Five Reasons to Bridge the Gap Between Sales and Customer Care
- The Orange Stack
- Oct 16, 2018
- 3 min read
Sales and customer care are often at odds because each department tends to think the other does something completely different from what they do. This perceived disparity in role and function creates a moat between both departments that prevents the flow of information and expertise. However, when considered deeply, each department plays a complementary role to the other, much as they may not see it. Consider what a sales agent does: they work hard to help the customer see how the product or service will meet their need while a customer care agent does the exact thing, only that they are doing so to keep the customer using the product or service. To delve deeper into this, we look at five areas where collaboration between both departments can foster synergies that help the business grow.
Sales Kicks Off Everything
Sales plays an important role in that the customer relationship with the company starts with them. In a way, they are the first touch a customer has with a company. This provides valuable insights into how the customer was onboarded and what expectations the customer had when signing up. For customer care, such insights can prove valuable as it would help them understand how to deal with each customer. While this may not work for high volume sales, it can work great in real estate where the number of clients is not exceptionally high relative to customer care agents.
Customer Care Know Customers
While sales may know clients before the sale, customer care knows clients after the sale. As the department interacts with customers daily, they understand the needs and expectations of customers in a deeper and meaningful way. Channeling this information to sales would help sales better anticipate questions customers may have and respond to them in a meaningful way. This would create a sales process that does not just try to drive sales, but one that is centered on providing solutions to customers.
Customer Care Can Help Build Transparency
Sales are often pegged on doing whatever it takes to close the sale. This often means salespeople may not always be transparent when discussing with clients. Customer care, on the other hand, tends to offer greater transparency as they are dealing with customers who are already using the product or service. By pairing a salesperson with a customer care agent, sales can offer greater transparency into how the solution will work and to what extent it will meet the customer’s needs.
Everyone Should Focus on Customer Care
While sales may feel as though it is not their role to keep customers happy, the reality is, a happy customer is a customer who keeps buying. What this means is that everyone in the organization must be focused on customer care regardless of the department they are in. For sales, this means treating prospective customers in the same way they would treat customers. Although they may not have signed up yet, it is sale’s duty to ensure they have a great experience with the company.
Information Sharing Builds a Stronger Organization
Finally, information is power. Therefore, keeping information in separate buckets does more harm to an organization than good. If you consider the wealth of information both sales and customer care have on customers, it is every company’s imperative to ensure this information is shared seamlessly between departments. Moreover, in a rapidly digitizing world, this sort of information can help generate a single view of customers, helping build more compelling narratives by which to capture and maintain customers.
Conclusion
Sales and customer care are two sides of the same coin. The roles they play are complementary to each other and as such, can provide an opportunity for an organization to develop new competencies that outpace the competition. By focusing on bringing these two departments into synergy, customers too will appreciate the added capabilities that arise.
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