Companies always struggle with the question of whether or not to have their customer service teams sell products and services.
On the one hand, they talk to consumers frequently, so the opportunity is there. Even if they made a sale on a small fraction of their customer interactions, the revenue would add up quickly.
On the other hand, they were not hired to be salespeople and customers are not usually contacting them to buy something.
The answer, as always, should be more about the customer than the company. Are there instances where a customer would benefit from a different or another product or service based on what the customer service person learns? If the answer is yes, then you are doing customers a disservice by not preparing service teams to fit them with the best solutions.
Now comes the harder question. How do you get service teams to pull this off successfully?
Focus on Problem Solving
Companies need to win over their customer service teams before they can have any success with upsell or cross-sell efforts.
The first step is to not call it “selling” in the first place.
To a lot of customer service people, selling means pushing something on a customer who didn’t ask for it. They didn’t sign up for that, and they’re not wrong to resist it. Most of them chose customer service over sales on purpose. They know their counterparts on the sales side probably make more money, and they are okay with that trade-off.
So when leadership hands them a script and calls it selling, you get exactly what you’d expect: a forced mention at the end of a call that the customer can feel coming from a mile away. It’s not productive at all. Both the employee and the customer walk away uncomfortable. Even if the customer had a good experience up to that point, their memory will be of the botched attempt to sell them something.
That is why customer service teams should operate with a simple rule. If a customer contacts them with an issue, they solve that issue first. Period. If they are not able to address what the customer needs, they should never introduce another product or service.
However, while they are helping the customer they are going to learn more about them. Many customers who contact customer service for one issue, reveal a different challenge that can be addressed with another product or service. If the service rep can successfully help address the original need, there is no reason they should not introduce other relevant offerings to the customer. Right-sizing or right-fitting the customer, whatever you want to call it, is part of delivering great service.
What should the service person do if they address the main issue, but don’t discover a relevant need for another product? Nothing! Thank the customer for their business and send them on their way. If there is no problem to solve, customer service people should be forced to pitch.
Start Small and Grow the Effort
Company leaders should recognize that it will take time for customer service teams to get comfortable with this approach. That is why it is best to keep it very simple at the beginning.
Focus on one or two products that are the most likely to come up with customers. Don’t expect them to learn a full portfolio and cross-sell a lot of products. Get them comfortable recognizing the opportunities and trying to make the transition before making it too complicated.
This also goes for goals. Adding a sales quota to your service team overnight can cause culture shock. We have seen teams suffer significant attrition across their service teams immediately after pushing a new sales agenda. Give them time to try the new approach and see what is working before turning up the pressure. Once the new behaviors become part of their routine, leadership can layer in some goals.
Customer service can and should generate revenue for your company. The key is to not treat them like salespeople. Keep things simple in the beginning and recognize that their skills, motivators, and routines are different from their commission-loving colleagues.
