My brother recently attempted to get an irrigation service out to his new house. He called and left a message stating what he was calling for and to please get back to him. Well they never called him back. It’s been three weeks and he still hasn’t heard from them. He went with a different company. All it would have taken was a simple phone call back and he probably would have gone with the first company, but he never heard from them and got tired of waiting.
It’s plain and simple, respond to your customers! We know sometimes things come up whether it be a hectic day or a true emergency took over, but you need to respond to customers ASAP. They will only wait so long before they get tired of waiting and move on to your competitors, just like my brother did.
Field service software is a great tool not only out in the field but also for the office side of your business. There are many ways you can be more responsive with the help of field management software and we will talk about a few below.
First, schedule it. When you need to call someone back, put it on your schedule along with your other appointments. If it’s a part of your schedule, you will be more likely to make the call since it fits in to your day.
Next, set reminders. Reminders are a great way to tell yourself who and when you need to call back. They are much more efficient then sticky notes, since they won’t get lost. A good field service software will have reminders that you can set to pop up throughout your day. This is helpful if you have certain times of the day that are best for making calls.
Or, put it as a job. Perhaps your office staff do not use the schedule for themselves but rather for the techs. That’s okay. Make the phone call in to a job. Assign the job to a person in your office staff.
Finally record the customer’s information and mark down any calls in their history. You can be much more responsive to customer’s questions if you know what has been done for them in the past. Plus, having the information on hand when you make the call shows you care enough about the customer to look in to their history instead of calling and providing answers such as “um”, or “I don’t know”.
Bonus: One of our managers had a good suggestion that almost every business can use. He says to set up an automated email response. This way the customer knows their email was received and the email can also include when they can expect a response.
Field service software is just the extra step you can take to improve your customer service, not only out in the field, but also in the office. Use technology to help you respond as quickly as possible. Not only will customers appreciate the quick response, your office staff will appreciate the ease of use and not having to remember as much information.