Subject areaProcess and organisation
Also known ascustomer servicecustomer support
Customer care is the set of activities through which a company looks after its customers along the whole relationship: it answers questions before the purchase, solves problems during use, and handles complaints and requests in after-sales.
It runs across different channels, from the phone to email, from chat to social media; when it happens on social networks it is called social customer care.
Its weight goes beyond the single reply. Inefficiencies often arise in the hand-offs between functions (marketing, sales, logistics, IT, customer care), and the customer lives them as one experience: for this reason customer care is one of the touchpoints that shape the customer experience and the choice to stay or leave.
An example
A bank customer reports on a social network a charge they do not recognise. Customer care replies publicly within the hour, moves the conversation to a private channel and closes the case: whoever reads the comment sees a problem solved, beyond a problem reported.
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Enrico Giubertoni. Licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0: you may quote, translate and adapt this entry with the author’s name and a link, stating any changes. For commercial use, write to info@enricogiubertoni.com
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