Front Office Customer Service Tips

Frank Sahlein – Children’s Activity Center owner and business consultant – offers tips on providing great customer service.

Here are some Quick Customer Service Tips:

• Keep it real! Short of a personal family emergency, there is nothing more important than the customer who is either standing right in front of you, on the phone or on hold, or the one waiting on an email response.
• Always greet everyone that comes in the door, by name if at all possible.
• Don’t keep customers waiting.  When they approach the desk, say “Hi, how may I help you?”
• Be proactive with customers. Please don’t wait for them to ask for help.
• Remember that personal phone calls or office work needs to wait if you have a customer that needs help.
• Please keep personal calls to a minimum and NEVER answer your cell phone while on the business phone or helping a customer.
• I am sure that you sound great on the phone. If you do, or you have someone in your organization that DOES a great job, have them train everyone!
• If you need to find something out or talk with someone else to help the customer, please put them on hold to find out the info, and complete the circuit by getting back to them quickly.
• Be sure to check phone messages as soon as you see the light blinking and return the call right away.
• Pitch in to help when the phones are busy. It is better to have a live person answer than to put the customer into phone answering loop prison!
• Always try to answer the phone on the 1st ring.  Never let the phone ring while you are talking with a staff member/on a personal call.
• Remember to always treat the customer as you want to be treated.  It’s hard with some customers, but just fake it with them.

And – of course – Continue to give AWESOME service both on the phone and in person.

– Frank Sahlein helps owners and managers of children’s activity centers develop and grow their businesses through 3rd Level Consulting, www.3rdLevelConsulting.com, (208) 869-3656.