Whether you sell a product or provide a service, creating a phenomenal customer experience remains immeasurably important. Every aspect of how you operate your business should keep the customer experience in mind, from how intuitive your website is to navigate, to how quickly you respond to messages and inquiries, to how easy it is for clients to make payments.
Unfortunately, a great customer experience is sometimes sacrificed at the altar of operational efficiency.
That might sound counterintuitive at first, because the more efficient your team is, the happier your customers will be, right? Well, not always.
Depending on the size of your organization, the lifecycle of a single project could involve a number of people and departments, from sales, to the delivery team, to the accounts department. The problem comes in when the processes put in place to maximize efficiency inadvertently create a gap between what the customer was promised and what ends up getting delivered. This happens when each team is so laser-focused on their designated roles that critical communication between departments – and customers – falls by the wayside.
Often, the biggest bone of contention is the handover from sales to the delivery team.
Once a sale is made, the sales team often feels that their job is done. They hand over to the project manager or delivery team and move onto the next prospect. Realizing the client’s dream is now someone else’s problem. Obviously, this doesn’t bode well. To deliver a great customer experience, you absolutely need to ensure that everyone is on the same page regarding the client’s expectations and the agreed deliverables.
Here are four ways to improve your customer experience by improving communication within your organization:
1. Use technology to manage all client communication in one place.
Don’t rely on dozens of different email threads between different team members and the client to keep your team aligned. Rather, use specialized technology to manage all communication with the client in one central place. For example, Morphed’s Customer Portal allows for one-on-one messaging from first-touch to completion; including the initial enquiry, fee and scope negotiations, client check-ins throughout the project, and more.
When all communications are kept in one central portal, the delivery team has access to a complete record of everything discussed between sales and the client, including the finalized proposal. This way, no detail is omitted and the delivery team is always up to speed with the client’s expectations.
2. Get everyone on the same page with an internal project kick-off call.
Before work begins, schedule an internal kick-off meeting with both the sales and delivery teams to ensure alignment on client objectives and the scope of work. Be as thorough as possible in this session and encourage the delivery team to ask as many questions as possible.
3. Establish communication standards and processes with the team.
Great communication doesn’t happen spontaneously. Set up communication processes and standards and train your team members on the correct channels to use for different types of communication. For example, you might choose to set up a dedicated Slack channel for more informal internal team communication and banter. However, any communication around client scope changes, project updates, and client escalations should always take place in a formally designated channel or client portal.
4. Establish regular scheduled check-ins with the client.
Another easy way to ensure a great customer experience is to schedule regular check-ins with them. This way you’re able to keep them up to date on the project’s progress, field any questions they might have, and get valuable feedback on work completed as you go. Making yourself available to the client in this way not only lets them know they’re a priority, it also allows you to keep your team aligned with your customer’s needs and expectations.
Deliver an exceptional customer experience with Morphed’s Customer Portal.
Morphed’s Customer Portal allows you to manage all client communication in one place. Understand prospects’ needs through one-on-one messaging, finalize the scope of work, agree on payment terms, and check in with clients regularly as projects progress. Because all of this takes place in one centralized place, the delivery team has access to a complete record of the sales negotiations and agreed scope of work at all times.
It doesn’t end there. Once the work is actually delivered, your customer can post a review in the portal. Once you’ve verified a review, it’s pulled directly through to your website and appears at the bottom of your service package information for new prospects to view.
Find out more about the Morphed Customer Portal here or watch this video to see this technology in action.
