The franchising industry is extremely competitive and outstanding customer service leads to franchise growth. Every service-providing industry irrespective of the nature of the work deals with a good chunk of clientele, directly or indirectly. For businesses like food and beverages, healthcare, etc, for example, the businesses’ growth and brand image are proportional to their customer service. When the ultimate goal is to create better services, it’s vital for business owners to be open to feedback and follow-ups.

Customer satisfaction is the conclusive aim of any product, service, or business per se because it’s the customers who bring the business. Irrespective of the sector of operation, the focus as a franchisee or a franchisor should definitely be on customer satisfaction. and providing them with the optimum quality of service that they are paying for. In order to attain a breakthrough in the customer psyche, business owners need to strategies their customer support by seeking answers to a few major questions:

• Who are the customers of this particular business?
• What would you want as a customer?
• How would you have liked for any difficult situation to be handled?
• What are the brand expectations as a customer?

Statistics ensure that about 54% of customers today have higher expectations of customer service than they had a couple of years ago. Well-planned customer support and service system rewards the business by :

• Bringing in a good reputation to the brand.
• Enabling the franchise to yield profits through loyalty and referrals, and profits in general.
• Makes the workspace healthy and respectable for the employees.

Here are a few tips on How to Provide Outstanding Customer Services for Franchise Businesses:

1. Know the clientele

Knowing the customer base is the key to a strong brand value. Because knowing the customers that get you business and focusing on them can result in the greater good for the business. Here, tools like feedback forms, surveys, etc come in handy so as to keep that bridge between the owners and the customers solid.

2. Weigh the offerings of the brand to the requirements of the customers

Just ensuring that the products or services offered by the business are giving the highest quality product doesn’t suffice. Each and every person associated with the business should have a general idea about the products that are at stake. Only when one knows about the products, can one find the perfect fit for customers.

3. Continuous training of staff

Training and keeping the staff informed is crucial. They are the first point of contact to the brands in the case of franchise businesses. even if, there are insights gathered by marketing experts associated with the business, well-trained staffs are confident staff, and they would be able to provide customers with what they require. This would drift the whole system into clarity about standards of customer care in operations across the franchise business.

4. Customer complaints and redressal procedures

More crucial than receiving complaints are the redressal policies by a franchise business. A business such as a franchise stands tall on grounds of reputation. Customer services can be a major turn and result in making or breaking the business altogether. No business is perfect and no customers can be met their expectations to the fullest, hence complaints are received. What switches the situation is the redressal procedures. How swiftly the difficult situations are handled by a franchise business defines their close-knit assemblage with the customers.

5. Maintain transparency

The customer today wants to be kept informed at all times. If it’s out of their understanding capabilities, they would want to be made to understand situations, rather than keeping them in dark with vague responses like, ‘We are looking into the matter for your convenience, it will be resolved soon’  Restating the same phrase and adding up few more sentences like, ”Meanwhile, let me walk you through the quick process that we are going to follow to address your inconvenience.” This instills a sense of confidence amongst the customers and they feel connected with the brand.

The goal is to keep the customers attached and keep the business running. There is no way businesses, especially franchises, can overlook the importance of customer services while taking off for a major kickstart in the business.

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