Virtual receptionists allow you, the business owner, to focus more on your work, reduce the workload on your in-house staff, and improve customer care. However, did you know that virtual receptionists can also build and enhance customer relationships?
This means, you can start seeing more loyal customers coming back to do business with you, simply because you have subscribed to a phone answering service.
Virtual receptionists are prompt and are always available to answer calls and help build meaningful relationships with customers. Most importantly, they have access to your business information and have experience speaking to customers and clients in your industry.
Simply put, virtual receptionists not only provide better customer care, they also help you build lasting connections and loyalty. Here are a few ways virtual receptionists can help you nurture your customers and build long-term relationships with them.
1) Virtual Receptionists can provide professional phone answering
Virtual receptionists are trained extensively in call handling, customer relationship building, lead nurturing, and displaying empathy. They are also trained to professionally manage time and resolve issues as quickly as possible, and that helps to soothe most irate customers. Soothing an irate customer has a therapeutic effect on the individual, and is very important in long-term relationship building.
Research shows that displays of empathy helps customers to forge a positive relationship with a business. The more empathetic they perceived a company’s staff to be, the more likely they were to return as customers again. In other words, empathetic virtual receptionists help build customer relationships.
In addition, unlike in-house receptionists, phone answering services are available round-the-clock, which means, your clients and customers can call you and be served even when you are not in the office. When you subscribe to a phone answering service, your customers will not be inconvenienced with in-house receptionists leaving their desk, changing jobs, or taking a sick day or vacation.
2) Virtual Receptionists can Send Data to Your CRM
Virtual receptionists can submit the caller’s information to your CRM and save it for future use. It’s highly recommended to integrate your CRM with your phone answering service. Call notes, customer names and phone numbers, and other customer-centric data are easily submitted by virtual receptionists to you. This data can be used for lead nurturing and building relationships.
Customers always like it better when they are given more than they expected. By having the virtual receptionists input the information in your CRM it will better prepare you for when you return the caller’s message and create a better overall customer experience.
47% of CRM users feel CRMs have a positive impact on customer retention, according to Capterra. Nucleus Research revealed that sales representatives witnessed a 26% increase in productivity thanks to CRMs. The use of CRMs for your business can ultimately lead to higher levels of retention for your customers and increase sales and productivity.
3) Virtual Receptionists can engage with callers
To build a valuable relationship with anybody, people need to listen and engage actively. In-house receptionists usually have a number of other tasks on any given day that they cannot answer or give their full attention to each and every call. By not answering all the calls, this can lead to a reduction in customer satisfaction and lose potential new clients.
Virtual receptionists, on the other hand, are always available to actively engage with customers and provide the assistance a caller needs. This proactive support (at Abby, we call this the Abby Proven Process) helps customers to view your business in a positive light, which helps to build relationships in the long term. Active engagement involves note-taking, finding ways to solve the customer’s issues quickly, and giving the customers compliments, empathy, and personal connections.
Customers who get better service are ready to pay a whopping 140% more just for being treated right, according to a Harvard Business Review report. 82% of customers left when they didn’t get treated right, according to Right Now. This means, better customer service and active engagement leads to higher levels of customer retention.
Building customer relationships is a Long-term task
They say that Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither are good customer relationships. Virtual receptionists track every call to ensure that customized and exceptional service is delivered to every customer. They focus on empathy and friendly service so customers develop a positive opinion about your company. They also deliver non-stop customer care with their ability to input call notes, customer names and phone numbers into your CRM.
By actively engaging with customers and ensuring that they receive the most professional service possible, virtual receptionists can outperform in-house when it comes to building relationships. Building good relationships takes time and phone answering services are here to do just that.
Abby Connect Virtual Receptionists is ranked #1 in customer support according to Clutch, a B2B marketing research company. Our virtual receptionists know that connecting on a personal level is the foundation for establishing trust and confidence within callers. With this in mind, we invest most of our day into people and giving and serving others. We give a listening ear; we give compliments; we give many laughs; we give our time, we give optimism, hope, and confidence to callers. Our employees love working here and it shows on each and every call.
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