How Electricians Can Use Tonality on Phone to Connect With Customers
Customer Service in 2018 has been rerouted to emails and chat. But it is important to remember that phone calls are an important part of your business and customer service.
In the electrical industry, you have got to make an initial phone call to the customer before the job is scheduled to start. I believe that the initial phone call should be for achieving connection above everything else. You have got to make a solid, strong, and positive first impression so that the customer knows that you are enthusiastic about completing their job efficiently and effectively.
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To showcase your understanding as well as interest, you can ask relevant questions to the customer. If they are calling regarding a power cut, you can ask your customer, “Can you go into the rooms and tell me whether there is power there or not?”
You can also go technical with the questions and ask detailed questions like, “Is this regarding an external or internal wall? If there is no cavity on an internal wall, you might need to repaint the wall. Is that all? Happy to talk about it.”
When you ask such relevant questions, what you are effectively doing is extending the phone call. All this while you are also engaging the customer to interact with. Make sure to be light-hearted and make the whole conversation only about your customer, what they need to get done, how they want it done, and when they want it done.
Auditory senses are on a high-alert when you are talking to someone on phone. So you have to make sure that you are not monotonous. To come across as cheerful, energetic, and positive, you have to have variations. We tend to listen to people who speak enthusiastically.
You can also change the tone of your voice to be more colourful and expressive. Extend and accentuate your words where needed, make sure that there is positive voice modulation such that it goes up and down because:
“It is not WHAT you say, but HOW you say it.”
In a Huffington Post article titled, “How to win your customer’s heart through a phone call,” it is suggested that you --
Prepare before you make the call. -- Do not make a hurried or an unscheduled phone call. Have a context before you make the phone call.
Practice active listening. -- Listen thoroughly to what your customer has to say and make mental notes.
Build and strengthen customer relationships. -- Lighten the mood and build a strong foundation of the customer relationship.
Keep it simple. Do not get too technical in your explanations. -- Make sure that the customer understands the urgency of the task. That’s it. Do not go into the nitty-gritty of things.
Be expressive and use gestures which will translate to positivity in your voice, too. -- Positivity goes a long way. And when you are expressive over the phone you come across as a warm person.
Stay positive and before you end the call, summarise it in one line to make sure you and your customer are on the same page.
If it comes down to discussing the price on the phone, you can tell your customer: “I hear what you are saying but we need to do this, which requires a lot of labour and it is time-consuming. We are offering you a very competitive price. We will do a good job because we have done it so many times before.” Thus you can end the call by giving a good explanation that addresses your customer’s concerns but no need to go into the details.
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