Shepherding

A large part of customer service is shepherding. Customers often are unsure of what they actually want. They come to you expecting you to help them, to guide them to the answer or solution to their respective question or problem. The trick for those of us serving the customer is to not only help them with what they say they need but ascertain what they REALLY need and help with that too. If we fail to accomplish this, even if we help them with what they requested, they will not be fully satisfied with the interaction. I need to take a moment here and clarify, not every customer will have the underlying need that must be met. Sometimes a request is simply that. We must use wisdom to figure out when a question is simply a question and when it is not.

The simplest way I have found to discover the unspoken need is to ask questions and then actually LISTEN to the responses. Listening is probably the hardest customer service skill to master. If you are unsure what questions to ask just ask the first relevant, kind thing that comes to mind. With practice you'll quickly learn what questions to ask and when to ask them. Don't be afraid of the customer, most are very patient when they can tell that you are trying to help and that you care.

To tie this post in with its title I'll use a parable. Shepherds spend more time listening to their sheep than talking to them. When a lamb gets lost it will bleat for help. If the shepherd is listening to its lambs (the customers) it will hear their cries for help and come to the rescue. The sheep trusts the shepherd because it knows that he cares and is there to help. The same is true for our customers. If they know that we care and are there to help (which they learn by our listening and helping them solve what they REALLY need) they will trust us and will come back again and again. It's common "cents" really, and that's how we make our pennies.