6 Customer Service Trends Your Small Business Needs in 2020

In a year of twists and turns, there’s nothing more important than caring for your customers and helping them feel safe, so they keep coming back and the lights stay on.

Thankfully, tough times bring opportunities too, and the pandemic has given us new insight into customer service and how we show up for the people who keep our businesses going. We just have to pay attention.

So what are those opportunities and how can you tap into them? 

We dug through the best articles out there to give you an in-depth look at the top six customer service trends of 2020, how your business can use them, and perspective from some of our 5 million members.

Ready?

Customer Service is the New Marketing

First, let's take a look at how customer service has changed since the pandemic, what your customers expect now, and how great customer service and marketing go hand in hand 

More requests are coming in

• Overall global customer service requests are up 19% over last year, according to Zendesk’s latest Benchmark Snapshot: Tracking the impacts of COVID-19 on Customer Experience. They're starting to fall a bit since they peaked mid-May.

To meet those requests, the most successful companies are reorienting their customer experience efforts to meet their customer’s primary needs: 

• Safety
• Security
• Everyday convenience

And the more your customers feel safe and happy with their experience, the more likely they are to think highly of your brand, come back often, and provide those word of mouth referrals for new business. Win-win-win. 

Here are the stats on a few trending service channels to deliver those needs to your customers, according to Zendesk's report.

Messaging platforms

• WhatsApp use has increased 148% since late February
• Texting is up 26%
• Direct messaging on Facebook and Twitter is up 21%

Self-service support

• Self-service customer support is growing five-times faster than any other type of customer support (up 206%)

For Elizabeth Timmins from Muehl Public Library, who’s dealing with this on the ground: 

“[I've been] spending extra time explaining, educating, and doing everything in our power to create a good user experience and get the patron what they need.”

No matter how you communicate with your customers, the idea is to demonstrate goodwill and build long-lasting emotional connections. So what's trending in customer service and how do you get started?

6 Emerging Trends in Customer Service for 2020

We scoured the web and our forums to find the best insight on the latest emerging trends in customer experience. Thankfully, there's great stuff out there on what it takes to provide excellent customer service in our world now.

Here are the six most important trends we discovered and what you can do with them.

1. Coronavirus is setting higher expectations for customer service

What the trend is all about: “Customer service may be on the verge of a historic improvement,” sums up a recent Forbes article. Now that many businesses are offering limited services, quality customer service is even more critical—it can separate your small biz from the rest.

Experts say companies that figure out how to adapt, incorporate new technology, and develop deeper human connections will come out on top.

Top takeaways for your business:

• Be a customer advocate: Work with and for your customers to build trust and loyalty. Help your employees, if you have them, do the same. 
  
• Try out new technology to help customers online quickly and automatically.
• Think about new customer needs and adjust how you meet them in person and online.
• Keep human connection in the picture. At the end of the day, we all want a little connection with other people. Show them you care.

"Bottom line: Good marketers will learn from this experience both in terms of the importance of customer service and how to provide good customer service under stress and in a massive volume," Marcia Flicker, an associate professor of marketing at Fordham University, told Forbes.

Customer service in action
“Our customer experience has changed drastically because we are an agency that provides strictly in-person services,” explains Dr. Jim Bostic from Nepperhan Community Center. 

“We have had to switch to providing virtual services, which for many of our clients provides a major challenge because of extreme poverty and a lack of technology resources. We have been able to get about 60% of our clients with access to some form of technology and internet services on virtual platforms.”

Showing empathy for your customers is crucial

What the trend is all about: More than anything, the customer experience is about emotion, and this pandemic has created a lot of it. If you can tap into your customer's emotions, you can craft high-quality customer service. 

The key is to shift your customer service mindset, “by attempting to understand the other person’s perspective, their journey, and most importantly, their feelings,” says the article by Customers That Stick.

Top takeaways for your business:

• Beware of implicit and confirmation bias. Instead of automatically responding to customers, be open to their explanations and where they’re coming from.
  
• Understand where your own beliefs are coming from so you can shift your lens when talking to customers.
• Ask non-judgmental questions to show your customers that you care about how they're doing and what they need.
  

Empathy in action
For Kris Young from My Daily Choice HempWorx, demonstrating empathy has meant understanding the amount of stress her customers are under during the pandemic.

As part of that recognition, she’s pushed fewer of her company’s products and instead focused on offering, “education and knowledge” to help customers “get relief from their stress and issues.”

You don't know what each and every job or business out there is dealing with, but at least we can offer options.

Agile and responsive customer experiences will win out

What the trend is all about: Customer experience leaders say that success means being “proactive rather than reactive." But the crisis has pushed a lot of us into “reactive mode” just to get by.

To handle the new reality, try to adapt and move forward, says the article in CX Journey. Customer experience is “a long play, not a short-term response.”

Top takeaways for your business:

• Think through your decisions, instead of making knee-jerk calls due to coronavirus. Take thoughtful action based on what you know and customer feedback.
• "Proactively monitor the pulse of your customers’ sentiments” and use them to find opportunities to make their lives easier and better.
• The best customer experiences are intentionally designed based on your values, vision, and authentic

Agility in action
“Using Zoom has forced me to be in the 21st century, and at the same time, reach more current and potential customers and business partners all around the country, writes Barbara Gill from SaferForYou.com.

Customer trust is even more important than customer satisfaction

What the trend is all about: While satisfaction changes quickly, trust is harder to influence because it involves a choice. But that also means it can also be recovered when it’s lost, says Customer Think.

Top takeaways for your business

So, how can you build trust in your business services and products?

• Adjust your response to meet changing customer needs. For example, during covid, many stores eased up on their return policies, recognizing that helping was more important than penalizing.
• Decrease friction and stress. Just as many airlines allowed customers to cancel and change flights without fees due to coronavirus, you can decrease friction to increase trust.
• Be transparent. Tell your customers that you understand their needs and are doing something new to meet them.
  

Trust in action
 "We waived our delivery fee to help people get food, and we give out coupons every day via text for free pizza to people who are out of work due to the virus," says Timothy Trujillo from Mario's Pizza and Subs.

Related reading: 4 Communication Tips That Will Help Your Customers Feel Safe

It's critical to keep up with changes in consumer behavior

What the trend is all about: There’s been a huge cultural shift since the start of the pandemic. The key is to shift with your consumers and embrace new ways of doing business.

In other words, for customer success, close the gap between what they want and what you offer, explains a recent Skift article.

Top takeaways for your business

In total, there are ten emerging consumer trends, suggests Skift. Here are the top four that can help your small business, depending on your industry.

• Offer virtual experiences. Consumers are looking for ways to connect now that they can't attend in-person events. How can your business create virtual experiences for them? 
• Look into Shopstreaming, which is all about creating online shopping experiences that combine shopping and chatting.
• Make it easy for your customers to feel healthy in your store. 
• Teach new skills. Consumers are embracing businesses that connect them with experts and mentors to help them learn something new.

Customer effort and customer anxiety are growing

What the trend is all about: Hold times for customer service lines have gone up as much as 34% and escalations have skyrocketed 68%, suggests the Harvard Business Review article. In other words, customers are anxious.

So how do you decrease those feelings of anxiety and increase customer satisfaction?

Top takeaways for your business

• Update your policies to reduce customer frustration. Don't rely on your previous policies or hide behind them. Make changes to keep your customers less stressed in the world we live in now.
• If you have a team of customer team, take advantage of collaboration tools to help them learn from each other in real-time.
• If you're on you own, make note the next time you successfully handle customer issues so you can pull from those experiences next time.
  

Decreasing customer effort in action
For Arline Link’s pottery business, The Kiln Doctor, decreasing customer effort has meant immediately changing how they do business.

They’ve gone “above and beyond to help [their customers] get the supplies they need and offer fun things they can take home to share with their families.”

For example, “within a week we had an online store where people could order to-go kits to take home with curbside delivery. We then offered online Zoom workshops.”

Happy customers can help your business rebound

Great customer experiences create happy customers who want to spend money on your business. As long as you shift your service to match your customers' needs, you'll be in good shape.

And don’t be afraid to reach out to fellow business owners within the Alignable community. We have thousands of members who offer incredible customer service and are willing to help.

Ask for their advice and work together to come up with truly incredible customer experiences.

What do you think is the most important new trend in customer service? What does excellent customer service mean to you? Share in the comments.

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For more ideas on improving the customer experience, check out these reads:

• How has the customer experience at your business changed since the pandemic? A discussion with hundreds of small business owners in the thick of things.
• 4 Communication Tips That Will Help Your Customers Feel Safe
• How To Manage Your Clients: 6 Tips That Will Improve Your Business