Why is it important to be Friendly?
It’s in our human nature that we build trust, loyalty, and a positive relationship with people who are nice to us. And the same applies in the commercial world too. Customers make their purchasing decisions based on how they feel – and we are much more likely to buy from friendly people! Friendliness should not be under-estimated. It’s crucial that customer facing staff recognise and understand how to deliver a Friendly service experience.
How to define ‘Friendly’
The dictionary definition for Friendly is ‘Behaving in a kind and pleasant way’. But what, specifically, does this mean? HOW do you behave in a kind and pleasant way? WHAT do you have to do?
Tips for delivering a Friendly customer service
At Performance in People (PiP), we’ve defined ‘Friendly’ as a behaviour ‘Instantly likeable, due to their facial expressions, voice tonality, body language and humour’. We’ve analysed 1000’s of customer experiences (recorded through the use of mystery shopping), and populated a set of characteristics that contribute to delivering a ‘Friendly’ service, including:
- Welcoming greeting
- Smiled throughout
- Thanked the customer
- Sincere close/farewell
- Made general conversation/small talk
- Empathised with the customer
- Complimented the customer
Delivering a ‘Friendly’ customer service shouldn’t be difficult – and that’s why we’ve broken it down and simplified it into a specific characteristic library. It’s easy to win the customer over with friendliness! It can influence the customers purchase decisions, their likelihood to recommend to others, and crucially… return to buy again!
Friendly – a behaviour within the award-winning BMS® methodology
PiP has developed an objective way of measuring the impact of behaviours on customer experience. The Behavioural Measurement Score (BMS®) is proven to link directly to improvements in independent CSS, voice of the customer and NPS measures. It analyses the 6 key behaviours that impact most on the customers’ experience: Friendly, Enthusiastic, Professional, Interested, Attentive and Helpful.
The methodology is used by 100+ UK organisations, providing valuable benchmarking data to understand their specific areas of behavioural performance and how they compare within and outside of their industry.
At the UK Customer Experience Awards, BMS® was crowned the winner for the ‘UK’s Best Customer Experience Measurement’. It also received an award for ‘Best Customer Experience Innovation’ and is now recognised as “the science behind delivering a great customer experience”.
Contact us to find out more about how our BMS® methodology can help improved your customer service!
