As merchants continue to invest more heavily in ecommerce software and merge these systems with brick-and-mortar functions, they'll be expected to provide adequate support to customers. 

Despite the fact that the majority of retail customers have access to the Web, many of them don't want to spend time searching for information regarding specific products or services. Customers often measure a merchant's capabilities by how well it can assess requests. 

Waiting too long 
Retail Customer Experience noted that the average U.S. adult spends 364 minutes on the phone every year waiting for a call center employee to satisfy their inquiries. That's almost six and a half hours listening to elevator music. The source cited statistics from Populus Research and Kana Software:

• The average amount of time employees spend addressing one compliant is one hour, four minutes
• Almost three-quarters (71 percent) of U.S. consumers have filed inquiries in the past three years
• An unsettling majority of respondents (69 percent) had to submit complaints multiple times 
• Getting issue resolved typically required people to make requests for service three times on average
• While 33 percent of survey participants claimed they used email to deliver inquiries, another 39 percent used their phones
• A mere 7 percent voiced complaints on social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and Yelp

Basically, it's taking too long for businesses to address customer concerns. Some may point to a lack of adequate technology, while others may place the blame on inadequate training. Maybe the manner in which systems are set up breed redundancies. The fact of the matter is, there isn't a single issue that's encouraging exorbitant wait times. 

What can be learned from small businesses? 
It turns out that specialty retail companies may be handling customer issues much better than their larger components. Business News Daily contributor Nicole Fallon referenced a survey of 1,200 consumers conducted by CorvisaCloud, which found that 50 percent of respondents asserted the best customer service is often provided by small enterprises. 

Overall, what are these businesses doing well? 

1. They create a "people first" culture, according to Fallon
2. Develop a strong first impression by having people answer calls instead of machines
3. Use retail analytics to zero in on customers who may not have had the best experiences
4. Chart each interaction between individuals and the brand 

With these four points in mind, merchants are in a strong position to reassess their customer service operations and implement changes as they see fit. 

This entry was posted by Retail Pro on Friday, October 24th, 2014 at 6:09 am .