8 Customer Service Statistics for Small Business
Jess served on the founding team of a successful B2B startup and has used a wide range of sales and marketing tools over the course of her 15-year career. She uses her industry knowledge to deliver the best answers to your questions about sales tools and sales management.
Jill is a writer at Fit Small Business specializing on Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software.
This article is part of a larger series on Customer Service.
Customer service directly impacts your bottom line. Clients who are satisfied with your products, services, and customer support become repeat customers, increasing overall sales. Therefore, providing reliable and high-quality customer service must be a part of your overall business strategy. In this article, we share eight relevant customer service statistics revealing how exemplary customer support fosters stronger customer relationships and business success.
1. 68% of customers will spend more money with a brand that treats them like an individual
Customer service is more effective when there is a human touch. As a business, you receive countless customer queries on a regular basis; however, it is essential to remember not to treat customer service cases as purely transactional. Every case is an opportunity to strengthen your relationship with your customers when handled with a willingness to help.
Keep in mind that there is a real person behind those queries, so treat your customers the way you want to be treated. Go the extra mile and have a genuine intention to help them resolve their issue instead of treating it as another task to cross off your list. This also translates to sales as customer engagement statistics show that 68% of customers are willing to spend more on a brand that understands them and treats them like individuals.
2. 78% of consumers will forgive a mistake if customer service is excellent
Building robust relationships with your customers gives you the elbow room to make occasional mistakes—just make sure you avoid doing so repetitively. Customer satisfaction statistics show that 78% of customers will still do business with a company even after a mistake if they have previously received excellent customer service. Mistakes happen, and maintaining a good relationship with your customers means they are more forgiving in unfortunate circumstances.
Apart from providing your customers with timely and proper support, acknowledge mistakes if they happen and be willing to rectify the situation as soon as possible. Owning up to your mistakes and showing your customers you are willing to correct them is a sound customer service best practice. Not only does it reflect humility, but it also shows accountability.
3. 76% of customers would switch to a competitor due to multiple poor customer service experiences
Not working to improve the quality of your customer service is costly. Not only does it make you lose valuable customers, but it also encourages them to switch and try the offerings of your competitors instead. This is evident in a customer service stat that says 76% of customers would switch to a company’s competitor due to multiple poor customer service experiences.
To assess the quality of your customer service, you must identify certain parameters to measure customer satisfaction. These give you data-backed insights that allow you to craft concrete plans of action for areas of improvement. Measuring this can be done through various methods, such as computing using a customer satisfaction survey to analyze your Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT), as well as analyzing your customer churn rates and social media sentiments.
Customer service software platforms like Freshdesk let you send customer satisfaction surveys to clients after each case is resolved. Apart from gauging their satisfaction, you can also ask them to leave comments on particular areas they found useful or need improvements. This helps increase your overall customer satisfaction rates.
Freshdesk users can easily create and automate satisfaction surveys after each case is resolved.
(Source: Freshdesk)
4. More than 70% of consumers believe companies should understand their history
Having a centralized customer database with detailed records is crucial in providing your clients with excellent support. Having an integrated system makes it easy for any agent to take on a case and still have the full context of the query or complaint. This affirms the customer service fact that 70% of customers expect agents to share information and collaborate in handling their concerns so they don’t have to repeat information to different reps.
Customer service or customer relationship management (CRM) software usually has a contact management feature wherein the system builds a profile using all the information associated with a customer. It typically includes customer profiles, past purchases, archived and active cases, as well as communication history. This addresses the expectations of 63% of consumers who believe businesses should know their unique needs and expectations.
Consider using a tool like HubSpot CRM with specific customer service features under its HubSpot Service Hub solution. The software allows you to record all relevant customer information that can be accessed by the entire team any time there is a conversation with a customer.
HubSpot’s contact management page shows all associated information about a customer—including profile, past tickets, and communication history.
(Source: HubSpot)
5. 69% of consumers first try to resolve their issue on their own, but less than one-third of companies offer self-service options
Providing quality customer service doesn’t necessarily mean every case requires human interaction. Having informative materials on your website and online channels is equally important, too—especially for 69% of consumers who try to resolve their issue on their own first before reaching out to an agent. Unfortunately, few companies create self-service tools, such as a knowledge base or frequently asked questions (FAQ) page.
Creating a dedicated resource page where informative materials can be found is not only helpful to your customers, it actually saves you time and money because it lessens the need for actual human interactions. This gives your agents more time to focus on complex cases that require real-time conversations with customers.
Customer service providers such as Zoho Desk have a knowledge base creator tool that allows users to develop various self-help resources. It has tools to create how-to guides, FAQs, as well as a platform to upload prerecorded instruction videos and educational articles. It also lets users create community forums where customers can ask or answer questions.
Zoho Desk helps brands design how-to articles to build their knowledge base.
(Source: Zoho Desk)
6. 69% of customers say they are willing to interact with a bot on simple issues
Apart from having a knowledge base, another resource-saving customer service channel is the chatbot. In fact, customer service stats show that 69% of customers are willing to interact with a bot on simple issues. Chatbots are designed to simulate human conversations, handle commonly asked questions, or lead customers to relevant pages on the website to address their queries.
Chatbots are typically programmed using conversation workflows to provide information to customers. The ChatBot software has helpful bot features like a no-code chatbot builder, chatbot testing tool, and prebuilt conversation templates.
Bots from ChatBot help customers resolve common and simple issues.
(Source: ChatBot)
7. 59% of customers say it feels like most businesses need to improve the training of their customer service agents
Having a dedicated customer service team is not enough—you have to ensure they are equipped to do their job by giving them proper training and guidance. Unfortunately, this seems to be widely lacking as customer engagement statistics show that 59% of customers feel like most businesses need to improve the training of their customer service agents.
One of the key areas of having a sound customer service strategy is building and training your team. This includes coaching them on processes and procedures, handling difficult customers, familiarizing them with information on products and services, and teaching them how to use your customer service software.
8. 90% of consumers consider issue resolution their most crucial customer service concern
Ironically, the top concern of customers is the issue resolution itself—further highlighting the need for companies to train their customer support team to handle cases effectively. While having a robust customer service tool, a rich knowledge base, and multichannel support are great, these are not enough if agents don’t know how to use them to support customers. Implementing a comprehensive customer service training program can help businesses address this.
Bottom Line
Customer service is a crucial part of your overall business. Remember, the best products and services attract customers, but excellent and reliable customer service makes them loyal to your brand. Use these customer service statistics as a reference to improve the various aspects of your customer service activities, including training your team and providing personalized service to clients.
