When customers contact your business you must ensure that the highest levels of customer service are maintained at all times. It may seem easier to make a personal connection with your customer during a face to face interaction, but this can and must be done over the phone as well. Here are some tips on how to personalise customer service communication, for happier customers and business success.

Running a successful business is all about gaining new sales. This is what builds stronger and larger client bases. However, it's no good achieving great success with your sales force if you are leaking orders because you are losing existing clients. In fact, losing the opportunity for repeat business in this way is one of the cardinal sins that any business can make. This is where deploying a contact centre, using a specialist outsourced customer service facility, can reap dividends.

Nothing annoys buyers more than being ignored or being on the end of poor customer service. Winning new orders is just the beginning of building a successful business. If you don't have a top contact centre offering excellent good customer support for all after sales queries, you are jeopardising that success.

Many businesses are so concerned with promoting their brand and getting customers through the door, that they forget to nurture the relationship with the customer when they bring them onboard. A fundamental and costly mistake for any business. Your customers are what makes or breaks your business, so it is important that you take care of them and provide them with the best possible service. These are some ways you can improve your customer service to help ensure you retain your customers and increase the likelihood of referrals.

There are many benefits to outsourced customer service, from taking the weight off the shoulders of in-house operations, to leaving the telephone answering service function in the hands of the experts. But how can you tell the pros from the amateurs? What are the hallmarks of customer service experts, based on the performance of their agents? Here we look at some ways of spotting the best outsourced customer service agents.

When you're handling calls relating to funerals, being 'human' can go a very long way. It might seem obvious, especially when calls are sensitive in nature. However, sometimes the stress of the situation, the volume of calls taken and the need to get the call right means it can at times start to feel robotic. It's important to remember that every call you take is a new person with a new level of grief and emotion. They're not just a phone number on a sheet. It's a difficult time fraught with complex feelings and often requires a greater level of sympathy and support

It may seem a strange proposition – that a healthy, growing business needs to actively encourage customers to ring in to complain – but here are just a few reasons why that kind of feedback is vital

Customer service has the power to make or break your business. We live in an incredibly public and socially-orientated age. Marketing is continually evolving to accommodate the growing need for immediate access and transparency from organisations. Building relationships with clients and potential clients should be right at the top of your business agenda. 

As Customer Service Week rolls round again, it's perhaps a good idea to take a look at why this is such an important part of your business strategy. It doesn't matter what type of business it is, whether traditional bricks and mortar or exclusively online – if you don't have a commitment to excellent customer service at every stage, you will quickly run into trouble. The world is awash with examples of companies that fell into this trap – but there are also

It starts with an open mind and desire to provide an exceptional customer experience to each and every client, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year...