Customer empathy is an important skill to have for people who work in customer service. They need to be able to understand the feelings of the incoming customers and treat them with care. This indeed does not mean that they have to agree with anything the customer says. They just need to understand their feelings, truth, and perspective. Have you heard that the top 10 most empathic companies boost their financial two times as much as the bottom companies that land in the bottom ten according to HBR’s 2016 Empathy Index report? After looking at this, it shows that it is crucial to have good customer empathy. They must be able to talk to different customers with different customers, such as angry and furious ones, while still having to represent the company in a good and positive way.
Customer empathy aims to maintain a human interactin with the customer, something to build from. This is because a higher compassion and understanding of the customer result in a more robust financial performance, customer loyalty, satisfaction, and more significant innovation. These all seem great, but your customer service will have to follow some guidelines to obtain them. We will list the top 5 tips for you to follow.
Observe, interview, and engage
Take a researcher’s approach and observe the client. What is he/she feeling and saying? What does the client want? After this, start probing them with questions about their opinions, feelings, and what they are thinking. Listen to them and try to put yourself in their shoes. How do you feel then? You should learn to anticipate how they feel, and try to meet their needs, imagine their physical and emotional experiences related to the company. After this, you’ll also be able to fine-tune your product or service to better meet the customers’ needs in the future.
Look at the reviews
Many customers use review sites to express their feelings about companies. Some of these reviews are good, and others are bad. In order to have a good review rating for your business, you should try to look at the reviews and learn from them. These can and will usually give you more insight into how the customers think and feel about your company. On most sites, you’re able to respond to the review and maybe help them with their problem.
Design an empathy map
This map is designed to look at your customers’ emotions and takes their experiences into account with four categories. This helps you understand the customer and lets you know what’s going on inside their minds and hearts.
– What are they seeing
– Hearing
– Saying and doing
– Feel and think
You will need to know the relationship you have with your client in order to complete the map. This would also serve as a guide for after you had a conversation with a customer and observed, interviewed, and engaged with them like step one. Be able to distinguish between what the customer feels and think and the other steps in this map.
Say positive and understanding sentences to customers
Many customers become furious or agitated when something doesn’t go how they like. In situations like these, you’ll need to be prepared to say the right thing to calm them down and not make them angrier. Sentences like ” I am so sorry you are facing this problem” or “Our team will try our best to solve your problem” help the customer and assure him or her that you are thinking about their problem and helping them. You should always confirm the customer that you will help them. No matter what, always stay friendly. But try your best to come over genuine. Don’t overdo it because a customer can notice this, and that is not good.
Look at the preferences and differences
Very often, people have preferences. We try to hide this, some don’t, and that’s okay. But sometimes, these biases could interfere with how you treat other customers. Depending on age, gender, and race, you could treat somebody differently than another customer. If you have a bias, then it is often very obvious to a consumer, and you should try to avoid this problem at all costs.
Improve your customer empathy with these five easy steps. Pay attention to how you treat your clients, and they will treat you the same way. There is always room for improvement.
Want to learn more about customers and other topics, be sure to check out our other blogs.