It might be the most wonderful time of the year according to all the songs you’re streaming on your music app of choice. But if you work on the customer service team for nearly any retailer, you know it’s also the most hectic, stressful, and headache-y time of the year for you. Emotions are already running high with the holidays, and even the smallest problem can derail your customers’ faith in and loyalty to your business. It’s up to you to provide the gift of excellent holiday customer service . . . even if you’d rather serve them a lump of coal. 

While our customer service team here at CloudExtend might not have to deal with the same sort of holiday rush as retailers do, we still connect with a lot of folks who are working under tight deadlines, so if something doesn’t work right, they need it fixed now. So we know a thing or two about stressed-out customers. And if there’s one thing we pride ourselves on, it’s on providing the best customer service we can, especially in high-anxiety conversations. 

So here are some tips from my team to yours to help keep your customers happy during the holiday season, in January (when all the returns start coming in), and beyond. 

Tip #1: Involve Everyone

Believe it or not, excellent holiday customer service does not only depend on the customer service team. It’s actually the responsibility of the entire company. What do we mean by that? Of course, you’re not going to ask your accounting team to talk to customers. But you do need each department to keep the customer service team in the loop when it comes to information that impacts customers. (Which is pretty much everything.) 

Are there inventory updates that will impact shipping times? Perhaps pricing changes that are only honored for a specific set of SKUs? If users are talking to someone else in the company—maybe they’ve been talking to accounting about a billing issue—is that information being communicated downstream to the customer service team? 

The more you can involve each department, the more well-oiled your customer service machine will be. 

Tip #2: Prioritize Requests

Of course every customer who contacts your customer service team believes their issue is the most important thing. And to them, it is. But when ranked against another customer’s issue, it may not be. Yes, you want to meet every issue with empathy and respect, but it helps to teach your team how to best prioritize requests so they can give undivided attention to pressing issues. 

For example, defective products require immediate attention, where perhaps a future product update can fall further down the priority list. 

AI chat bots can also help with prioritization, pointing customers to self-serve options on your support portal that can answer questions right away. If the issue is too complex for the bot to help answer, then it can connect the customer to the customer service team.

Tip #3: Have an Escalation Plan

No one likes to hear, “Is there a manager I can speak to?” But when that question comes up or there’s an issue that needs to be handled by someone higher up, it’s best to have an escalation process already in place. Know where each type of issue needs to be directed, as well as what historical information you can provide so the next individual has all the resources they need to understand the issue and help solve it. 

Tip #4: Share as Much Information as Possible

Emotions run high at the holidays, which means customers may tend to be quite a bit more particular than normal and more easily upset if the smallest thing doesn’t go quite right. Help your customer service team manage these frustrations by arming them with as much information as possible so they can go the extra mile for the people they talk to. Access to information like inventory numbers, shipping speeds (and the costs associated), when a purchase will be billed and shipped—all of it can prove to be that last inch of help that will tip the customer’s opinion of you from “good” to “great.” 

Tip #5: Keep Those Standards High

The holidays can be a stressful time for your customer service team, but it’s during this high-stress season that high standards can really improve customer retention and loyalty. As many as 97% of consumers say that customer service interactions will determine whether they remain loyal to a brand. 

When it comes to the crunch time of the holidays, it’s important to keep up those high levels of support. Customers will deeply appreciate your patience and empathy during this stressful season, and your bottom line will thank you when they come back to buy more in the new year. 

Wrapping Up More Efficiency for Your Customer Service Team

Excellent customer service is the goal year-round, of course, but it takes a little extra effort during the holiday season—because it’s extra important during this time of year, too. With an increased volume of calls and emails to respond to, it’s important to find every way possible to improve efficiency for your team, like centralizing customer information for easy access.

You’re probably already using a CRM such as NetSuite to centralize all your customer information, and that’s great. But what if you could make your NetSuite CRM even more powerful for your team by creating easier and even automated ways to collect important customer emails and information? 

That’s why we built ExtendSync for NetSuite. This integration app connects to Outlook or Gmail to instantly integrate information between your inbox and your CRM. Update customer contact records in NetSuite—or create new ones—instantly, without ever clicking away from your inbox. Email Autopilot lets you select email messages by thread or by email address and have those automatically sync to a contact record, even if your customer messages you outside of your working hours and your computer is off. Attachment Autopilot will automatically save email attachments to contact records so you’ve got a trail of all the important documentation needed to address an issue. ExtendSync has multiple ways to ensure that all the right customer information is effortlessly tracked in NetSuite CRM, giving you all the information you need right at your fingertips when a customer service issue needs solving. 

Want to check it out? Use ExtendSync FREE for two weeks—that’s basically the rest of the holiday shopping season!—with no obligation. Get started now.