Turn your Support Department into a profit generation machine

Too often Customer Service & Support is looked upon as a necessary evil, a department that costs money but isn’t tied to re venue generation or profit generation witin the business like say the Sales or Marketing Departments. The common thought is that Marketing brings the leads, Sales Closes them, Support, well supports them. This, unfortunately is outdated thinking. The boom of the Customer Service and Support was justified by the cost savings analysis that it was less expensive to keep an existing customer, than to spend on marketing and sales to win a new customer.

The Support function was always looked upon as a cost saving strategy, and customer retention strategy, rather than a growth strategy. But in today’s world, the consumer is much more savvy. They use the support department to their advantage. Whether you like it or not, the customer is constantly probing the Sales reps with the same questions they probe the Customer support rep, to see where they differ in their stories. Often times the first point of contact a prospective client has with your business is by calling support. Today, since Customer Service and Support is so accessible, they are used as a “staging ground” by prospective customers to test their negotiation skills and get inside information about the products, services, business, etc from someone who is not trained to answer the questions in the ‘right way’ before they engage Sales, as a way to get the inside track and gain an edge in the buying process.

Sadly, Support reps are rarely trained to answer Sales questions adequately and can drive away potential deals without even knowing they are doing it. Even worse, if a hot lead calls the Support dept and tells them they are hot, the only option for the support rep is to ‘pass it off to Sales’. Often times the support department knows how to answer the questions of the customer in a language that they understand, and can answer how to do things, but are rarely trained on what the business benefits are of your product and services.

In today’s world, all Support reps should be thought of as Sales reps as well. They are in support because they love helping the customer and they see how helping them with their support related issues help make their customers happy.

Is it that far of a stretch to think that if they had as part of their arsenal the business pain that is being addressed and what is the business benefit of implementing your product or service in this situation, that the Support rep would be able to do their jobs and better help the customer be successful? Not answering that question can cost your business a lot of sales, because if a rep is not trained but yet is put in the position of having to answer these types of questions for leads, then they will make up their own justifications for why, instead of having an informed understanding of how your product and services fit the needs of your customers.