Why Is Frontline Support Important to Drive Sales?

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You may think that customers are the backbone of your business, and you’d be right. But you’re forgetting the frontline support, the people who make your customers satisfied with their purchases.

These people are called frontline support workers and are responsible for maintaining brand image, answering customer queries, and managing all issues related to customer satisfaction.

Without these valuable workers, your business couldn’t maintain its brand equity. But if frontline workers are so important, can anyone be a frontline support worker, or can people with training in customer service only act as frontline workers?

In this post, we’ll understand the role of frontline support workers, realize why they are essential to your company, and who can become a frontline worker.

 

Who Are Frontline Support Workers?

Frontline support refers to the support agents of your customer service department that customers get in direct contact with. These agents are a tremendous asset to any company, representing your whole organization in real-time.

They allow your brand to retain customers, reduce churn, maintain equity, and ensure return on investment (ROI).

 

What Are the Responsibilities of Frontline Support Workers?

Frontline support workers have a lot of responsibility on their shoulders, including:

  • They Act as Brand Representatives

Frontline workers need to give customers a good impression of the company and be knowledgeable in all possible company domains.

As a result, they must be generalists and have a broad understanding of the company’s products and related problems, queries, and general procedures.

  • They Answer Customer Queries

Frontline workers answer customers contacting the company’s help desk for any complaints. Moreover, these support agents also screen questions before transferring them to other departments if needed.

  • They Collect Customer Information and Feedback

Frontline support agents convey relevant customer information to the concerned departments. They are also responsible for getting customer feedback.

 

The Importance of Frontline Support

Frontline support is the backbone of good customer service in any company. Good customer support sets you apart from your competition in a cutthroat market.

When one-third of the consumers say that they would consider switching companies because of one bad customer service experience, and 39% say they will avoid a company for two years after a bad customer service experience, the need for frontline support becomes evident.

However, frontline support workers usually do not get the due recognition or support they require from their companies. Many frontline staff is present in a company, and often, they are left alone to deal with the wide range of customers on their own.

According to Harvard Business School’s report, 43% of the companies are not empowering their support workers with adequate tools for their business needs, and only 7% of organizations shared that they do have some tools for their customer services practices.

So, how do companies ensure that they support their frontline support staff and that the rich communication resource that the support workers handle is not just ignored or forgotten when it comes to company growth and bettering customer relations?

The answer is bringing the experience of frontline support work to everyone within the company. Rotating out this role for a limited time to everyone has massive benefits for the company’s ideology towards customer support, ensuring everyone is on the same page about the company’s vision.

 

Why Should Every Employee Have Frontline Support Experience?

There are several reasons why every employee in your company should have frontline support experience, including:

  • It Allows Brands to Provide Better Customer Service

A huge plus of letting all employees serve in customer service at some point is the improvement in the customer service department.

Dedicated frontline workers have traditionally been carrying the weight of providing excellent customer support. Still, this support can be enhanced through the knowledge and different perspectives of employees from other departments.

A product engineer, for example, could go beyond the customer service script and “how-to guides” and provide more in-depth solutions to possible customers’ problems and confusions.

  • It Helps Brands to Gain Invaluable Insights

Another advantage of having workers from different departments working on the frontline support is closing the customer gap, allowing the employees to connect with the users.

These connections lead to real-life learning and invaluable feedback to the company. For example, a marketing officer will learn more about the nuances of selling the product to the customers if they are given a chance to deal with customer queries.

Similarly, engineers can learn what customers want from their products and directly use these insights to make upgrades in the product roadmaps.

  • It Makes Customer Support More Efficient

In customer service and all other departments, we know that routine procedures can become traditions, even obsolete ones, leaving no room for innovation.

So, having different people with various skill sets work as frontline support helps new and improved methods emerge.

This change can come from product developers improving solution guides to marketers enhancing the call script to attract customers in a better way.

  • It Aids Brands in Recognizing the Importance of Frontline Workers

Another unmatched advantage of having all employees try frontline support work is its impact on the company culture. The frontline workers get the recognition and respect that they deserve.

All departments come to appreciate customer services and, in the future, be more mindful of what the frontline workers require from them.

 

The Takeaway

Frontline support is crucial for any business, as it allows them to gain valuable insights, quickly satisfy customer complaints and queries, and realize which customer pain points to target.

But when everyone in the company undergoes a temporary frontline customer service experience, the insights gained from customer-company interaction aren’t just limited to the CS sphere.

Engineers can gain insights that make their designs better suited to the market, marketers realize the customer pain points they need to target to drive brand equity, and customers get all their technical queries answered.

So, ultimately, having all workers try frontline support drives the company forward from all angles.

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