How we talk to our clients
Communication is key. We experience that every day. This article explains why we use a light-footed tone in our communication, and why we sometimes need to be firm.
At Easy LMS, we admit, we are people pleasers. We are customer-centric. Or whatever you may call it. Our support team works hard to meet our clients’ expectations in the best possible way. We know, however, that doing support for long hours can be very stressful and that we cannot please everyone. So, we don’t try to please everyone. We know some clients will love us, while others won’t, and we accept it. The sun doesn’t shine every day. That’s life.
The approach is simple, and it leads to more clients that are a good fit for us and what we have to offer, and fewer clients that are not a good fit. The result is happier customers and employees. Our support team is not stressed and burnt out, and has more time to work on different projects for the company. So, how do we talk to our customers?
What is our tone of voice?
Our tone of voice is positive and fun. We use emojis in our emails and chat messages when talking to clients, and even in some of our more “serious” articles in the Knowledge Center. Why? First of all, have you noticed the Owls on our website? 😁 Many of our clients use Easy LMS for corporate training, usually a very “serious” environment with lots of deadlines, rules, and procedures. For other clients, using an LMS is an attempt to get organized with their training, perhaps already done in a disorganized way (sending PDFs, videos, and emails to employees).
We are professional, and we do take our customers, and our jobs, very seriously.
We don’t want to make your work life harder. We want to make it easier by trying to get the "boring" out of the "corporate" in every way we present ourselves as a brand and interact with you. We want to help you take yourself and your work life a bit less seriously. You might think that this is not “serious” enough, or that it diminishes our professionalism. It does not. We are professional, and we do take our customers, and our jobs, very seriously. We just choose to keep a lighthearted tone of voice.
How do we treat our clients?
We come from a place of friendly strength. What does that mean? It means we act as “friends” to our clients, but we come from a place of strength. We do our best to attend to their needs from the start, but we do not let them take control. We have fun with our clients. We send them emojis and GIFs when answering queries on the chat. We cry with them when something goes wrong. But as we say at Easy LMS, “we won’t be held hostage by our clients”.
We come from a place of friendly strength.
Steli Efti, in the book SaaS Sales for Startup Founders, talks about the risks of going from one extreme (being a "wolf") to the other (being a "lamb") when dealing with your customers. The wolf is rather aggressive when selling and wants to close the deal at any cost. The lamb is passive and operates with friendly weakness. Lambs attract wolf customers that no company wants to keep in the long run. Wolf customers are the main stressors for support and salespeople.
So, what is the middle ground we try to achieve? Being a “good parent”: giving clear instructions, saying what is possible and what is not, and leading with clarity. When something goes wrong, we don’t get overly apologetic. We own our mistakes and do whatever is possible to correct them, and then move on.
The customer is always right. Right or wrong?
"The customer is always right" is a slogan made popular by pioneering and successful retailers such as Harry Gordon Selfridge and Marshall Field to motivate service staff to give customer satisfaction a high priority. They advocated that customer complaints should be treated seriously so that customers do not feel cheated or deceived.
At Easy LMS, of course, we take our customers and their complaints seriously. Does that mean they are always right? No. Our customers can be right or wrong. We will listen to our customers’ needs and do our best to find solutions for them.
Our motto? “I can’t go for that” – Daryl Hall & John Oates:
I'll do anything
That you want me to do
Yeah, I'll do almost anything
That you want me too, ooh
Yeah
But I can’t go for that, no
No can do
What kind of user experience do we want to create for our customers?
The best possible user experience we can provide. From development to sales to support, what goes around comes around, full cycle. The input we collect from clients during demos and from support channels is used to improve our product. Our clients use the product and tell us what they want, or what needs to be improved, and we work on that. Don't believe it? Check out some of our reviews.
The input we collect from clients during demos and from support channels is used to improve our product.
Our approach to clients also helps our team: we remain motivated, and not unnecessarily burdened with clients’ complaints and aggressive behavior. That positiveness shines through in our interactions with clients, and so on. Happy employees are better able to develop long-term relationships with our clients, based on loyalty and trust.