Email etiquette for customer service is one of the crucial skills you should learn if you want to be the best customer service virtual assistant. Because 64% of small businesses use email marketing to reach their customers. And, 74% of millennials regard email as the most personal channel to communicate with brands.
You can see that both the business and customers agree that emails are the preferred communication mode. Therefore, you can expect that your job description will entail using emails to create and maintain relationships with your client's customers.
In that case, today's discussion is about preparing you for what awaits you as a customer service virtual assistant.
Why Do You Need to Follow Email Etiquette for Customer Service?
Did you know that it will cost you anywhere from 5 to 25 times more to acquire a new customer than retain an existing one? Let that sink in for some time.
If you are not yet convinced, maybe the finding of a study by Bain & Company will change that. The company, which is responsible for developing the net promoter score found that increasing customer retention rates by 5% could result in a 25% to 95% profit increase.
Email etiquette for customer service is one of the vital ways to retain your client's existing customers. It sends a message of business accountability and professionalism. It also helps clear any nagging issues a customer may have with how things are done in your client's business.
So, here is some email etiquette to observe as a virtual assistant.
Avoid Sending Unnecessary Emails
The worst mistake you would make is assuming things about your customer. Not everyone is thrilled and looking forward to your very many emails. Customers already have to deal with numerous marketing emails that they did not even subscribe to in the first place.
Therefore, if not careful, your email may find its way into the customer's spam box even if the customer had subscribed to your communications. Learn to be patient and give your customers time to digest the last information you shared with them.
In this regard, there is no harm in restricting non-official customer emails to one in a month. That is not unless there is something urgent. Or the customer triggers the email communication themselves.
Always Make Sure You Have Answered the Question
Do you remember the last time you contacted any business customer service department? You will notice a pattern when you communicate with the customer service reps. For example, it is when you have a pressing issue, inquiry, or complaint you want to be handled.
You can now understand why about 52.7% of customers consider having to explain issues repeatedly as the most annoying thing about interacting with customer support teams. Another 32.7% are not thrilled about getting automated replies from service bots that may not provide a solution to your question.
The bottom line is that customers are always looking forward to solution-oriented replies from the customer service department. Therefore, anything short of this will leave the customer unsatisfied and probably frustrated.
Therefore, before sending that reply, please take a few minutes to skim over it again. Have you answered or provided a solution to the issues addressed by the customer?
Pay Attention to the Subject Line
Email subject line research reveals that about 64% of email recipients decide whether to open an email based on its subject line. Another 33% of email recipients open emails because they have catchy subject lines. Furthermore, 69% of email recipients will classify an email as spam after reading the subject line.
The worst mistake you would make when writing a customer service email is to leave the subject line blank. It does not also look good when you include non-professional subject lines.
The golden rule of writing a catchy email subject line is that it should be brief and address the main point of your message. It would help if you tailored it to the specific message being delivered. For example, "Apologies for the order mix-up."
Keep Emails Brief
Please never forget that a single customer may receive over a hundred emails daily. Therefore, you do not want to be the one boring them with long hard-to-read emails. Customers tend to blocklist senders who they notice have a pattern of sending lengthy emails.
Always be straightforward with your email communications. Also, it would help if you used short paragraphs and bullet points to make the message easier to read.
Keep it Professional and Friendly
Even if you are replying to an angry customer email, never forget to include a personalized salutation in your mail. For example, "Dear Ms. Angela." Such a simple salutation could be the ice breaker you need to start a friendly conversation with the angry customer.
As a customer service virtual assistant, you want to instill goodwill and trust in your clients. Being polite and maintaining tact in your email communication will help clear doubts in the reader's mind.
On the other hand, you can never compromise on professionalism in your communications. That includes ensuring you are using proper grammar when communicating with the customers.
Be Responsive
Do you remember the last time you emailed a customer service team and never received a timely reply? How did that leave you feeling? Customers consider it rude and unprofessional when you don't reply to their customer service emails.
When you don’t respond, there is a higher likelihood that many of your customers will stop doing business with you because of unresponsiveness in your customer service.
Statistics reveal that over 83% of customers feel more loyal to brands that respond to and resolve their complaints. In addition, 90% of customers rate an "immediate" response as crucial when they have a customer service question. 60% of customers define "immediate" as 10 minutes or less.
Do You Want to Learn More Email Etiquette for Customer Service?
There is more email etiquette for customer service we are ready to share with you. You can get them all hassle-free by joining our Royal VA community. There is no better place to learn the tricks of this trade than in this community.