Excellent customer service is vital in any industry, with business owners realizing that happy customers are often returning customers. However, some trade businesses find it challenging to know how to improve their customer service when they don’t sit behind a desk and answer phone calls all day.
While your version of customer service might look different from that of an office-based business, you can make a good impression and enjoy repeat business by taking the following actions:
1. Look After Your Employees
Your employees can be your best or worst form of advertising, so look after them. You can get specific policies delivering workers’ compensation for electricians, builders, plumbers, and all other trades. These specialized policies cover you for the line of work you’re in, ensuring your employees are taken care of in the event of an accident. Paying your workers a competitive wage with benefits is also crucial to ensure their satisfaction.
When you look after your employees and keep them happy and safe, they are incentivized to repay you with loyal service and a high standard of work for your customers. In turn, this will build trust and keep those customers coming back for more.
2. Keep Expectations In Check
Most tradespeople are more than capable of performing their work to a high standard and leaving their customers satisfied. However, there may come a time when an obstacle prevents you from providing a specific service or achieving a finish you usually would.
Keep your customers’ expectations in check by making them aware of what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. Communication between a customer and a tradesperson can make the difference between a minor issue and a major blow-up.
3. Improve Communication
Communication has long been seen as a problem in businesses, but it can be particularly tricky in the construction industry. Often, poor communication is seen between customers and business employees rather than between colleagues.
Many customers become frustrated when tradespeople don’t turn up when they say they will or fail to pass on important information to other workers about a job. So ensure your employees are equipped with more than just a phone to contact clients. Implement business communication policies that give your workers clear guidelines to follow if they will be late for a meeting or if they need to extend a project deadline.
4. Provide Detailed Quotes
Customers approach tradespeople to perform tasks at their homes or businesses when they don’t have the skills or knowledge to perform them themselves. However, they want to ensure you understand what they need before handing over their hard-earned money.
When visiting a prospective client to quote a job, ensure you thoroughly understand their wants and needs to provide a detailed quote. Ask questions and confirm details to be 100% sure of what you’re quoting. Failure to provide an exact quote might mean you under-quote for a service and aren’t able to meet the customer’s needs when the job is completed.
5. Clean Up
Whether you’re an electrician rewiring a home or a builder performing a renovation, it’s easy to get caught up in the task and forget you’re in someone’s cherished home. Don’t forget to clean up after yourself and leave the client’s home as clean as you found it.
If you leave leftover materials or mess, the customer might be dissatisfied with your service and refuse to use you again or recommend you to friends.
Exceptional customer service can improve a business’s reputation and profit potential. If your company hasn’t made customer service a priority in the past, now might be the right time to address it and reap the rewards.