The Ultimate Online Customer Service Guide E-Book

Marsha Collier

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2010

Seitenzahl: 308

Beschreibung

Make your online customers happy--and create new ones--with this winning guide Social media gives you an unparalleled vehicle for connecting and engaging with an unlimited number of customers. Yet this vehicle is different than other, more impersonal forms. With social media, reps become part of their customers' lives. They follow back. They handle complaints immediately. They wish customers "happy birthday." They grow their brands by involving themselves in communities. The Ultimate Online Customer Service Guide gives you the keys to authentic and engaged service to customers through social media. Using a blend of case studies, a primer on classic online customer service, and instructions on how to execute quality customer service, this book enables you to access the opportunities that social media presents as a means of serving customers. * Authentically use social media to connect with customers to boost your bottom line * Attract new customers through your online presence * Achieve higher GMS (Gross Merchandise Sales) with quality customer service Social media gives you a new and growing realm to distinguish your business. Create a productive presence in this interactive space with The Ultimate Online Customer Service Guide.

Leseprobe

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Art of Customer Service

Developing Your Customer Service Intuition Skills

Do Lessons Learned from Large Companies Apply to Your Business?

When the Light Came On

What Is the Business Value of Customer Service?

A Word from a “Soft Scientist”

What Online Customer Service Means to You

Chapter 2: Quality Real-World, Small-Business Customer Service

A Little Research

The New Retail: It’s All About Entertainment

Engaging Your Clients and Patients

Plenty of Places to Eat

More to Photography Than Just Pictures

Chapter 3: Using Your Web Site to Connect with Your Customer

Handling Those Urgent Messages

Explain Products and Services with Videos

Chapter 4: Developing a Blog to Engage Customers

Engaging with Your Brand on Your Blog

Reposting the Good Stuff on Posterous

Some Regulations Apply

Got a Brick-and-Mortar Location?

Chapter 5: Connecting with Your Customers Where They Play

Making Fans on Facebook

Setting Up Your Pages

Geolocation Services: Foursquare and Whrrl

Chapter 6: Microblogging for Service, Fun, and Profit

Twitter: The Answer to a Short Attention Span?

Generating Appealing Content

Twitter Chats and #hashtags

Tweet Frequency

To Follow Back or Not?

Direct Messaging

Kingly and Queenly Engagement

Chapter 7: Checking Out Where Customers Review Your Business

Yelp.com

Angie’s List

Other Sites to Watch

Handling Reviews

Chapter 8: Knowing Your Customers’ Expectations

Defining the Generations

Reaching the Generations with Social Media

Misunderstanding a Market: A Cautionary Tale

Chapter 9: Platforms to Enhance the Experience

Keeping Up with the Leaders

Study the Demographics

Tools to Run Your Small Business Like a Big Brand

Customer Service Tools for Your Web Site

Frequently Asked Questions and Support Community

Handling the Support Issues

Blogging for Your Business

Monitoring Your Web Mentions

Social Media Searches

Finding People to Follow on Twitter

Managing Your Twitter Stream

Chapter 10: Engaging Your Employees as Brand Ambassadors

From “Absolutely, Positively Overnight” to “We Live to Deliver”

Getting Your Employees Invested

Chapter 11: Pioneers of Online Community

eBay—Née AuctionWeb

Everything from A to Z, with a Smile: Amazon

Changing the Way We Mail: Endicia

LinkExchange Kick-Starts a Career

Chapter 12: Small-Business Examples

The Veterinarian

The Vineyard

The Restaurant

Food Trucks

Mobile Computer Repair

Linen Supply

Chapter 13: Lessons from Big Business

Comcast

Dell

DISH Network

Domino Sugar

General Motors

Ford Motor Company

JetBlue

Kodak

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)

Network Solutions

Sears

Zappos

Index

Copyright © 2011 by Collier Advertising and Promotion, Inc., and Marsha Collier. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone], or on the web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

For general information on our other products and services or for technical support, please contact our Customer Care Department within the United States at [phone], outside the United States at [phone] or fax [phone].

Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books. For more information about Wiley products, visit our web site at www.wiley.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

Collier, Marsha.

The ultimate online customer service guide : how to connect with your customers to sell more! / by Marsha Collier.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 978-0-470-63770-8 (cloth); ISBN 978-1-118-00763-1 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-00764-8 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-00765-5 (ebk)

1. Customer services. 2. Internet marketing. 3. Social media. I. Title.

HF5415.5.C6225 2011

658.8’12—dc22

2010036020

Introduction

Though I’ve run a small business for much of my life, I’m a consumer, as well.

It’s human nature to desire choice. We want to be able to choose one item over another or one vendor over another, based on a variety of reasons. When we exchange our hard-earned money for an item or a service, we ask for something else in return: to be treated with respect and honesty. We prefer to do business with people “like us,” because we want to believe that those we trust to have our best interests at heart. Think about it: Have you ever asked a sales clerk in a clothing store how a particular outfit looked on you? How handsome you looked in that flashy sports car?

I’ve been writing about eBay for e-commerce vendors for over 12 years, and in that time I’ve seen thousands of homespun businesses fail in their attempts to become work-from-home moguls. Why? Because many felt—due to the fact that they were selling online—they could omit the personal touch. It made selling so much easier (or so they thought) to never have to actually deal with their customers. They thought they could ignore the small niceties that made customers happy to be doing business with them. Time—and a lot of unsuccessful companies—have shown that these assumptions were wrong.

If merchants or service providers put their bottom line before the customer, they will doom their businesses to ultimate failure. They may flourish for a while, maybe even long enough to sell their business to another company and walk away with a healthy profit. But to create a long-term, stable business, you need to have long-term, loyal customers. The best companies grow as a result of positive word of mouth—both in the real world and on the Internet.

Online customer service is an important part of marketing your business. Brilliant, spot-on marketing not only generates revenue for your bottom line; it’s also a way to make your customer’s life easier. When you give someone quality service, you’re a step ahead of your competition.