developer.com - Reference Click here to support our advertisers SOFTWAREFOR SALE BOOKSFOR SALE SEARCH CENTRAL JOB BANK CLASSIFIED ADS DIRECTORIES REFERENCE Online Library Reports TRAINING CENTER JOURNAL NEWS CENTRAL DOWNLOADS DISCUSSIONS CALENDAR ABOUT US Journal: Get the weekly email highlights from the most popular online Journal for developers! Current issue developer.com developerdirect.com htmlgoodies.com javagoodies.com jars.com intranetjournal.com javascripts.com All Categories : Web General How Should I Do It? Providing Information Building a Community Reinforcing the Purchasing Decision Keeping on Top of Things Summary – 15 – Customer Service Online Many people have gotten the idea that whatever information they may have, whatever odd service or product they offer, whatever strange fetish or hobby they enjoy not only deserves to be on the WWW, but will be astronomically profitable once it is published online. The idea of "sell, sell, sell!" is bolstered by the almost constant Internet "symposiums" taking place, and the news media's superhype of the Information Superhighway. Sales are certainly the primary goal of business, but it is often good customer service that generates sales—especially repeat sales. Many of the most successful companies on the Web have made customer service a primary goal of their sites, and for good reason. Poor customer service is often a great downfall of business. Federal Express's excellent high-bandwidth site makes customer service a main focus (see Figures 15.1 and 15.2). Figure 15.1. Federal Express's home page. Figure 15.2. Federal Express's tracking service page. Maybe it's the remnants of attitudes from the late '80s and early '90s. You know, the same ones that cut service to nothing, replaced real receptionists with voice-mail mazes, and replaced knowledgeable service reps with $5-per-hour "technicians" who do little more than read you your owner's manual. Whatever the reason, customer service (especially in the United States) has often become the sacrificial lamb when it comes time to cut budgets. We're now starting to see a backlash, and we predict that this will continue. We won't go into the concepts of perceived value and other theories that might help to explain this trend because the reasons can be put fairly simply: People are getting sick of giving their money to companies who apparently could not care less. Fortunately, the WWW and Internet are excellent tools for customer service. First of all, much of customer service is simply providing information. As you know, the Web provides constantly updatable, cross-referencable (hyperlinked), graphical, interactive communications. Furthermore, the on-demand, 24-hour, 7-day nature of the Web lends itself well to answering customer needs immediately (think of how the ATM has changed the concept of customer service in banking). Secondly, a good portion of customer service relates to peoples' need to belong. When people purchase a service or product, they've joined a club of sorts[mdthey belong to a group of people who've bought something from company X. Have you ever seen someone who puts a $20 decal on their car to advertise the fact that they bought a pair of $100 sunglasses? The feeling that the WWW can promote, that whole cyberspace thing, the idea that you've entered some "realm" when you are viewing and navigating a site—all that really helps support the idea of belonging, the sense of community. Thirdly—and this goes hand-in-hand with the other things—people like to have their purchasing decisions reinforced. They'll do whatever they can to facilitate this themselves, but anything you can do to help promote this will pay off ten-fold, as the least expensive and most effective form of advertising is word of mouth. Just showing that you care after the sale goes a long way to letting the customers feel that they've made the right purchasing decision, and good customer service communications help do this. How Should I Do It? We've touched on customer service in just about every chapter of this book. The concepts of clear communication, good site design, and user-friendliness all go hand-in-hand with providing customer service. In the following sections, we discuss some key communications goals you may wish to approach in your own customer service endeavors. How you go about presenting an effective customer service site will depend on your company and the needs of your clients. Your best starting point is to find out what is and is not working in your current customer service efforts. What is it that clients want? What can be streamlined? What types of people are requesting customer service? Providing Information Suppose that your company makes vacuum cleaners, and you get a huge volume of calls asking how to replace the bags. Obviously, you'll want to include this information on your Web site. How you do this can make a huge difference, as you can see in the following examples of mock introductions to the vacuum bag page: This bulletin is in response to customer reports of problems in the installation of X vacuum cleaner bags. The following steps should be followed to ensure proper installation of the X bag. Failure to follow these instructions may result in poor product performance. Thank you for your purchase of the X vacuum—the most remarkable vacuum ever invented. Because of the revolutionary design of the X vacuum, the bag replacement procedure is somewhat different than that of old, ordinary vacuums. In order to assure full performance from your powerful brand X vacuum, please follow the step-by-step instructions below. Now, which of these two introductions would have made you feel better about your vacuum? Which one would make you feel like the company cared, and that you made the right decision? While this has nothing to do with HTML design, it has a lot to do with communication. Customer service is communication, and for the most part, you should try to stay away from dry information like that shown in Figure 15.3. Figure 15.3.This page gives dry, straight information. Good for an MIS person—not so good for a father who can't get his kid's new encyclopedia to work. Building a Community Again, people like to belong. If you intend to include customer service information on your Web site, remember this point. In order to generate brand loyalty, repeat sales, and word-of-mouth advertising, it is in your best interest to foster a sense of community on your Web site. This also helps to promote your product/services to new customers, in that they can see what they're missing. Your Web page design will already have given your system a personality. Most of the community (or exclusivity) your system promotes will be provided by your text and navigation. The previous example shows how text can be used to promote customer satisfaction. So, we'll now deal with navigation. The best way to achieve a sense of belonging is to have a link right off of your main page. The link can lead to an "existing customer" site, which can have its own navigation, graphics, and so on. In this way, you will be building a subsite for existing customers. In some cases, where customer service is the main goal of the overall site, this step can be omitted. Note Some companies password protect their existing customer sites. We avoid this when possible (obviously, if the company is selling information, this wouldn't work) for two main reasons. First, unless this is done very carefully, potential clients may get the impression that there are hidden problems being kept from them. Secondly, giving prospects a view of your customer relations activities, unless they're something to be ashamed of, is often a good idea. The customer service site should be labeled in a way to give the impression of exclusivity, information, and interaction—not just recall notices. Labeling a link something like "Club X: The Brand X Owners' Site" will help promote the idea of community, as Pepsi has done on its site (Figure 15.4). Furthermore—and this is a case where we would break our hotlinks rule—including service-oriented features such as places of interest might be a good idea. Figure 15.4. The Pepsi site focuses on a sense of community and being "in the know." Other headings you might include on your customer site would be Common Questions and Answers, Technical Information, Accessories, Service Locations, Feedback, and Contacting Customer Service. Reinforcing the Purchasing Decision This is not really a separate aspect of customer service, but rather a thread that should be common throughout your site. Your pages should give existing clients the feeling that they made the right decision in purchasing your product, and should show them that you appreciate their business. This is not to say that you should drool all over them, or fill every page with hype, but that you communicate to them that you appreciate their business. You may also wish to include examples of why your customer has made the right decision, as Intel has done (see Figure 15.5). How exactly you do these things will depend upon your clientele, your product/service, and the type of feedback you get from your customers. Figure 15.5. Intel's sprawling site includes reams of information, as well as sample applications that make the most of the Pentium processor—thus reinforcing the buying decision. Keeping on Top of Things No matter how well you design your customer site (or customer portion of your site), you will probably not meet all of your clients' needs. Luckily, you'll be able to customize your design based on the feedback you get from your clients. Obviously, this will require that you keep on top of things. You will have to provide your clients with ways to communicate with you—via e-mail, response forms, phone, telephony (chat phone or other digital voice communication), chat, regular mail, and so on—and you will need to track those communications. If a significant number of people have a specific question or problem, or would like to see something on the site, it would obviously be a good idea for you to accommodate this group. There are two good reasons for doing so: you will be keeping your customers happy, and you will be decreasing the burden on customer service reps (who have to answer the same question over and over again). Quick and Dirty Guide: Starting Small If you are in a rush, designing a site for a start-up business, or designing for a business that doesn't really have a huge need for customer service, your best bet is to start small. The easiest way to accomplish this is to design a customer service page, and then simply provide a customer service e-mail link. The page should say something about how committed the company is to its clients, how feedback is important in providing continued service, and then give a simple mailto: link. Your customer service section can then evolve in reaction to the feedback you receive from this page. Summary Throughout this book, we have dealt with key issues of customer service. This chapter has gone into detail about key communication objectives in customer service, as well as the overall "feel" a customer service site should have. We have also discussed the need to adapt your site to meet your customer needs, and suggested a fast way to start out small. We will now move on to discuss that green stuff (you know, the reason you work) in the next chapter, "Taking Payment Online." Use of this site is subject to certain Terms & Conditions. Copyright (c) 1996-1998 EarthWeb, Inc.. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of EarthWeb is prohibited. Please read the Acceptable Usage Statement. Contact [e-mail] with questions or comments. Copyright 1998 Macmillan Computer Publishing. All rights reserved.