truth for feedback.
2. Identify measurable ways to gauge the impact of incoming feedback.
3. Operationalize feedback review and response.
4. Close the loop.

These steps are important: As a customer service team, your job is about solving whatever problems your customer may be facing.

Technology can help streamline this process. Social media is a particularly great way to enhance the customer service experience. Facebook isn’t just for getting likes, and Twitter shouldn’t only be used to rack up followers. Most businesses have business pages on multiple social media platforms, and their users take advantage of them to seek solutions to their problems. Pizza Hut’s Twitter followers, for example, know they can reach out to the restaurant chain and expect a response.

If someone has a question about a product or wants to discuss an interaction, they’re just as, if not more, likely to post an inquiry on the company’s Facebook page or tweet them about it as they are to pick up the phone and call the company directly. Therefore, companies that recognize this and devote part of their customer service team to responding to these social media messages fare better than those that ignore or don’t prioritize them.

Another example of a brand responding to its customers using Twitter is the Gaylord Opryland Hotel, which made sure one of its customers received a special alarm clock made only for the hotel after she tweeted the company telling them how much she liked it. And Air Asia makes it a point to respond to all customer complaints and inquiries on its Facebook page in a timely manner and with helpful links and advice. (It’s a big job, considering they have almost 3 million “friends.”)

When you interact with your customers on social media, make sure you follow some basic best practices. This technology has made it easy to communicate directly with customers, but it must be done correctly in order for it to be worth the effort.

3. Develop an App that Makes Tasks Easier

The phrase “there’s an app for that” is fairly literal; there‘s an app available for pretty much anything you need, from handling your finances to getting a ride or ordering a pizza.

Most businesses know what their customers need from them, and many companies have incorporated that into smartphone applications their consumers can use. Airlines have apps that allow their patrons to check in for flights, check flight times and routes, access Wi-Fi, and more. Retail stores show their product selection in their apps, allow consumers to store and access loyalty points, and provide coupons.

4 Keys to Creating an App Your Customers Will Love

• Test it thoroughly to ensure it does what your customers need
• Ask users what they want
• Make the app onboarding process painless
• Pay attention to data, analytics, and metrics

Simplifying important tasks for consumers is one part of providing excellent customer service, but you could take that one step further. Consider devoting a section of the app to customer requests and comments, then address those messages in a timely manner. Customers will appreciate how easy it is to open the app and make an inquiry from their smartphone or tablet. If your competition has an app, this use of technology is vital—and it’s not hard to get started.

4. Keep Customers Informed

An essential aspect of creating a good customer experience is keeping your customers informed about what’s going on with your business and in your industry. Technology is a great, fast way to do this. If your phone lines go down or your website will be temporarily unavailable, consider tweeting an alert . If you’re coming out with a new product or changing a current line, it’s not a bad idea to post a photo on Facebook or Instagram with information about the change.

And there’s always one of the most important technological communication tools: email. Email marketing remains king, and your customers will appreciate an occasional email update . Don’t be afraid to use multiple channels to keep your customers informed of anything relevant, including updates and new information. They will appreciate your transparency and willingness to get them the information they need in a quick and easy manner.

The Takeaway

Incorporating technology into your customer service department is a win-win for both businesses and consumers. Use it to improve your lines of communication, respond to your customers’ needs, proactively interact with customers through an app, and keep customers informed.

Learn how a customer relationship management platform can take your customer service to the next level in our eBook, “CRM: Put Your Customer at the Heart of Your Business.”

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Instagram “Stories”

Similar to SnapChat’s “My Story” feature, Instagram “Stories” let users compile photos and videos from one 24-hour period into a continuous stream. They are displayed chronologically, and then disappear at the end of the day. Once you submit your content to Stories, you can overlay text and emojis. So how can you use this fun feature for your business?

Take photos of new products and upload them to Stories to give followers a taste of what’s to come. Make a video tutorial of someone using a popular product, or film the production process. Engaging users with Stories will more than likely increase your Instagram followers, which drives more traffic to your site. You can also download and save any photos or videos you submit to Stories, and then share them at a later date.

Instagram Direct

Instagram took another page out of SnapChat’s playbook when it introduced Instagram Direct. (It makes sense considering disappearing content is the most popular feature on SnapChat.) Why wouldn’t Instagram want to capitalize on that success?

With Instagram Direct, users can put an expiration time on photos and videos. People who send content will be able to see when it is viewed and whether or not the person on the receiving end has chosen to take a screenshot. Consider using Direct to give followers a sneak peak of a new product. This will pique interest and drive some users to your website for news of the release. With Direct you can also customize the audience who views your content. (This feature is limited to only your followers.) Consider sending a disappearing promo code to a group of loyal followers, or make a video for a product you know will engage a specific audience. You can even send disappearing content through direct messages.

Instagram Live

Many social media sites, such as Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, and now Instagram, have incorporated some form of live video into their platforms—and with good reason. Live video streaming has become an extremely popular way to engage users by giving them a “behind-the-scenes” look at employees, products, and services. Creating a Live video is more efficient and less expensive than writing a blog post. Plus people are much more likely to watch a short engaging video than they are to read through a long post. You can go live for up to an hour, and you can even send your followers notifications when you plan to begin a live session. Consider interviewing an employee live, or run a tutorial on how to use a popular product. Followers may also appreciate a live Q&A where they can post questions in the comments section and get them answered in real time. And if you just want to stream an event or discuss an upcoming promo, Instagram Live also gives you the option to turn off comments so followers can better focus on the content.

One element that sets Instagram Live apart from other platforms’ live capabilities is that once you finish streaming a session, it disappears completely. It’s not saved to your profile or any user feeds and it cannot be viewed again. For this reason, you may not want to spend a ton of time creating detailed, in-depth videos for Instagram Live. Instead, use it for quick previews or to gain traction for an event, and then direct your audience back to your website or blog where they can find more information that won’t disappear.

Conclusion

Incorporate one or all of these Instagram features into your company’s marketing strategy to increase brand awareness, gain followers, and boost engagement with your audience.

Learn how you can take your customers on a 1-to-1 journey with your brand with a quick demo of Salesforce’s powerful Marketing Cloud.

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From a lead looking at reviews and your website, to completing a form, reading an ebook, contacting a sales rep, or the myriad of other potential steps, you must consider the strategy behind making sure each step leads to another. Remember: As long as the person is in your sales funnel, you have the potential for a sale.

Awareness and Engagement

It is important to understand the impact social media has on exposure to new products and services; without it, they may go undiscovered. According to an article by Kimberlee Morrison for AdWeek’s SocialTimes, “At least once a month, 83 per cent of survey respondents heard about a brand or product on social media before they heard about it from any other source.”

That number underscores the power social media has on consumers. Furthermore, not only are posts reaching audiences, but audiences are then converting and making the purchase after seeing the post. Thirty-eight per cent of Facebook users actually purchase a product after liking or sharing it, and half of these purchases are made within one week of engaging with the post.

Engagement can lead to brand awareness, and ultimately the sale. The key, however, is making sure you do not lose people as they move down the pipeline.

Reviews and Product Feedback

When people become interested in your product and brand, one of the first things they are going to do is search for reviews and feedback. Reviews are one of the top things people take into consideration when purchasing a new product or service or switching providers. The top sources that people gather information from include:

1. Retail websites (i.e, if you sell your product on Amazon, they read the Amazon reviews)
2. The brand or manufacturer website (your company’s website)
3. Facebook
4. YouTube
5. Brand communities
6. Blogs
7. Pinterest

This list helps us to see where feedback is especially important. Of course, do not discount the value of reviews on Google or other sites, but focus on building up the positive feedback you can gather in these arenas.

Your Website

Once people see a social media post, like your product, and do a little investigating, they are likely to visit your website. This is when it is important to make a positive impression on your audience. Whether they order from a third-party site or directly from your ecommerce site, it is important that your website is up-to-date, user friendly, and relevant.

Today, people are not interacting as often with physical stores. Instead, they head to websites through social media posts, so your website is your image and it determines whether people decide to do business with you.

If you are a service or B2B company, you may not necessarily be selling products. This makes your website all the more important, as your social media post will lead them to your website—more specifically, to a landing page you created and optimized specifically for that social media post.

Inquiry Form

Once your social media post leads a visitor to your website, you likely want people to fill out an inquiry form. The goal is to get their contact information so that even if they do not convert, you can follow up with them.

Inquiry forms should be simple and straightforward. For example, their name, email, phone number (optional), and space to leave a message will often do. The best contact forms leave out unnecessary requirements and focus on making it easy for visitors to give you the information you need.

Contacting Your Sales Rep via Social Media

Social media posts can also lead to prospects contacting your sales team directly. With the CTA option of “Call now” on platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, some users call the business directly rather than navigate the website. If this is the case, make sure the path of social media post to sales representative directly results in a sale. Train your sales team, and help them respond to social media traffic that contacts your company over the phone.

Completing a Purchase

The end goal of a social media post is to get a customer to complete a sale. It is nice to get traffic on your website, inquiries, and people contacting your sales reps, but if they don’t complete the sale, then you may not see the end result you want.

Part of the life of a social media post involves measuring conversions and seeing what leads to a sale. Which of these ideas give your business the most success? Are some of your posts more successful than others in getting your visitors to complete a purchase? If so, find out why and what you did well with that particular post. Researching what gets your audience to react the way you want them to—and measuring your success—is a big part in every social media campaign.

Learn how you can take your customers on a 1-to-1 journey with your brand with a quick demo of Salesforce’s powerful Marketing Cloud.

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Looking to start a company? While there are dozens of elements that contribute to the success and demise of fledgling startup companies, location may have more of an impact than we give it credit for.

In Canada, startup businesses have really taken off. Based on growth, performance, funding, and exit values, Canada is ranked the 25th best startup ecosystem in the world. In fact, outside of Silicon Valley, Waterloo has the highest startup density of any area in the world. And with a combination of economic freedom, low startup costs, government funding, accessible business tools, and plenty of talent, Canada is one of the best places to launch your new venture. Read on to learn more.

The Perfect Ingredients for Startup Success

Before we break down the key reasons Canada is a fantastic country for startups, let’s clarify what we mean by startups. In this case, we’re looking at four business types: bitcoin, hardware, software/internet-based Companies, and wearable technology. Here are some of the conditions that allow these businesses to grow and achieve success.

Economic Freedom

Canada falls in the top 10 of the world’s freest economies, beating out both the United Kingdom and the United States. The Index of Economic Freedom takes cultural aspects such as property rights, freedom from corruption, government spending, fiscal freedom, business freedom, labor freedom, monetary freedom, trade freedom, investment freedom, and investment freedom into account when establishing a country’s ranking. This kind of economic environment makes a big impact on business culture and is one reason why Canada bodes well on the startup front in 2016.

Business Start-Up Costs and Funding

One factor that drastically contributes to the functioning and performance of startups is the ability to have reasonable start-up costs as well as funding support in the form of grants and loans.

Canadian businesses often have the opportunity to apply for government (and other) grants, loans, and financing as a start-up. With different financing options available to startups, Canada offers fantastic support for business and commerce. Some of the grants are regional or industry-specific, while others offer general business support. For more resources check out the Canada Business Network site.

Canadian Economic System

Deep Centre recently conducted a study on the Canadian tech industry to evaluate Canada’s business accelerator and business incubator ecosystem for what they call the “Startup Ecosystem.” While they note that there is room for economic improvement that would improve the likelihood of startup success, they found that the top 20 Canadian accelerators and incubators have helped attract more than $1.7 billion in follow-on investment and helped facilitate the creation of more than 10,000 new jobs. As such, the Canadian economic system has allowed for many successful startups, and this success will hopefully continue to grow.

Startup Business Tools

Startup business tools, such as BizPaL and Salesforce, are another factor that lead to startup success in Canada. BizPaL is a platform that allows startups to search for permits and licenses when they first begin their business journey. It also provides 24/7 support for any questions or concerns business owners may have on regional or federal issues. With Salesforce, people can build highly scalable apps, grow their company with sales, customer service and marketing solutions, and build a strong company culture all from one powerful platform.

Finally, Canada Has the Right Talent

Canadian startups would not perform nearly as well without the many university programs offered and the country’s high rate of university completion—Canada ranks first in the proportion of 25 to 64 year olds with a college education and is tied for seventh place for the proportion of adults with a university education among all 35 OECD countries. These programs produce tech-savvy individuals who enter the job force with big business ideas and marketable skills. Educational and community programs in Canada play a significant role in the success of new and existing startups.

While the world focuses largely on Silicon Valley for startups, Canada is quietly but quickly becoming a startup powerhouse. For more on how you can take advantage of what Canada has to offer entrepreneurs and new ventures, check out our detailed infographic.

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