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What if you cou{“type”:”inserter”,”blocks”:[{“clientId”:”3ee88701-000e-4e6f-9de6-b768835b5c32″,”name”:”core/image”,”isValid”:true,”attributes”:{“alt”:””},”innerBlocks”:[]}]}ld have better customer trust and loyalty directly at your fingertips? Email automation can help!
Businesses often spend many years trying to cultivate that trust and loyalty. Unfortunately, many businesses overlook the best way to achieve this goal. Crafting a quick response to every customer e-mail. Use hekadoc’s email automation functions to do this automatically!
E-mail promptness can save the day and really put your business (especially a local business) on the map. Still not convinced? Keep reading to discover our complete guide to why a quick e-mail response is so important.
Simple Courtesy
Schedule auto-reminders through email automation. Sometimes, the best reason to do something is also the simplest reason. And when it comes to why each customer e-mail needs a quick response, much of it comes down to simple courtesy.
All of us know how frustrating it can be when someone doesn’t respond to an e-mail. And pretty soon, you’ll be reading a lot of intent into that lack of response. You may think the other party is being rude, disrespectful, and dismissive.
This is bad enough when it comes to personal e-mails or intracompany e-mails. But when it comes to customers, they aren’t likely to wait forever for a response. Instead, they are likely to take their business to your competition!
Even if your e-mail is short and to the point (more on this later), quickly acknowledging customers is a way to show them courtesy and respect.
Clean Inbox
Let’s face it: sometimes, there is nothing more stressful than discovering how many unread e-mails are in your inbox.
If you’re not careful, these e-mails will just keep piling up. Not only will this hurt your productivity, but the sheer sight of your inbox numbers going up will just cause more stress by the day.
Long story short? You need to get in the habit of answering e-mails as soon as they come in. Customers are generally expecting shorter responses. An instant response won’t take much time to write. You’ll keep your customers happy while achieving every worker’s dream: an inbox with zero new messages!
Appearance of Reliability
When it comes to your business and your brand, it is no exaggeration to say that your reputation is everything. This is why companies pour millions of dollars into complex marketing campaigns. To build their brand and boost their reputation. But one of the best ways to build your reputation costs nothing. That is providing a quick response to every customer e-mail.
No matter how you respond and how much (or how little) you write. A quick response tells customers much about you and your business. It showcases that you are both prompt and reliable. Eventually, customers who notice your prompt customer service will view your business as very trustworthy.
And that trust didn’t come from an expensive marketing campaign. Instead, it all comes down to hitting the “send” button in a timely manner.
Increased Accountability
We have focused much on how a quick e-mail reply is beneficial to your customers. But it is also beneficial to you because it helps do what you might have thought impossible: it eliminates procrastination. Email automation can help remove that procrastination.
The essence of procrastination mostly comes down to those four little words: “I’ll do it later.” But when it comes to customer e-mails, doing it “later” is very dangerous. By that time, your reputation has already taken damage and the customer may have taken their business elsewhere.
However, imagine what happens after you send out a quick response such as, “Thank you for taking the time to write to us. I am going to look into your question and answer as soon as possible.”
The customer will be happy that you responded so quickly. But just as importantly, you have now made a promise to look into their problem. Instead of forgetting about the e-mail or their concern, you have ensured that solving their problem is now one of your immediate priorities for the day.
And just like that, you have defeated procrastination. A quick response helps increase your accountability and re-focus your priorities around improved customer service.
Buy Yourself Some Time
What is the main obstacle to writing out a quick response to each customer? In some cases, you might be worried about responding to customers who have complex questions or serious issues. And the reason is that it will take some time to craft the response they deserve.
But as we have noted, one of the best things about an instant response to consumer e-mails is that it can be short. And “short” doesn’t mean “definitive.” As our example above showed, you can simply thank the customer for writing and pledge to get back to them as soon as possible. Email automation can schedule these responses to happen automatically.
These kinds of short acknowledgment e-mails help the customer feel seen and heard. At the same time, the quick response effectively buys you some time to look into more complete responses to any customer questions and concerns.
Defusing Volatile Situations
Speaking of customer questions and concerns, here is a simple truth: your happiest and most satisfied customers are the least likely to send you an e-mail. Instead, you are far likelier to hear from customers who have had a negative experience.
Because of this, one of the main reasons to send a quick response to customers is to help defuse a volatile situation. On a very basic level, this strategy works because when a customer is already angry, making them wait a long time for a response will only make them angrier.
If you want to make sure your initial response sounds appropriately neutral and respectful, you may want to use an e-mail template and modify your response as need be. And template or no template, your e-mail should underscore your respect for the customer and your desire to solve their problem.
Ultimately, you may not be able to make everyone happy. But quickly responding to customer concerns with courtesy and respect is the cornerstone of high-quality customer service.
Quick Response to E-mails: What’s Next?
Now you know why a quick response to customer e-mails is so important. But do you know who can take your e-mail marketing to the next level?
We specialize in e-mail marketing, analytics, A/B testing, and much more. To see what we can do for your company, come learn more about our pricing plans today!
© 2021 – 2020, Chris Duncan. All rights reserved.
