Like PB&J: Customer Service as a Marketing Strategy

How to align customer service and marketing

It’s no secret that the COVID-19 pandemic changed how companies do business and affected customer service and marketing teams. Likewise, consumers have changed their purchasing habits. With many customers relying on online sales instead of in-person shopping, it’s more important than ever for businesses to deliver a stellar customer experience.

Aligning your customer support, marketing and sales teams with a customer-service-focused approach can help increase your profits. Here are five ways to achieve this goal.

Foster organization and communication.

For your customer service and marketing strategies to complement each other, there needs to be a consistent exchange of information between those teams. Marketing staff should conduct market research on customers’ needs and desires. The customer service team can then use these insights while fielding customer questions and concerns. Customer support representatives should have accurate promotional and product documentation on hand, courtesy of the marketing team.

Consider cross-training employees and including your marketers on support calls with customers. Take advantage of internal communication apps and the best CRM software to keep all departments informed in real time. That way, the customer service and marketing teams can coordinate their actions. 

For example, if a customer calls customer service with a question about a promotion, the answer may need a follow-up from marketing. Once the correct information is provided to the customer, a sales rep can see if the customer is still interested in making a purchase. 

When you have a centralized database that tracks customer relationships, all team members can see a customer’s journey and communicate along the way.

Stay competitive.

By coordinating marketing objectives, sales promotions and excellent customer service, you build trust with customers. Even though a client may be drawn to a competitor’s offer, they’ll likely be reluctant to change brands if they consistently have a positive experience with you. The better customer assistance they receive, the less likely they will defect to the competition. When the bonds between customers and brands are strong, your teams can even make a mistake or two and still keep the customer. 

Be sure to keep tabs on changes in the marketplace and your competitors so your customer service and marketing teams can make adjustments as necessary.

Harness the power of motivation.

When your customer service and marketing teams are correctly aligned, the positive outcomes will likely boost employee morale and motivate your staff. Hard work leads to happy customers, which leads to happy staffers who keep working hard. 

Use that motivation to encourage employees to keep delivering at a high level and continue working together to accomplish company goals. In addition to higher profits, you’ll see a positive sales culture and reduced turnover.

Redistribute your budget.

All businesses rely on marketing tactics to attract new customers and increase revenue, but you should consider spending your marketing dollars on strengthening relationships with your current customers. Clients with a satisfying customer experience are likely to make repeat purchases and tell their friends and family about your products and exceptional customer service.

Increasing word-of-mouth marketing and getting glowing customer reviews are two of the best ways to cut marketing costs. Instead of spending money on ad campaigns, you can reallocate it to improve customer service software, shipping processes and other aspects of your business. These expenditures benefit customers, and satisfied customers help the company in the long run.

Be transparent.

Your business must be transparent from the top down to keep departments focused on the company-wide goal of emphasizing the customer experience. All relevant teams should be updated on product launch dates, promotional details and the ideal customer personas. If you outsource customer service or use a marketing agency, include these partners in company updates. 

Transparency benefits your business by ensuring everyone is on the same page, which can reduce mistakes that could turn a customer away from your business. Transparency, customer retention and company sustainability are directly linked.

Chaela Krueger, marketing director at Brickyard Healthcare, agreed that transparency keeps customer service and marketing teams more connected. This can translate into valuable insights, such as customers’ preferred channels, which, in turn, aid both departments.

Benefits of implementing customer service objectives into your marketing strategy

When your business focuses on customer service as part of its marketing strategy, it benefits your bottom line. In fact, Salesforce reports that nearly 90 percent of customers say a good customer service experience makes them more likely to make another purchase. [See our Salesforce CRM review to learn how the platform can enhance your customer relationships.]

Here are some of the additional benefits your company can reap by aligning its customer service and marketing efforts. 

Competitive edge

Great customer service gives you a competitive edge because it encourages repeat business and referrals. Nelson James, co-founder of Signs.com and vice president of signs and banners at Digital Room, has experienced this firsthand.

“Customer service is a critical part of our marketing efforts at Signs.com,” he said. “We work hard to make sure we have incredible customer service that sets us apart from our competitors. In addition to our excellent products, our customer service is why people choose us in the first place and the main reason people keep coming back.” 

Good reviews

Delightful customer service could motivate someone to leave a positive online review, and a wealth of excellent reviews builds a business’s credibility.

“The majority of our customer reviews are based on how our customers are treated by our customer service team, and we pay close attention to what people say,” James said. “Good reviews help us establish trust and confidence with our customers. A positive experience with customer service creates loyal, happy customers that spread the word about our service, driving referrals.”

Smoother collaboration

Some businesses experience conflict between their sales and marketing teams. But if everyone has a unified goal of prioritizing customer service, collaboration will be easier. Your overall marketing strategy should encourage cross-departmental cooperation, and that’s precisely what you get when you integrate customer service into your marketing strategy.

“Making sure we have top-of-the-line customer service is one of our most important marketing efforts, and it yields serious results,” James said. “Good customer service gives us a unique selling proposition, repeat business, increased trust, branding and word of mouth. That sounds like excellent marketing to me.”

Stronger social media interactions

Companies today need a social media presence, but a skilled social media manager shouldn’t be focused solely on clicks and impressions. That’s because your business’s social media accounts need to be about more than advertising. 

If your marketing pros are also prepared to address customer service issues expressed via social media, you can build stronger customer relationships. You can use social media to improve customer retention just by listening and responding to posts about your company. Businesses that engage with their customers on social media boost their customer loyalty.

Deeper understanding

Developing customer personas is a key part of any marketing effort. But instead of making assumptions about your ideal customer, you can study customer experiences and purchase habits to learn who is buying from your business and why. You’ll gain a better understanding of your customers’ needs, interests and pain points. With that knowledge, you can create content and products that appeal to your target customers and sell from a more informed place.

Although data is an important tool for segmenting your best customers, it’s also vital to receive genuine feedback from people who are loyal to your brand. “It’s essential to provide a place where customers can submit feedback,” Krueger said, which is why her company recently launched a customer survey campaign.

How to improve your customer service efforts

Too often, businesses believe they’re providing fantastic support but are actually falling into customer service pitfalls that could eventually destroy their brand. Fortunately, companies can take these simple steps to improve their customer service efforts:

• Use business process management to streamline operations and increase efficiency so there is more time to focus on the customer experience.
• Offer only the products your customers need and want.
• Give customers access to digital purchasing tools for easy online buying.
• Be reliable, accommodating and respectful, and show genuine interest when you’re conversing with customers.
• Follow through with what you say you’ll do — with both employees and customers.
• Use social media as a customer service tool.
• Listen to what your customers say about your business online, and respond to praise and complaints using the right tone.

Customer service case study: How USAA sets the bar for success

USAA, which provides banking and insurance products for military members and their families, is consistently a leader in customer service. This is evident in a consumer survey by Verint, which, in a 2022 report, found that USAA had the highest customer satisfaction score and the highest Net Promoter Score among insurers. Both of these measurements indicate that the company excels at customer service and is more likely to be recommended by satisfied customers.

USAA’s success is attributed to its customer-centric model, in which it treats its users more like family than like paying customers. As a result, USAA’s products reflect what the company’s “family members” need in various life situations, instead of cookie-cutter insurance and financial products that could be found elsewhere. 

Behind the scenes, USAA emphasizes employee involvement to keep staff motivated and to ensure departments work cooperatively to provide customers the service they deserve. It’s a winning strategy.

Greg Shuey contributed to this article. Source interviews were conducted for a previous version.