Ask customer care providers what they do and they'll list dozens of tasks from answering the phone, taking orders, building relationships, paperwork, to resolving issues and problems. These are certainly, critical aspects of any customer care positions. But if we boil the job down to its bare essentials, one definition I've always preferred is "Professional Communicator.”
Customer care providers spend almost their entire day having conversations with external and internal customers. They're communicators, pure and simple. They need to get information, process that information and then disperse information. They need to ensure they understand and are understood. Communication is a way to convey emotion, urgency, empathy, and appreciation.
Communication (verbal) is a complicated mix of actively listening for intent, understanding needs, connecting (problem solving) those needs to the company's products and services, and relaying information in a way that the customer can understand and appreciate. It's a combination of body language, tonality, and spoken words. We commonly see people who believe the words are the largest piece of their message, but the words we use are only 7% of the entire message. The tonality or how we say the words (the pitch, loud, soft, slow or fast) is 38% of communication, and our body language is 55%. Therefore, in communications, we need to ensure our words and tone are sending the message we want to be received.
Things are a little bit different on the telephone because of a lack of body language. In this situation, our words are 18% of the message, where the tonality in which we speak those words makes up 82%. A good customer care provider can also pick up on the tone and body language being used by the customer to help better understand what the customer is really saying (or needs.)
It's safe to say that being an effective communicator requires many skills and consistent (listening) practice.
If you want to be a good customer care provider, understand where your communication blind spots, or gaps, and work on constant improvement to your communication skills every day.
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