As we mark International Customer Service Week, I would want to take it as an opportunity to illustrate the difference between customer experience and customer service.
Customer experience refers to the experience customers have with a business and the impact that is left across the value chain or customers journey, from pre to post-purchase. Customer service on the other hand is about assisting customers and helping customers solve whichever challenge they have; including additional support needed on how to use the company’s goods and services.
This, therefore, means that customer service forms part of the entire customer experience while customer experience looks at the end-to-end interactions between the business and the customer, just to reiterate.
There are apparently three main areas that form the customer experience: discovery, engagement and delivery. Discovery is all about how companies contact customers and how relevant that contact is, or how customers can discover the brand or business.
Engagement looks at how customers interact with the company and its goods and services. And finally, delivery looks at the speed to execution and the condition of the goods or services.
There are soft skills or qualities that customer service personnel need to display, such as being attentive, having good listening skills (we have two ears and one mouth for a reason) and showing respect to the customer.
Every customer wants to feel listened to and valued. There has been a whole week dedicated to customer service, which I believe demonstrates the importance or focus that businesses need to put on its customers.
A message to all small and medium business owners, let us remember to take the time to celebrate or at least acknowledge our customers this week!
