We trade our best products and services to lure in customers to do business with us. They get great products and in exchange, we get their hard-earn cash. But when should we consider a customer, a customer? And when should we start managing their perception of our business?

Traditionally, we would consider someone who has purchased our products as a customer. If someone is browsing or still considering a purchase, that would fall under the realm of marketing and sales. In terms of customer relationship management, we would provide customer support. Customer support is for people who brought our products and found a problem which needs additional services. As a business, we provide a set of practices and procedures that assist customers after a sale.

Call center agents exist in most companies. They are the agents who handle incoming or outgoing customer calls within a business. They are the ones helping customers deal with locked bank accounts, setting up a speaker system, or finding that reset button on a device. Call center agents manage customer relationships by identifying needs, answering questions, solving problems, and building trust. They also up-sell products, get feedback, and gain insight directly from the customer.

Each instance a customer calls in is a critical interpersonal communication touchpoint between a customer and a business. One lousy customer call support experience might be the difference between a loyal customer for years to come or losing one.

We can all agree that call center agents are essential to keeping customers happy and vital to the success of any business. A small communication breakdown during a call is not just a one-star review. In the long-term, bad customer call support may hurt a business’ brand and bottom line.

What is currently in your company’s remote customer support toolbox? Perhaps you have invested in a software solution like Zendesk but have yet to explore beyond its basic features. Or, you have a Facebook page but no dedicated team members monitoring inquiries on the platform. Expensive resources are being wasted and support requests are going unseen. In response, your customer satisfaction scores are starting to drop and returns are piling up. To meet customers’ expectations for speed, efficiency, and quality, service teams need to have more than just phone and email.

In this article, we will discuss the four must-have remote customer support tools businesses need to satisfy customers in 2022.

“Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now?” Does anyone remember this Verizon commercial from the 2000s? While the intent of the video was to show that Verizon had wide cellular coverage across the United States, it makes me think about the painful experiences I’ve had when I had no idea what my friends or family were trying to tell me.

Now imagine they’re asking you for help with their computer, except they’re not tech-savvy and their computer won’t turn on. What do you do?