What you say to customers matters — as does when you say it.
No one likes to wait, but customers with a problem or a question have even less patience.
Yet that’s what’s happening to consumers nationwide, according to a recent study by Eptica, a company that specializes in software to improve customer interaction. Eptica asked 500 U.S. retailers 10 routine questions, then checked to see how long it took the companies to respond.
The results? “Staggeringly disappointing,” said Shep Hyken, a customer service expert and author of the New York Times bestseller, “The Amazement Revolution,” who addressed the epidemic of delayed response times in a recent blog post.
Here are a few stats from the Eptica study:
- For email, the average response time was 7 hours and 51 minutes.
- For Facebook, the average response time was one day, 3 hours and 7 minutes.
- For Twitter, the average response time was one day, 7 hours and 12 minutes.
Eptica also polled 1,000 consumers to find out how long they are willing to wait for a response from companies — and it’s nowhere close to the above figures:
- 77% of consumers won’t wait more than six hours for an email response.
- 85% of consumers using Facebook expect an answer within six hours.
- 64% of consumers using Twitter expect a response within an hour.
Delayed responses can be dangerous because they invite the customer to stew.
“Maybe all I have is a simple question,” Hyken said. “I’m not even upset or angry. But, due to the frustration of having to wait hours — or even a day or more — for a response, my simple question becomes a customer service debacle.”
Moral of the story: Douse a flame before it turns into a fire! Always have someone on your staff scanning your social media accounts and inbox for customer questions. If your customer service manager is out for the day, have a substitute fill in!
For a snapshot of the Eptica study, check out this infographic.
