More Typical Customer Contact Center Representative Competencies

More Typical Customer Contact Center Representative Competencies

In a previous blog article, I discussed crucial competencies call center and customer care More Typical Customer Contact Center Representative Competenciescenter applicants and employees must possess to be successful when interacting with customers. In this article, I share more typical customer contact center representative competencies. I do this because I believe that it is essential that call center/customer care center personnel have strong interpersonal communication skills, be organized, able to problem solve, and have a strong sense of the importance of their function as the “face” of the organization.

It is essential that call center/customer care center personnel have strong interpersonal communication skills, be organized, able to problem solve, and have a strong sense of the importance of their function as the “face” of the organization. The following are additional common competencies that employers look for in applicants desiring to work in a call center/customer care center. These are listed in alphabetical order and vary in importance depending on the organizational mission.

The following are additional common competencies that employers look for in applicants desiring to work in a call center/customer care center. These are listed in alphabetical order and vary in importance depending on the organizational mission.

Multitasking/Managing multiple priorities or assignments simultaneously. Ability to receive customer information via the telephone while inputting data on the computer.

Negotiating effectively. Ability to identify customer needs, wants and expectations and then meet them through the negotiation of appropriate alternatives, when necessary.

Organizational skills. Ability to assemble and maintain information and data using a logical system using software or hard files where it can be readily accessed by the employee and others.

Peer coaching. Ability to offer support and guidance to employees and others, when required or appropriate.

Problem-solving. Ability to identify a root cause for a problem or issue through effective questioning and application of appropriate interventions to address them.

Teaming. Ability to work with diverse employees and contribute to team tack accomplishment.

Technical literacy. Knowledge and ability to learn and use a common call center or customer contact center, and basic office software and equipment, to accomplish routine job tasks.

Time management. Ability to use time and resources to address assigned tasks and customer issues.

For additional call center/customer care center competencies, ideas, techniques and strategies for enhancing customer relationships, and information on ways to build solid interpersonal communication skills, check out How to Be a Great Call Center Representative. In this self-study course book, you will find hundreds of powerful ideas for improving knowledge and skills that can aid in meeting customer needs, wants and expectations and lead to greater customer satisfaction and retention. You also receive a certificate from the renowned American Management Association.

Typical Customer Contact Center Representative Competencies

Typical Customer Contact Center Representative Competencies

Typical Customer Contact Center Representative Competencies

To perform well in a call center/customer care center, employees must possess some very special competencies or capacities/abilities to perform required job tasks. Because of the specific requirements of the job, organizations must look for candidates possessing many of these typical customer contact representative competencies as possible. It is essential that call center/customer care center personnel have strong interpersonal communication skills, be organized, able to problem solve, and have a strong sense of the importance of their function as the “face” of the organization.

The following are some common competencies that employers look for in applicants desiring to work in a call center/customer care center. These are listed in alphabetical order and vary in importance depending on the organizational mission.

Business acumen. An understanding of the relationship between their jobs and how they impact the business and customers.

Contact management. Ability to control customer interaction once they contact the representative through a variety of assigned technology.

Change management. Ability to adapt to and handle changing situations and customer and business environments.

Conflict resolution. Ability to use effective interpersonal skills to resolve difficult customer-provider interactions.

Cross-selling. In environments where selling of products and services is a business focus, the ability to recognize potential customer needs and opportunities to sell or up-sell to customers.

Decision making. Ability to gather and analyze information, then apply appropriate interventions to resolve and issue or come to a decision.

Interpersonal communication. Ability to actively listen, question appropriately, provide feedback, and use customer communication skills to build and strengthen customer relationships.

Managing diversity. Cultural diversity knowledge and the ability to interact with a variety of people from various backgrounds in the workplace.

Managing stress. Ability to maintain a calm demeanor and mental state when situations and emotions escalate to higher levels when interacting with a customer.

For additional call center/customer care center competencies, ideas, techniques and strategies for enhancing customer relationships, and information on ways to build solid interpersonal communication skills, check out How to Be a Great Call Center Representative. In this self-study course book, you will find hundreds of powerful ideas for improving knowledge and skills that can aid in meeting customer needs, wants and expectations and lead to greater customer satisfaction and retention. You also receive a certificate from the renowned American Management Association.

Customer Service Skills for Success 6th by Robert W. Lucas Now Available

Customer Service Skills for Success 6th by Robert W. Lucas Now Available
Customer Service Skills for Success 6th by Robert W. Lucas Now Available

Customer Service Skills for Success 6th by Robert W. Lucas Now Available

The top-selling customer service textbook in the United States, Customer Service Skills for Success by Robert W. Lucas, is now in print from McGraw-Hill. This 6th edition includes a four-color layout with more images to enhance the content and a completely changed graphic appearance.

In the book, readers will find real-world customer service issues and provides a variety of updated resources, activities, and examples for customer service representatives at different levels in an organization. It also includes tips from the author and other active professionals in the industry designed to gain and hold readers’ interest while providing additional insights into the concepts and skills related to customer service that is found throughout the book.

The text begins with a macro view of what customer service involves today and provides projections for the future of the customer service profession, then focuses on specific customer service skills and related topics.

Here’s what readers will find inside the book:

Part One – The Profession

  • The Customer Service Profession
  • Contributing to the Service Culture

Part Two – Skills for Success

  • Verbal Communication Skills
  • Nonverbal Communication Skills
  • Listening Skills

Part Three – Building and Maintaining Relationships

  • Customer Service and Behavior
  • Service Breakdowns and Service Recovery
  • Customer Service in a Diverse World
  • Customer Service via Technology’
  • Encouraging Customer Loyalty

This book answers everything from “What is Customer Service?” to “How do I handle a variety of diverse customers in various customer service situations?”.

To gain thousands of ideas, strategies and customer service tips for interacting successfully with internal and external customers in any type of customer service environment and deliver excellent customer service, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success 6th edition.

Why Internet Sales Revenue Continues to Climb over five years

 Why Internet Sales Revenue Continues to Climb over Five YearsInternet Sales Revenue Continues to Climb from 2012-2017

Ever since customers discovered the value and savings in time, effort and money from using the Internet to shop for products and services, the world has not been the same.

Revenue generated from electronic commerce (eCommerce) continues its upward climb each year. According to eMarketer.com (April 2013), U.S. eCommerce sales are expected to almost double between 2012 and 2017, going from 225.5 billion t0  434.2 billion in revenue by 2017.

This type of volume justifies business owners and others with products and services to sell on the Internet and through other eCommerce sources to invest in training employees how to effectively deliver the best possible customer service through technology.

For ideas and strategies on how to effectively deliver stellar customer service using technology, get copies of Customer Service Skills for Success and How to Be  Great Call Center Representative.

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills.

Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Bob Lucas B.S., M.A., M.A, CPLP is the principal in Robert W. Lucas Enterprises, Inc and an internationally-known author; learning and performance professionals. He has written and contributed to numerous books on the subject of customer service skill training.

He regularly conducts workshops on creative training, train-the-trainer, customer service, interpersonal communication, and management,
and supervisory skills.

Learn more about Bob and his organization at www.robertwlucas.com and follow his blogs at www.robertwlucas.com/wordpress,
www.customerserviceskillsbook.com, and www.thecreativetrainer.com. Like Bob at www.facebook.com/robertwlucasenterprises

Black Friday Stats Show a Huge Success

Black Friday Stats Show a Huge Success

Each year, online and brick and mortar retailers strive to increase sales and revenues generated around the period of Thanksgiving and Black Friday. This year was no exception, with many companies offering pre-Black Friday deals followed by Cyber Monday opportunities to attract customers and generate sales, customers were treated to an extended period of sales bargains.

Black Friday Stats Show 2013 Was a Huge Success

According to a Vancouver, Canada-based company (Wishpond Technologies Ltd.- a local shopping platform that connects online consumers with local merchants through the web, mobile, social media and partner platforms), 2013 was a huge success.

Here are some Black Friday statistics that the company shared through a presentation on the website Slideshare:

  • $12.3 billion was the overall brick-and-mortar store sales for Thanksgiving  and Black Friday 2013 – up 2.3% from 2012 (source: CNN Money)
  • $1.964 billion was the overall online sales for Thanksgiving and Black Friday  – up over 18.5% from 2012 (source: TechCrunch)
  • The average 2013 Black Friday online order was $135.27 – that’s up 2.2%  year-over-year (source: TechCrunch)
  • Black Friday online mentions peaked at 11 am CST (source: Forbes)
  • Walmart dominated in Black Friday mentions, with 77.5% of the voice (source:  Forbes)
  • But… 4 to 1 those Walmart mentions were negative (with words like “fight”  “fought” and “fighting”) (source: Forbes)
  • Pinterest vs. Facebook 7 Pinterest dominates in direct sales. Referrals from  the site spent 77% more than those from Facebook: $92.51 – average Pinterest  order $52.30 – average Facebook order (source: Forbes)
  • Pinterest vs. Facebook 8 But… Facebook referrals converted sales at nearly  4x’s the rate of Pinterest (source: TechCrunch)
  • Mobile traffic: Grew to 39.7% of all online traffic – that’s an increase of  34% over Black Friday 2012 (source: TechCrunch)
  • Mobile sales: reached 21.8% of total online sales – that’s an increase of  nearly 43% from last year (source: TechCrunch)
  • 24.9% of all online traffic on Black Friday came from smartphones – that  compares to tablets at 14.2% (source: TechCrunch)
  • How do you pay? PayPal reported a 121% increase in global mobile payments compared to Black Friday 2012 (source: TechCrunch).

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills.

Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Bob Lucas B.S., M.A., M.A, CPLP is the principal in Robert W. Lucas Enterprises, Inc and an internationally-known author; learning and performance professionals. He has written and contributed to numerous books on the subject of customer service skill training.

He regularly conducts workshops on creative training, train-the-trainer, customer service, interpersonal communication, and management,
and supervisory skills.

Learn more about Bob and his organization at www.robertwlucas.com and follow his blogs at www.robertwlucas.com/wordpress,
www.customerserviceskillsbook.com, and www.thecreativetrainer.com. Like Bob at www.facebook.com/robertwlucasenterprises

The Role of Technology in Customer Service

The Role of Technology in Customer Service

The Role of Technology in Customer Service

One thing is sure in today’s global economy; Internet marketing and sales are major components of a global and personal wealth strategy.

Research conducted by McKinsey and Company “…into the Internet economies of the G-8 nations as well as Brazil, China, India, South Korea, and Sweden finds that the web accounts for a significant and growing portion of global GDP. Indeed, if measured as a sector, Internet-related consumption and expenditure are now bigger than agriculture or energy. On average, the Internet contributes 3.4 percent to GDP in the 13 countries covered by the research.”

Further, “The United States is the largest player in the global Internet supply ecosystem, capturing more than 30 percent of global Internet revenues and more than 40 percent of net income.

Source: Internet matters: The Net’s sweeping impact on growth, jobs, and prosperity Internet matters: The Net’s sweeping impact on growth, jobs, and prosperity, Pélissié
du Rausas, M., Manyika, J., Hazan, E., Bughin, J., Chui, M., and Said, R.. McKinsey Global Institute.

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

The key to successfully making money as an author and/or self-publisher is to brand yourself and your company and to make yourself and your book(s) a household name. Part of this is face-to-face interaction with people at trade shows, library events, book readings, book store signings, blogging or guest blogging on a topic related to their book(s). Another strategy involves writing articles and other materials that show up online and are found when people search for a given topic related to a topic about which the author has written.

If you need help building an author platform, branding yourself and your book(s) or generating recognition for what you do, Make Money Writing Books will help. Bob’s popular book addresses a multitude of ideas and strategies that you can use to help sell more books and create residual and passive income streams. The tips outlined in the book are focused to help authors but apply to virtually any professional trying to increase personal and product recognition and visibility.

Technology Is Rapidly Changing the Face of Customer Service

Technology Is Rapidly Changing the Face of Customer Service

Customer service is changing rapidly as technology encroaches on the traditional world of retail marketing and sales.  Customer and brand loyalty are quickly becoming a thing of the past as many customers search for the finest quality at the cheapest price through technology.  As all this occurs, new knowledge and skills related to the capabilities and operation of various forms of computer, Internet, cloud and mobile technology are being required of customer service representatives and others in their organizations.

Technology Is Rapidly Changing the Face of Customer ServiceTo give an insight into this phenomenon, think about the fact that virtually every aspect of our lives is now impacted by some form of technology. People around the world are now part of a 24/7/365 society, meaning that many have to technology 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and can communicate at any time and in virtually from any place.

Ecommerce now dominates the retail industry. According to the website Internet World Stats, there are over 7 billion people worldwide in 233 countries and regions in 2012. Of that number almost two and one-half billion now use the Internet.  Further, the International Telecommunication Union reported that in February 2013 there were 6.8 billion mobile phone subscribers around the globe (over 96% of the worldwide population).  Mobithinking (www.mobithinking.com) reports that at the end of 2012, there were over 321 million mobile subscribers in the United States alone.

Through all this technology, consumers spend billions of dollars each year. For example, eMarketer reported in January 2013 that consumers spent nearly 25 billion dollars on orders placed through mobile technology (e.g. phones and tablets) alone. This does not include travel services and tickets purchased.  Technology sales are catching up with retail sales.

According to Adobe Digital Marketing Blog, the digital sales on Black Friday in 2012 reached approximately 1.3 billion dollars.  Some sources estimate that $1 in every $4 dollars spent on merchandise is now through technology. These numbers do not take into consideration the sales of online retailers from other countries.

To find out about products and services, many people turn to the Internet to do their research. In many cases, they are now using bookstores and other retail sources to browse potential products, and then order via technology. And why wouldn’t they when giants like Amazon and Wal-Mart are deeply discounting and in many instances offering free shipping.

Entire industries are changing as a result of this worldwide trend. An example is the publishing industry, which has virtually reinvented itself to stay competitive and meet the rapidly changing needs, wants and expectations of a global customer base. One of the biggest factors causing this change is the evolution of eBooks and electronic readers. Book prices are spiraling downwards as more people read on a technology-based device. Amazon now sells more eBooks than they do print versions.

As a service provider, if you are not staying abreast of these changes, gearing up with training and education to develop and maintain knowledge and skills, you may soon find yourself outsourced.

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

The key to successfully making money as an author and/or self-publisher is to brand yourself and your company and to make yourself and your book(s) a household name. Part of this is face-to-face interaction with people at trade shows, library events, book readings, book store signings, blogging or guest blogging on a topic related to their book(s). Another strategy involves writing articles and other materials that show up online and are found when people search for a given topic related to a topic about which the author has written.

If you need help building an author platform, branding yourself and your book(s) or generating recognition for what you do, Make Money Writing Books will help. Bob’s popular book addresses a multitude of ideas and strategies that you can use to help sell more books and create residual and passive income streams. The tips outlined in the book are focused to help authors but apply to virtually any professional trying to increase personal and product recognition and visibility.

Quote on Change – Charles Darwin

Quote on Change – Charles Darwin

Change is constant in the world. This is especially true in the customer service profession. Recent decades have seen the advent of computerized and technology-based service delivery, shifts in economies, an evolving diverse customer population and many other factors that have required service providers and organizations to adapt.

Some organizations and individuals have made the transition fairly well intact, while others have fallen by the wayside.

Charles Darwin summed the situation up when he said:

Quote on Change - Charles Darwin

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives,

nor the most intelligent,

but the one most responsive to change.”

Charles Darwin

Who was Charles Darwin?

Charles Robert Darwin was born on February 12, 1809, in The Mount House, Shrewsbury, United Kingdom. He was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist.  he received his formal education from Christ’s College in Cambridge. Charles Darwin was best known for his contributions to the science of evolution.  During his lifetime he received many awards including Copley Medal, Royal Medal, and Wollaston Medal.  His proposition that led to these awards was that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestors and are now widely accepted and considered a foundational concept in science.  He past away on April 19, 1882, at his home called the Down House in Downe, United Kingdom.

Here are a few more quotes from Charles Darwin…

  • “A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.” – Charles Darwin
  • “Animals, whom we have made our slaves, we do not like to consider our equal.”
  • “Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.” – Charles Darwin
  • “Man tends to increase at a greater rate than his means of subsistence.” – Charles Darwin
  • “The very essence of instinct is that it’s followed independently of reason.”
  • “A man’s friendships are one of the best measures of his worth.” – Charles Darwin
  • “At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace the savage races throughout the world.”
  • “I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection.”
  • “My mind seems to have become a kind of machine for grinding general laws out of large collections of facts.”
  • “To kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes even better than, the establishing of a new truth or fact.” – Charles Darwin
  • “A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motives – of approving of some and disapproving of others.”
  • “It is a cursed evil to any man to become as absorbed in any subject as I am in mine.” – Charles Darwin
  • “On the ordinary view of each species having been independently created, we gain no scientific explanation.”
  • “How paramount the future is to the present when one is surrounded by children.” – Charles Darwin
  • “I love fools’ experiments. I am always making them.”
  • “The highest possible stage in moral culture is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.” – Charles Darwin
  • “We must, however, acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities… still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.”
  • “I am turned into a sort of machine for observing facts and grinding out conclusions.”
  • “If the misery of the poor be caused not by the laws of nature, but by our institutions, great is our sin.” – Charles Darwin

Learn about Robert C. Lucas, a customer service guru, and award-winning author…

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

The key to successfully making money as an author and/or self-publisher is to brand yourself and your company and to make yourself and your book(s) a household name. Part of this is face-to-face interaction with people at trade shows, library events, book readings, book store signings, blogging or guest blogging on a topic related to their book(s). Another strategy involves writing articles and other materials that show up online and are found when people search for a given topic related to a topic about which the author has written.

If you need help building an author platform, branding yourself and your book(s) or generating recognition for what you do, Make Money Writing Books will help. Bob’s popular book addresses a multitude of ideas and strategies that you can use to help sell more books and create residual and passive income streams. The tips outlined in the book are focused to help authors but apply to virtually any professional trying to increase personal and product recognition and visibility.

In my book Customer Service Skills for Success, I define customer service as “the ability of knowledgeable, capable, and enthusiastic employees to deliver products and services to their internal and external customers in a manner that satisfies identified and unidentified needs and ultimately results in positive word-of-mouth publicity and return business.”

U.S. House passes federal ‘customer service’ bill

U.S. House passes federal ‘customer service’ bill

The House approved legislation that aims to improve “customer service” across federal agencies.  U.S. House passes federal 'customer service' billThe House passed the bill, the Government Customer Service Improvement Act (H.R. 1660), by unanimous consent on July 31. According to the bill’s sponsors, the legislation will build on existing performance management frameworks to track service delivery across the government and speed up service. The bill now heads to the Senate.

“Just like the private sector strives to provide excellent customer service to bring in business, the federal government should embed better service to bring efficiency,” said Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), who co-sponsored the bill with Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas). “I have a strong belief that we owe our taxpayers more than delays and service breakdowns – we owe them an effective, efficient, and responsible government because, ultimately, the government is in the business of customer service.”

The bill would require the Office of Management and Budget to develop baseline customer service standards that agencies must use to improve response times for citizen inquires to federal agencies, and to modernize processes to bolster the efficiency of customer service. Agencies also would have to work with OMB to create a system that allows customers to provide feedback.

The legislation also calls for the creation of a two-year pilot program under which federal process improvement experts would work with agencies that fail to meet the new service standards.

Additionally, the bill would the Office of Personnel Management to provide more detailed monitoring and reporting on the ongoing backlog for retirement claims and other benefits, as well as present regular updates on OPM’s retirement systems modernization project.

SOURCE: http://federaldaily.com/articles/2013/08/01/house-passes-federal-customer-service-bill.aspx

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

The key to successfully making money as an author and/or self-publisher is to brand yourself and your company and to make yourself and your book(s) a household name. Part of this is face-to-face interaction with people at trade shows, library events, book readings, book store signings, blogging or guest blogging on a topic related to their book(s). Another strategy involves writing articles and other materials that show up online and are found when people search for a given topic related to a topic about which the author has written.

If you need help building an author platform, branding yourself and your book(s) or generating recognition for what you do, Make Money Writing Books will help. Bob’s popular book addresses a multitude of ideas and strategies that you can use to help sell more books and create residual and passive income streams. The tips outlined in the book are focused to help authors but apply to virtually any professional trying to increase personal and product recognition and visibility.

Effectively Taking Telephone Messages

Effectively Taking Telephone Messages

Have you ever called a business only to have the person on the other end of the phone stumble through information gathering when trying to take a message for someone else? If so, you are not alone. It often seems that companies are not investing in basic customer service skills training anymore.  After all, how hard is it to ask someone for their name and other pertinent information, write that down and give the message to the appropriate person. Apparently very hard for many customer service representatives and employees in many organizations.

Effectively Taking Telephone Messages

If you ever find yourself in the situation where you are on the receiving end of a customer’s call and need to capture information professionally, the following is a “cheat sheet” of essential things you should get and record. At a minimum, when you take a message you should get this information from a caller when you answer a phone for someone else. This will aid you in providing the best customer service possible

  • Name (correctly spelled—ask the caller for spelling and do not assume you know how they spell it. For example, my last name is spelled LUCAS. There is a nursery in town spelled LUKAS).
  • The caller’s company name.
  • Phone number (with area code and country code, if appropriate).
  • Brief message (why they are calling and what they expect to happen next).
  • When the call should be returned.
  • Time and date of the call and your name (in case a question about the message arises).

Many office supply stores sell pre-printed phone message pads to help guide message takers.

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

The key to successfully making money as an author and/or self-publisher is to brand yourself and your company and to make yourself and your book(s) a household name. Part of this is face-to-face interaction with people at trade shows, library events, book readings, book store signings, blogging or guest blogging on a topic related to their book(s). Another strategy involves writing articles and other materials that show up online and are found when people search for a given topic related to a topic about which the author has written.

If you need help building an author platform, branding yourself and your book(s) or generating recognition for what you do, Make Money Writing Books will help. Bob’s popular book addresses a multitude of ideas and strategies that you can use to help sell more books and create residual and passive income streams. The tips outlined in the book are focused to help authors but apply to virtually any professional trying to increase personal and product recognition and visibility.

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