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Customer Service

How to Identify Customer Pain Points

We’re sure you’ve had those moments: dreading the need to do business with a company or deciding that you’ll never support them again because their products or their service failed to satisfy you. Maybe your pain points led you to craft the most scathing review you could think of and to tell all your friends about your unpleasant experience. Looking back, you’re probably able to detail all the reasons why you won’t go near that business again.

But, from the slightly cringeworthy to the massively deal-breaking, it’s a lot harder to identify the pain points of your customers. You might even think that there are none. After all, you went into business with good intentions and a competitive product. You’ve certainly heard from customers who absolutely love your business. And perhaps, customer complaints are few and far between. Scary fact: 96 percent of unhappy customers will not complain, and 91 percent of them will simply walk away and never come back.

Where Does it Hurt? Common Customer Pain Points

Customer discomfort could be costing you sales and repeat business. Broadly speaking, we can divide their pain points into four categories: 

  • Financial pain points
  • Productivity pain points
  • Process pain points
  • Service pain points

In reality, a single issue often relates to more than one of these categories. For example, if someone buys a product that doesn’t seem as valuable as they expected, they will worry that they’ve wasted their money (financial pain). They may feel that your company could have given more product information (process pain). They’ll regret the time (productivity pain) they have already spent as well as being annoyed about the effort they might exert to get help (service pain). 

Practical Examples of Pain Points

  • Despite technologies that should make getting help easier, poor customer service and support are among the top reasons why customers complain. Their number one beef? Difficulty in accessing authentic interactions with real people is a common complaint, says CBS.
  • Complex processes that make it difficult for customers to make a straightforward purchase get their share of customer rage. For example, while it’s tempting to gather as much data about your customers as you can, they don’t want to fill in lengthy registration forms.
  • Lack of information can be a huge hurdle for customers. Browsing through multiple FAQs and resources to get the info they want or talking to chatbots that don’t understand their questions is frustrating. Will they persevere? Probably not.
  • Of course, buying a product only to find that it isn’t all they thought it would be is sure to drive customers away. This could be put down to poor quality or defective products in some cases. In others, it could be a simple matter of not knowing how to use the product properly.
  • Operational issues are bound to crop up at times. But if they’re hard to remedy or keep recurring, customers’ patience will run out quickly. Think about the times you had to struggle to get an incorrect account rectified or the occasions when businesses failed to deliver goods on time.
  • Financial pain points shouldn’t be overlooked. For example, a sudden and significant price increase will alienate customers. In 2010, a software company implemented a price increase, with some customers experiencing a 300 percent price hike. The issue, which had prompted a Twitterstorm from outraged customers, was resolved when the company announced that the new price would not apply to existing clients.
  • Failure to recognise customers as individuals with high-priority needs makes customers feel undervalued. Even if you have thousands of customers, every one of them wants to feel as if they matter to you. 

How to Identify Customer Pain Points

Think

You can begin looking for customer pain points by doing a little thinking of your own. For example, customer journey mapping might point to bottlenecks, unnecessary process steps, and other customer experience pain points. 

However, your customers are still more likely to experience pain points than you are to spot them, so it’s time to start looking for information that shows you how real customers are experiencing their journeys. 

Look and Listen

There are many ways to listen to your customers and many sources of valuable information that you can use to improve customer experiences. 

  • Your customer service agents are in a prime position to tell you about customer frustrations and difficulties.
  • Automated ticketing systems also gather important data on customer experiences. Satisfied customers don’t have issues to report
  • Social listening can uncover what customers aren’t telling you but are sharing with the world at large. 
  • Surveys and questionnaires (keep them simple) can uncover what works for your customers and what doesn’t. 
  • Analysing online user behaviour can show you where customers are having difficulty navigating your website, whether they’re succeeding in information searches, and which experiences lead to cart abandonment. 
  • Researching the market can help you to spot what customers dislike about your industry in general and offers clues on how you can do better. 

Test

Usability testing is very helpful for spotting product-based pain points your customers may be experiencing. Software as a Service companies are particularly well-positioned to examine how customers use their products and whether they continue using them. You can take immediate remedial action with customer success interventions, and if difficulties are common, you might decide to improve the product itself. 

A/B testing is an excellent source of information for any business with a website. Do a little experimenting to see what works well for your customers. Surprisingly small changes can make big differences. 

How to Address Customer Pain Points

Although the specific actions you take depend on the pain points you identified, there are some general points that apply. 

Set Priorities

If you identified several pain points, you should begin by prioritising the ones that affect the greatest number of customers and those that are likely to have the most severe impact on their experiences. 

Search for Solutions

Identify and evaluate solutions that may remedy pain points. You might consider changes to the product, adapt your business processes, or look for better ways to support your customers through customer experience design or improved access to customer service. Remember, your aim is to make things easy for customers. Whether it’s finding what they need, making a purchase, using your product, or asking for help, minimising customer effort is your objective. 

Take a Fresh Look at Customer Service

Making it easy for customers to get what they want without help is the ideal, but customers who do need assistance must have access to well-trained, efficient, and empathetic people. 

A fascinating study published in the Harvard Business Review found that angry customers who had been contacted by brands after venting frustration on social media were likely to become strong brand advocates. In fact, they were far more loyal than a control group that did not appear to have had a negative customer experience. 

Gather Feedback and Monitor Metrics

Remain alert to customer sentiment, keeping your finger on the pulse by gathering customer feedback and tracking metrics like customer satisfaction, retention and engagement. Don’t forget to look for information from within your business. Sales and customer support personnel are constantly dealing with customers and will easily be able to identify common pain points. 

Customer Expectations are High: RSVP Can Help

Customers expect companies to address their pain points quickly and effectively. But for many businesses, scaling customer service to match their needs presents a costly challenge. There’s an understandable reluctance to outsource. Most people have experienced situations in which outsourced agents don’t know enough about the business or its products to be helpful. However, there is a solution.

RSVP, an established UK-based contact centre company, believes in becoming part of your business’s team. Our customer service agents are chosen for their communication skills, and we ensure that they have the training they need to interact with your customers constructively. 

Our aim is to provide a customer service experience that’s not only as good as anything you can offer, but better. Check out our case studies and remember, if you need professional help with customer service that sets you apart from the run-of-the-mill, it’s time you talked to RSVP

 

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