How technology can enable better customer service

Competition between Leisure Facilities is becoming increasingly difficult as the lines between facilities become blurred and consumer demands increase.

Being more accustomed to instant gratification, customers demand instant accessibility and a personalised experience now more than ever, and on a shoe string budget. Put simply, customers want more, for less, and they want it now.

This creates pressure from customer service team members who must deal with a large volume of repetitive requests from customers during peak hours, who expect immediate answers.

Technology is the answer

Smarter facilities are quickly realising that to maintain a level of customer service whilst also keeping costs low, technology is the answer. It is rapidly becoming the difference between the clubs that are exceeding in all areas of customers service, expectations and experience, and the clubs that are not.

Technology is becoming the fail safe to customer service representatives who are not always able to be available when needed. But more than that, technology offers the ability to free up team members to actually increase the warmth and receptiveness of the clubs through face to face interaction!

Have you ever been to a facility where a queue is so long that the customer service representative feels overwhelmed and rushes to get through each customer as quickly as possible? These situations are not uncommon, and a solution is needed to relieve pressure from your team members, but also to reduce customer annoyance.

Imagine if customers did not have to queue up to find out the price to a class or to purchase a membership, or book into a class. This would free up the staff to focus on the day-to-day operations of the business and restore some warmth in the club!

Technology enables centers in peak traffic to deal with customer’s queries more efficiently if members can be educated about such technologies as online membership portals. These portals empower customers  so that your team members are able to spend more time with the customers who have unique questions and require more attention, thereby providing better customer service.

By enabling customers the convenience of easy access to information and empowering them to do things without being reliant on staff, queues are shortened, customers are less frustrated and your staff are freed up.

Online Customer Portal features

One particular technology from Links Modular Solutions that enables this specifically is the Links Online Customer Portal powered by Active Carrot. Some of the features include:

The Links Online Customer Portal is fully modular, so you control which features you would like your customers to have access to.

It is also able to be customised to suit your existing website, retaining your brand across the board and seamlessly becoming part of your company’s online experience.

Benefits of Online Customer Portal

Some of the added benefits include:

The future is in the Cloud

Technology will never fully replace your customer service team members, but it is a vital tool for your business that helps your team members and empowers your customers like never before.