Introduction
As businesses are moving forward at a rapid pace, offering quality customer service has become a necessity.
For businesses, in the race of getting better, factors such as technology and automation have emerged to be unbeatable and human elements such as “empathy” have been easily overshadowed.
But you know what, empathy has the power that no automation or technology will ever have – the ability to understand and share the feelings of others.
As we are in an era where customers have limitless expectations, empathy plays a crucial role in interacting with customers and tackling challenging situations.
This blog explains why empathy in customer service is crucial and how you can achieve it.
Let’s get started.
What is empathy in customer service?
Empathy in customer service is all about understanding the feelings of the customers you interact with. It covers factors such as customer emotions, needs, issues, etc. As every customer has different concerns and needs, being empathetic enables you to treat every customer differently by addressing their particular concerns.
It helps you to manage complex situations as you can successfully create a scenario where your customers feel heard and valued. In addition to that, by putting yourself in your customer’s shoes, you can easily understand what they are going through and you can treat their issue as your own. This way, empathizing can help you find quicker and more suitable solutions for your customers.
Why Empathizing with Your Customers is Crucial
1. Can Help You Tackle Challenging Situations
Empathy is one way to show your customers that you care for them. In typical situations, it might not have as much impact as it does when you are in a challenging situation. But it is not like you only have to empathize with your customers in challenging situations. You always have to be in the shoes of your customers to understand their issues better.
Let’s see an example with two different scenarios:
Scenario 1: Like every day, today also a few queries are raised for you to handle. And the queries are also not anything that you have not solved before. It’s an easy job for you to connect with your customers and solve queries for them without making anything worse.
Example: For Michael, a service agent, it was a regular day at work. There were a few queries generated that he had to solve and they were also not that complex. It was an easy task for him to manage without making anything worse.
Scenario 2: But imagine, getting hundreds of extra queries among which some are complex ones. Now what will you do? In such scenarios, empathy can help you a lot. You can simply start by apologizing to your customers for the inconvenience and assure them you will give your 110% to solve their issues before the given time. And then ask them about the issue.
Example: Unlike the first scenario, this time there are hundreds of queries raised by the customers. Michael has not faced such a situation before. But he remembers that in such situations showing empathy towards customers can work wonders. He started the conversation with the customer with an apology, which ensured that the situation remains calm and under control.
Always remember, in order to find a solution proper communication and understanding of the issue is extremely important, which might not happen while in anger or in frustration. That’s why, keeping calm and empathizing with customers is crucial. This way, the situation stays under control, the customer is calm and the solution is found quickly.
Empathizing can help you solve the queries faster, as you can ensure that the situation is under control and you have a proper understanding of those complex queries.
2. You Can Understand Your Customers Better
Solving customer issues sometimes gets hectic. Mostly it’s not due to an abundance of complex queries but due to the lack of understanding of customer needs. For example, a customer has a query. But you do not have its proper understanding. You do not know what solution to provide.
In such situations, you can empathize with your customers to find a solution. You can ask them what their issue is all about and even know a few inside details related to it. Such as whether they have ever faced such an issue previously or not, how often they face such issues, etc.
By asking such questions you can make sure you understand their issue well and offer them a proper solution. Not only their issue but you can also understand your customers very well as you know what kinds of issues they face, how they behave, what kinds of queries might trigger them, how much time they expect for a solution, etc.
3. Creates Strong Personal Connection
Empathizing with your customers is a genuine way to create strong personal connections. When you empathize with your customers you try to go beyond the usual path of customer service to interact with them.
This way, you can effectively let in the human connection between you and your customers to create an emotional bond. It can allow you to develop trust, loyalty, and better understanding. Such positive customer experiences can create long-lasting relationships.
4. You can Avoid a Potential Bad Customer Experience
Bad experiences might inspire your customers to take extreme steps such as leaving your brand. And you do not want that. Hence, always make sure you empathize with your customers. It might help you to avoid potential bad customer experiences. How?
Imagine, a customer reaches out to you with an issue and is all riled up. In such situations, if you put yourself in your customer’s shoes, then you can understand their issues properly. By empathizing, you can also ensure that your customers relax, as you are working on their query and would find a solution as soon as possible.
By doing so, you can avoid a potentially bad experience for your customers and attract their loyalty for life.
5. Allows You to Stand Out in the Competition
Most businesses only focus on their offering and once the customer has made the purchase, they think it’s all over. But they are wrong, it is just the beginning. After making the purchase customers becomes one small but crucial part of your business. And they want you to look after them at any time at any cost.
So, you need to make sure you offer them quality service. And showing empathy towards your customers is key to offering quality service. From my personal experience, I can say that service agents are only trained to solve customer queries and not to show empathy or respect towards the customers.
This is where your business can stand out. You can train your service agents at an early stage so that they do not forget to empathize with your customers. Empathy in customer service is one factor that will ensure your customers stay with your brand forever.
Problems Usually Faced in Empathizing with Customers
1. Mismatch in the Tone of the Agent and the Customer
The tone of the service agents and the customers might differ. As their tones did not match, the chances of misunderstanding increases. When the agent and customer are face to face, then it’s a totally different story. But when they are having a conversation online or on call they can not see the facial expressions. And this is where the issue begins.
Sometimes what happens is, even if the agent is being polite, the customers might not feel so. And such problems are caused more often than you might imagine. This factor is one of the most common obstacles that a business could face when it comes to showing empathy toward customers.
2. Not Apologizing for Responding Late to Customers
Customers depend on the customer service department for any issue that they face post-sales. As they are the only ones who can help them. But imagine, the one person who can help is also not responding to you when you need them the most. It’s so frustrating.
After not living up to the customer’s expectations and responding late, the least an agent can do is apologize. But instead, they choose not to. This is not a good sign when it comes to customer service and can create a bad experience for the customers. So, if possible respond quickly or at least ensure that you apologize for responding late.
3. Not Interacting Enough with Customers
In customer service, knowing your customers is always going to play out in your favor. But the major issue is agents only interact with the customers for just the sake of solving their issues and nothing more than that. This is one area that they need to transform.
What they can do is ask customers how they feel about their product, what issues they have been facing the most lately, etc. In short, they can ask questions that can give them insights into their customers. This way, they can interact with customers more and can also understand them a little better than before.
4. Agents Not Treating the Issue as Their Own
Customers reach out to the service department looking for solutions to their issues. They expect agents to give their 100% in order to solve the query. But sometimes agents do not take this very seriously. They take the customers and their issues for granted. Agents take a lot of time to solve the query and keep the customers waiting.
For some complex queries taking a lot of time to find a solution is reasonable but even when the queries are not that tough, it makes no sense to keep the customers waiting, right? So, agents who do so, need to stop it and consider the issues of the customers as their own. This way, not only they can offer quality service but can also assure their customers that they care for them and are available to help them out whenever needed.
5. Overpromising to the Customers
Overpromising to customers is just like destroying something special with your own hands. By doing so, a bad experience can be created for customers in a jiffy. So, always make sure not to over-promise customers and stay realistic with them all the time.
This way, a transparent environment can be created and the situation where customers get frustrated can also be avoided. Transparency is better than keeping the customers in the dark. It is taken well by the customers.
Tips to Ensure that You Empathize with Your Customers
1. Listen, Don’t Just Hear Your Customer
You would think hearing and listening are the same. But it’s not. Hearing means a sound that reaches your ears. It does not assure that you understand it properly. But listening refers to the fact that every word that reaches your ears makes sense to you. It has some meaning that conveys a message.
So, now as the confusion is clear, customer service agents have to always listen to their customers and not just hear them out for the sake of it. Every word that the customers say is important as it can help the agents to find a solution.
Listening to customers carefully also assures that you empathize with them and are trying to understand their issues better. It reduces the chances of error. So, the easiest way to empathize with your customers is to listen to them with full attentiveness and alertness.
2. Don’t Just See Them as a Source to Earn Money
Businesses should not look at customers as only a source to earn money. There is much more to it. Once the purchase is made the customer’s journey is not over. According to us, it is just the beginning. And businesses have to be aware of this fact. Hence, businesses have to focus on how to put their customers first.
One way to do so is to treat them as one of their own. Being there for the customers whenever they need it. Also, empathizing with them can play a vital role. It makes them feel valued and they come to know that you care for them and not just their money. Once, you become successful in creating such an atmosphere for your customers there is a high chance you might win them for life.
3. Use Words/Sentences that Show Empathy
Words are free. It is how you use them that may cost you. So, always ensure you choose the right words. Customer service agents are the only ones who connect with customers once they have made the purchase. Imagine, them being rude to the customers, due to which you might lose your customers for life.
It is such a high price to pay for a mistake that can be easily avoided. As a business, you can easily avoid such situations by training your agents at an early stage, letting them know that your business prioritizes empathy and that your customers are above everything, etc. This way, empathy can be embedded in the way they work.
4. Respect Customer Opinions and Feelings
You have probably heard that customers are always right. It is not totally true. But sometimes the customers are right. It might not hurt to listen to what they are saying or what they are suggesting to you to find the solution. As an agent, you represent your business and it’s your job to keep your customers happy. And for that, you need to do everything in your power.
Assuring you respect your customer’s opinions and feelings is one important factor. Customers are in a vulnerable position when they reach out to you for help. And instead of making it worse you must try to assure them that they do not have to worry anymore, their issue will be taken care of.
What you should not do is avoid them and speak with them in an arrogant manner. This will only worsen the situation. So, always make sure to take the high road and be the bigger person. Even if the customer is wrong, ensure that you let them know it in a professional manner. This way, it is easy to keep them happy and manage the situation easily.
5. Leave Aside Your Attitude, and Always Stay Positive
No one likes a person who has a high temper and a bad attitude. And when it comes to customer service it can be considered the worst attributes that a customer service agent can possibly have. As, in customer service, everyday agents come across different queries and different customers. Every single customer is different from the others. Some of them might be calm and some of them might be hot-heads. Calm customers are easy to handle, but what if you encounter a hot-head customer?
Do you think with a high temper you would be able to manage the situation well? Of course not. To manage the situation effectively you yourself need to be calm and positive first. Then and only then you can tackle the situation with ease. This way, with your positive attitude you can also influence the behavior of the customers. So, for an agent to become the best, the most basic skills are to remain calm, composed, and positive.
10 Empathy Statements for Great Customer Service
Empathy statements are short phrases that can be used by service agents to build a connection with customers. This way, service agents can assure the customers not to worry about the issue, as they will do their best to find out a solution. Using empathy statements creates a sense of trust among the customers.
Below are a few empathy statements that customer service agents can use:
- I’m sorry you are having this problem.
- I understand how frustrating this must be for you.
- You’re right, this shouldn’t have happened.
- I can imagine what you must be going through.
- I really appreciate your patience.
- I wish I could make it better.
- Thanks for being so cooperative!
- It makes me really sad to hear this happened.
- Is there any other problem I can help you with?
- What can I do to make your experience with us better?
The Perfect Mix: Empathy + Customer Service
Customer service involving empathy can be considered the perfect mixture to offer quality service to your customers and stand out from the competition. As, empathy is the ability to understand the emotions, concerns, needs, etc. of the customer, when combined with customer service it can develop the greatest experience for them. In customer service, every day brings a new challenge and empathy can help service agents to cope with such challenges gracefully. The empathetic approach not only helps you avoid customer frustration but also enhances customer trust in your business’s ability to understand their needs. It is safe to say that, without empathy, customer service might not be as effective as it should be. Hence, empathy in customer service is an integral part to develop amazing experiences for customers.
