Change is inevitable in the business sector, especially in small businesses. When you think you have everything figured out, trends and markets shift, and you’re running to keep up again.
You may have noticed that with increasing sales, it is more challenging to scale customer support. However, scaling customer support operations is the core of your small business. If you stop providing high-quality customer service experiences, your customers will shop elsewhere.
Therefore, you must find ways to implement a successful customer service scale process before that happens.
Why Scaling Customer Support is Important
So, what does it mean to scale customer support? And what does it mean for a system to be scalable? Simply put, it means adapting your business to cater to a growing customer base. For instance, if you introduce a new product and receive 50% more inquiries than usual, your system and staff must easily handle the increase. Your customer service team must balance its response time and customer satisfaction while you focus on optimizing your existing customer service workflows.
Scaling customer support is of the utmost importance, particularly in small businesses. If your customer service process operations fail, customers will turn to your competitor. Customers are four times more likely to buy from a competitor if they experience a service-related problem with a small business.
Also, remember that not everyone unhappy with your business will tell you. There are at least 26 silent complaints for every vocal one. And the worst part is that 91% of unhappy customers will never buy from you again.
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11 Strategies for Scaling Customer Support
If you’ve been struggling with scaling customer success, or if you don’t know how to scale customer support, the following strategies are for you:
Utilizing Technology
1. Implementing chatbots and AI-driven solutions.
Even if you sell only two products, you must have at least one chatbot and other AI software to help you cope with an increasing customer base. Chatbots offer 24/7 customer chat support using a help desk. These bots are also instrumental in routing customers to human support agents during the day.
You can also use generative AI to create expanding customer scaling experiences. Generative AI allows your sales agents and scale support staff to streamline communication and provide the information they need to send the correct information to each customer.
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2. Customer relationship management (CRM) systems.
Investing in a CRM system can instantly improve your customer service scale. A CRM system will help you manage your contacts, gather critical customer data, and provide a detailed overview of each customer. This allows your agents to search for and find the information they need before contacting a customer. They can also use the CRM platform to document customer issues, store customer feedback, and reply to customer inquiries.
3. Automation of routine tasks.
While learning how to scale a service business, you must give yourself and your employees more time to perfect the scaling process. So, invest in an AI system that automates routine tasks. Doing this will help your agents focus on more important tasks that grow your business even more.
4. Do not over-automate.
Automation is great, but overdoing it may create an unnecessary distance between your business and your customers. You want to support your customers and provide timely service. But you don’t want to alienate them by using too many automated replies or forcing them to close a string of automatic pop-ups before they find the information they need. It is essential to keep that personal approach alive throughout any automation process.
Empowering Customer Service Representatives
1. Training and development programs.
Empower your entire team to scale your customer service operations to the level it needs to be. The last thing you want is for a customer to phone or send a message and then re-route to five different people. Each team member should be able to assist with inquiries and more. This means giving your sales reps and office staff the training and development they need to do so. If you have customer-facing staff, they need the bulk of the training and development. Ultimately, your business should consist of fully-trained and skilled customer service agents and customer support staff.
2. Providing necessary tools and resources.
Everyone must receive the same tools and resources to get your team, including new hires, on the same page. Allow everyone to work on the same systems toward the same goals. This will help you create a strong customer service funnel, no matter who your customers speak to within your business.
When you give your employees the right tools to empower themselves, you encourage autonomy and decision-making. You allow them to create a customer service experience using their knowledge and skills. You provide them with the opportunity to work on their own and within a team while constantly upskilling.
All of this will work together for the good of your business and continuously improve your customer service scaling.
3. Introduce a standard operating procedure manual.
At the same time, while allowing your employees’ professional freedom, you must implement a standard operating procedure manual. This manual will list the procedures and templates everyone must follow when delivering customer support. It may also include the answers to common questions and helpful FAQs. So, your employees can find creative ways to increase customer satisfaction and improve customer loyalty, but it must happen within the company’s SOP framework.
Creating Scalable Processes
1. Standardize procedures and workflows.
It is also important to standardize all your internal procedures and workflows. This process will allow you to scale your procedures when your customer support requests increase. If you have a standard procedure and workflow, it becomes easier to onboard new staff members, and you can also outsource some of your customer service operations. Everyone will work according to the same instructions, minimizing the risk of errors and unhappy customers.
2. Establish clear communication channels.
Clear communication is crucial inside and outside of your business. Your team must communicate well with each other, and your customers must be able to communicate with your business. Implement communication channels that work for each department. And you need an omnichannel communication approach for your customers. This system will allow you to answer customer questions via the platform they are comfortable with, whether it is social media, email, or even your chatbot.
3. Continuous improvement and flexibility.
Your small business must continuously strive to improve its processes. It is the only way to keep offering customers the excellent service you promised them initially. You can improve your customer support scale by analyzing key performance indicators. These may include response times and customer satisfaction.
Your business must also be flexible to accommodate customers with unique requests (within reason). If you can handle a larger-than-usual order or an unusual request, it will add to the scalability of your business.
4. Keep measuring and analyzing.
In addition to measuring key performance indicators (KPIs) or customer satisfaction metrics, you should monitor social media interactions and analyze website traffic. You can also track first response times, resolution rates, ticket volumes, and support ticket handling times.
Knowing what works and what doesn’t within the support experience will help you improve your scalable processes and enhance customer service further. Meeting customer needs will have a direct impact on your customer retention rate.
6 Challenges To Overcome When Scaling Customer Support
Scaling your customer service is a must for today’s complicated market. However, customer service scaling does not come without challenges.
1. Forgetting about your employees.
For example, it is easy to lose sight of what your employees are going through in their efforts to maintain customer service levels. You may become so focused on giving your customers what they demand that you don’t notice your employees becoming demotivated and disengaged. It is crucial to reward your employees for their ongoing hard work and provide them with the training and skills workshops they need to stay motivated.
2. Not showing the impact of extra hard work.
Also, if you don’t show your employees the impact of their hard work, they will lose interest in the process. Your team needs to see how they have helped you grow the business. You cannot build a cohesive team or a great customer experience if you don’t share the necessary data with them.
3. Maintaining personalized interactions at scale.
Speaking of the customer experience, it is hard to manage personalized interactions at scale as your business grows. Personalized service may wane means as you get more inquiries and more sales. If you empower your employees to handle more inquiries and sales, you can avoid losing the personal touch your customers are used to.
4. Balancing automation with human touch.
Personalized service will also decline if you go overboard with automation. If existing and new customers only get automated replies and responses, they might start taking their business elsewhere. You must balance automation and your company’s unique personal touch to maintain a connection with your customers. At the same time, this balance should not take away from your business’ established resolution time for queries.
5. Ensuring consistency across various support channels.
If you only respond to website or Facebook messages, it will hurt your business. If you want the scaling process to be successful in your company, your various support channels must offer the same service and assistance. However, this is not easy to do when your customer numbers start increasing in leaps and bounds. But, if your team is skilled and ready to welcome the influx, it is easier to achieve consistency.
6. Managing increased volume without compromising quality.
Moreover, the quality of your product may also decrease as your customer volumes increase. For instance, if you sell hand-made goods and can’t keep up with demand, the rush to finish orders could lead to a decline in quality. This is a huge problem that could lead to a demand for refunds or a downward trend in customer numbers. Avoiding compromising quality is another excellent reason to upskill and train all employees to do the same work (where possible).
2 Case Studies of Successful Scalable Customer Service Models
Big businesses set the trend for smaller ones when implementing successful scalable customer service models. The following companies provide excellent examples of scalability that work:
1. Airbnb
Airbnb revolutionized how people view accommodation options. Instead of booking an expensive hotel, people can now stay in someone’s home for half the price. Or, they can stay on their property in a specially built apartment. In the case of Airbnb, scalability is driven by the service’s ability to expand into any accommodation market. This keeps attracting buyers and sellers, so to speak. The service keeps gaining hosts and guests, and by using the right technology, it continues to grow.
2. Netflix
Netflix is a brilliant example of how one company single-handedly changed how the world sees entertainment. Netflix replaced the video rental industry and expanded its subscriber base on an unbelievable scale. It did this by offering something video stores couldn’t keep up with, namely original content. Instead of waiting for a video to land in the store, people can log on to Netflix and stream anything they want to watch. Netflix keeps up with demand by investing in technology and data analytics and adapting to consumer preferences.
Main Takeaways
If you want your small business to keep growing and hopefully reach the heights that big players in your industry have reached, scalability is a must. You should encourage more investment in your business, but you must also have the workforce and the technology to handle increased demand.
The best way to do this is to keep the customer experience front-of-mind while balancing your employees’ requirements. Allow your employees to upskill within your business so they can work together to provide unparalleled customer experiences. Invest in technology that will help you run your business, but don’t allow the technology to overshadow the personal customer experience. Be flexible with your processes, but keep the standard ones intact. Go the extra mile for your customers wherever possible without overworking your customer support team.
The future of customer service scalability depends on this delicate balance. In time, human intelligence and AI automation will form a knowledge-based partnership to help resolve customer queries, sell products, and provide after-sales service. There is no escaping AI at this point, even though you may be wary of it, so why not use it to create a hybrid scalability approach in your business?
This will allow you to efficiently deal with high demand while keeping your business’ human element intact. And that, in itself, is the way forward when it comes to customer service scalability in startups.
