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VAs Help With Providing Timely Client Care And Support

By ProdaktfPosted on Posted in Virtual AssistantTagged , , , , ,

Have you ever realized how challenging it is to stay on top of everything as your business grows? Although not by choice, there might be many times when things slide. It’s especially so, when you are a one person team and don’t have the time to keep on top of everything .

The most common slip up is providing your clients with timely support and information, an essential part of your business as it keeps your clients feeling valuable and satisfied. As most of us expect this from any service we subscribe to, it’s easy to understand why its important for clients as well. This is where hiring a Virtual Assistant would make a positive impact on your business.

A virtual assistant can be of great assistance in this area. A few ways they can contribute to improve client care and the help desk:

Acting as a client service representative

A popular rule of thumb to provide excellent customer support, is to respond as soon as possible. The faster the response, the better as the world we live in today it’s imperative that people hear back as soon as possible. 

Expected response times for customers are:

  • An e-mail reaction within 6 hours
  • An appropriate reaction time to a social media post or message in less than an hour
  • Response to complainants on Twitter, within the hour 

These expectations can be a formidable task for a business owner with a one-person army, trying to handle everything. A delayed response or a boiler plate response, could work against you and in turn ruin your diligent efforts.

Virtual assistants help in improving the critical response times for client service. The VA can respond to customer queries or complaints or acknowledge receipt and provide a timeline for a response. Providing them with information to handle standard queries on their own can save you a lot of time and effort .

A Virtual Assistant can also respond to a post on social media or quickly bring it to your attention, so you’re aware of it and can respond to it.

Responding to support desk queries

If you own a business that has to respond to troubleshooting queries, then time is of the essence and having a system that addresses this need is a great business decision. Hiring a Virtual assistant with skills to handle these tasks will alleviate your stress and indicate o your clients that their satisfaction is top priority for you.

The VA can make use of the guidelines and resources you make available to them. As a way to get started with this, document the policies and procedures that you want your virtual assistant to refer to without always having to get in touch with you to find answers. Your VA can then advice your clients based on that, and escalate it to you when a situation requires your involvement.

Often businesses put together FAQs on their websites, which clients can refer to, to troubleshoot when possible. A virtual assistant can also assist in putting together such a set, so clients across the board get the same answers. 

Setting up important communications

Customer communications being an important part of Customer care, can be quite time consuming. A Virtual Assistant can assist by either by setting up auto-responses to emails or responding to them or sending out newsletters or adding a blog post.  

Virtual assistants usually take on the responsibility of setting up the kind and frequency of communication. They don’t always create the content. The way it works is either you provide the content or they coordinate with a content writer and get the content. In which case, they might also assist in sending you or the content specialists, reminders for content creation around the scheduled time. On occasion the VA might be content writers themselves, wherein, they will contribute by creating the content and help with the setup as well. 

Monitoring on-line chatter

Many businesses watch out for mentions of their business or name online or on social media. When individuals discuss businesses (especially on social media), the opportunity for you to comment in response opens up. 

Virtual assistants can set up and use monitoring tools to watch the conversations around you or your business and either interact themselves or alert you as and when necessary. The tools they use for monitoring can also keep an eye out for trolls or fake accounts bearing your name or your business’s name with the intention of causing harm.

Give you a break!

We can all agree that it’s very hard to be on top of our game all the time while providing excellent customer service also. As such, it can be exhausting for business owners who manage everything on their own, .Delegating tasks that don’t always require your exclusive attention to a virtual assistant will free up some of your time which you can then use towards self care.

In addition to providing that breather, a virtual assistant can suggest potential opportunities for your business.  As they’re in constant touch with your audience they are privy to what your customers are talking and hence are able to see these opportunities. They can find or suggest, novel ideas or current/popular trends which might help in growing or improving your business. 

Set your virtual assistant up for client care success

Some Quick tips for client care success:

  1. Be very clear with your customers about your hours of operations and what is a reasonable timeframe with in which they can expect a response to their queries.
  2. Provide clear guidelines to your virtual assistant to follow by creating a document that outlines your expectations and includes information on:
    • Where they can find answers to questions
    • Minimum assistance requirements
    • Some sample question types and acceptable answer suggestions
    • Guidelines on how you’d like them to greet your customers, response structures and when queries need to be escalated.
  3. Provide guidelines for your expectation of their interaction on social media on your behalf, including, monitoring of mentions of you or your business on social media.
  4. Set up a good Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software and make sure that your virtual assistant knows how to use it so they can maintain records of customer interactions which can be referred back to in the future if needed.

By improving your client care and support services, a Virtual assistant will help your business in maintaining consistency and reach its next level. As difficult as trusting the task of caring for your customers to someone else can be, it is essential, and might be your ticket to prosperity. Are you ready to outshine your competition?

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