Customer Service Etiquette: What To Say and What To Avoid

By Tony Yeung — Originally Published at Apartment Number 2 “Customer Service Etiquette: What To Say and What To Avoid”

Many companies offer the same products or services. It is important to make your customer satisfied when they do business with you and interact with your brand.

So, good customer service is important. It can give you the edge over your competition.

In this article, I will provide some idea customer service etiquette, and I will provide some phrases that you should say and you should avoid.

Customer Service Etiquette (1): The Basic Rules

Many customers say that friendly customer service reps can keep them using the company’s product or service. Consequently, the customers would likely switch the brand because they have a bad experience with rude or unhelpful customer service agents.

So, you need to understand some basic etiquette when interacting with your customer.

• Always think before you speak or type
• Begin and end every encounter on a positive note
• Address your clients by their name
• Keep your customers informed
• Treat the customers with respect and empathy
• Learn how to handle angry customers
• Stay professional no matter what
• Make the customers feel valued and appreciated
• Say Thank You and Please graciously
• Follow up if necessary

Customer Service Etiquette (2): What to Say and What to Avoid

Choices of words is very important. The customers can get a very bad impression when the customer service agents use certain phrases.

For example:

• Phrases to avoid: “Sorry about that:”; instead to say: “My apologies.”
• You should not say: “I don’t know”; what to say: “I may not know now, but I will find out for you.”
• Phrases to avoid: “Unfortunately no”; you should tell the customer: “I’m sorry, that’s not something that we can offer. However, what we can offer is ____.”
• Phrases to avoid: “Please calm down.”; what to say: “I can understand why you’d feel that way. Let’s see what we can do now.”
• Phrases to avoid: “No problem”; what to say: “You’re welcome”

Here is the infographic of some customer service etiquette tips:

So do you have other etiquettes to share?

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About the Author

Tony Yeung is a digital marketing specialist and the owner of Apartment Number 2, a consultancy focused on helping entrepreneurs and marketers see results with SEO, social media, and content marketing. Apartment Number 2 has worked with a range of clients from Publishing Company and Medical Company to a new startups.