What customer service strategies should you be employing to keep your customers happy? 

In this guide, we'll cover customer strategies. Customer enablement is a customer retention strategy that helps your customer get the most out of their relationship with you. 

It's about helping them use what they've bought from you - and giving them the right tools, information, or support to do so successfully. 

The customer success manager role has become increasingly important in recent years as more companies focus on customer retention over acquisition. Find out how it works, why it matters and who can do it!

It is about giving your customer the right tools to get the most out of your product or service, and use it successfully. And this starts with their very first interaction - on-boarding. 

Getting new customers up and running quickly can be a make-or break moment for many businesses; but only if the customer has all the information they need. 

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When you're implementing customer strategies, here are some of the best practices to follow:

- Set up a customer success team that works together with sales and marketing teams to ensure your customers get off on the right foot - literally - from day one.

- Ensure new signups have access to customer success managers, who can help them get started and answer any questions they might have.

- During the sales process, make sure your customer success team is involved in providing information on how products work and what customer behavior should look like (this way you know there won't be a lag time while waiting for feedback from customers).

What enablement really comes down to is customer success. Providing customer support and customer service that goes beyond just answering questions, but also keeping customers satisfied and engaged over the long-term. 

Tools like help documentation and online training can be very beneficial for customer engagement - as well as your bottom line!

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Customer Success Enablement: What It Is & What It Involves

Customer success enablement is customer success through the customer's eyes. This means it isn't just about help documentation or training materials that your customer can access when they need them - although these are certainly an important part of enablement! 

You should also be thinking about how you can provide tools to allow customers to solve problems for themselves. This might involve things like customer communities, forums and chatbots - but it goes further than this.

It is about providing your customer with the right tools so they can help themselves when they need to. 

Giving them access to customer support teams who are available to answer questions or guide them through a process without having to wait for an email response or pick up the phone. 

It's customer success through customer success enablement, not just customer support - and it can have a huge impact on your business's bottom line!

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Who Can Do It?

It isn't easy to do well. You'll need someone with good communication skills who understands how customers think, as well as customer support or customer success skills. 

You'll also need the right tools to provide enablement - which is where Gainsight, our Customer Success Platform , comes in! 

Our platform allows you to deliver enablement that works for your business; whether it's through help documentation and training materials (like video tutorials), community forums, self-service customer portals, live chat or even automated customer success processes.

It is key to customer satisfaction and retention - it's all about empowering your customers so they can succeed with you! 

It requires good communication skills as well as the right tools; but if you're looking for an easy way to implement strategies into your business, enable customer success with Gainsight, The Customer Success Platform.

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A successful approach necessitates open communication throughout the organisation.

Client success enablement necessitates open communication not only within a business, but also with clients. 

It is not only necessary to conduct research and study customer behaviours in order to comprehend your client base, but it is also necessary to speak with clients and ask them questions. 

Finally, teams and organisations must keep up with the latest trends and technologies in order to provide adequate enablement. Falling behind could have serious, negative ramifications for the organisation.

Clients may see out-of-dateness as an indication that the company does not comprehend current trends or does not care to make an update if an organisation does not upgrade its technology to compete with other companies. 

You can combat this by forming a team that monitors trends and ensures that everyone in the firm is up to date.

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How should businesses implement these best practises and ensure client success?

Making a training programme for your teams is a fantastic place to start. Training representatives to understand and predict client behaviour benefits not only the teams, but also the clients. 

Representatives should also be thoroughly educated in communicating with clients during this training. 

Not only does knowing what to say and when to say it help with effective communication, but it also helps to know when and how to listen effectively. Listening to customers is a critical component of customer empowerment.

Asking your consumers is the simplest approach to learn exactly what they want. Make a note of the details so you'll be ready for your consumers in the future. 

Collaboration and knowledge exchange can also help to improve communication within the firm. Sharing knowledge across departments can also help each team, as well as the entire organisation, stay current. 

Different points of view can bring to light difficulties that were previously unnoticed. This enables for better streamlining and upgrades in each area, ensuring customer success enablement.

BEST PRACTICES

Now that you know the basics of customer enablement, let’s take a look at how to make the most of your program.

Turn Customers into Champions

Customers are a company's secret weapon: they can persuade even the most doubtful buyers to acquire your product through advocacy and influence. As a result, it's critical that you turn your customers into brand ambassadors.

Begin by grouping your consumers according to who is most likely to advocate for your firm and how much they are willing to do so. 

Create opportunities for each faction to interact with prospects and leaders by tailoring your advocacy approach, then empowering them with direction and resources and rewarding them for their efforts. You'll have clients selling your stuff for you before you know it.

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Users Should Be Informed

Is your product being used efficiently by your customers? If you market a cutting-edge solution, you might expect a steep learning curve. Educate your consumers on how to use your solution efficiently to ensure that they accept it successfully.

Many companies have achieved success by providing training courses and certifications for product mastery. 

If you don't have the resources to launch anything as large, make a series of "How-To" videos and publish them to YouTube, or simply share tips and tricks on social media. 

Your consumers will be grateful for the assistance and will be able to master your solution in no time.

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Competitive Analysis and Benchmarking

If your customer enablement program is not working, you need to know why. This requires a clear understanding of the customer experience journey from beginning to end. 

To get there, you'll need customer feedback; ask for it directly on social media or through surveys that are sent out via email (make sure customer privacy is a priority).

 Once you have the customer feedback, it's time to find an expert on your team who can analyse and distill trends from data.

A customer enablement program should be constantly evolving. Use customer input to help determine which areas need improvement so that you can adapt accordingly. 

Regularly monitor customer satisfaction scores and any other customer feedback to identify opportunities.

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Expand Your Network

Customer success depends on community - social groups allow your purchasers to connect with one another and share best practises, grievances, and other information.

Create a sense of community by sponsoring networking events, forums, or social media groups where your consumers may have genuine dialogues. 

Keep a close check on community customer sentiment - the good, the terrible, and the ugly. This will disclose not just where you are performing well, but also where you may have potential for improvement, helping you to develop a better product over time.

Provide Exceptional Support

When a consumer encounters an issue with your product, they want a quick and simple remedy. Your customer care and support personnel will be critical in ensuring that issues are fixed swiftly and that consumers remain satisfied.

Concentrate on developing a dependable and useful support service. Whether you provide replies via Twitter or have a global team addressing issues around the clock, empathy is the most crucial component of customer service. 

Every interaction, no matter how minor, should be treated as if it were a personal issue for your consumer.

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Incorporate Customer Feedback

Finally, consider how customer feedback may be incorporated into your product strategy. Your clients use your product every day, even if you are selling it. Their day-to-day experiences may reveal flaws you wouldn't have noticed otherwise.

Your product team will benefit from a customer enablement engine that captures and prioritises suggestions. You can ensure that your solution efficiently fulfils your clients' needs — and assures their success — by working closely with them during the development process.

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Look for Brand Ambassadors.

Your finest customers have the power to persuade even the most adamant customers to conduct business with you through influence and advocacy. 

Begin by dividing your clients into two groups: those who are likely to become brand evangelists and those who will take a backseat. 

Customize your advocacy techniques for the former group to provide opportunities for them to interact with potential prospects.

Then start providing them with the necessary guidance and resources. Make sure you reward them on schedule, as this is very important. You'll soon find a slew of these kind of customers that are eager to offer your stuff.

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Accept Customer Suggestions

Your product roadmap may have flaws that can only be discovered through valuable consumer input. As a result, seek ways to incorporate consumer feedback into your services on a regular basis. 

It's important to remember that your customers are the ones that utilise your goods on a daily basis. Their day-to-day interactions with your product can reveal a lot more potential than you previously realised. 

The value of a customer's feedback, whether positive or negative, is immeasurable. That's where a good enablement engine comes in handy for capturing those ideas and implementing them as needed.

As a result, working closely with your clients to develop your product will most likely suit their wants and ultimately satisfy them more.

You are, in a sense, investing in your future when you invest in your clients. While your future is in your consumers' hands, all you can do is endeavour to provide them with better and larger customer experiences.

Aside from that, making a pleasant customer experience a part of your company's culture is another method to emphasise a successful plan. 

Make sure that all of your departments are on the same page and that everything goes smoothly. You have a potential to develop powerful customer success enablement over time if you use these outlined best practises.