How to improve customer experience during peak season
It happens all the time: you have a shop that runs smoothly, your customers are satisfied and can make their purchases or services without any problems. But, all of a sudden, there is a peak of activity that turns everything into chaos. So, how do you prevent your clients from getting frustrated when they go to your shop? In this article, we tell you how you can improve customer experience when you face seasons of high demand for your services.
What is Customer Experience?
Customer experience (CX) is the way in which a company relates to its customers, with the intention of building customer loyalty through appropriate customer service. This not only applies to traditional customer service, it also involves other aspects, such as marketing, sales channels and each of the phases of the customer journey.
The customer’s experience will determine the degree of satisfaction with the brand and, therefore, the brand’s chances of being trusted again. Therefore, businesses and organisations must ensure that their customers’ experience is the best possible.
What to take into account during peak season
Good CX should be present at all times, but it is particularly important at times when demand is at its highest. For example, at Christmas or during sale season, the customer experience may deteriorate if the shop has not been able to adapt to this increase in activity. During peak season, there are several aspects to take into account when interacting with our users:
- Growing queues: one of the direct consequences of the increase in demand is higher customer flows and, therefore, the waiting time your clients have to experience in order to be attended to.
- Possible lack of stock: if you have a product that is in high demand, it is possible you might find yourself with a shortage of it during peak season. This is something you need to anticipate in order to be able to prevent a possible stock shortage.
- Lack of staff: if you have a large inflow, not only will queues increase, but it may also happen that your current staff is not sufficient to meet the demand.
5 ways to improve your customer experience during peak periods
Now that you know the problems you may face during high demand seasons, here are 5 tips to avoid your customer experience from suffering.
Efficient queue management
As the most direct consequence of an increase in demand is higher inflows of customers to your shop, the best way to avoid customer despair is to have an optimised queue manager. For this, a software for handling queues can be the ideal solution: not only will you be able to control the lines that form in your establishment, but you will also be able to optimise the time of your employees.
Staff reinforcement
If the number of customers increases, you may need to reinforce your staff during these seasons. This will prevent queues from becoming endless by having more staff to serve your customers.
In addition, the reinforcement of staff can not only be directed towards the customer service during the purchasing process, but also focused in helping the user to find what they are looking for, or to reinforce the logistics and post-sales team.
Appointment booking systems
If you already know the peak times for your business, you can prepare for the surge of customers by booking appointments. For example, a photography studio might have to deal with a large number of people in April and May, due to the arrival of communions. In this case, the studio can set up an appointment system to control the inflow of people to its business, thus avoiding work overload.
Personalised experiences
Although this is not something that should be limited to peak seasons, personalised experiences for your customers can be a great way to make their visit more enjoyable. You can offer them discounts on products or services they have already purchased in the past, and offer them a special price for a specific date. For example, a spa session for two for Valentine’s Day.
Conclusion
Peak demand seasons are often a test for businesses, as this is where they stake their reputation in the eyes of customers. You may have potential customers coming to your shop for the first time in one of these seasons, so it is important to make a good impression on them.
Also, remember that customer loyalty and customer experience does not end when the purchase has already been made: monitor customer satisfaction to know what aspects you need to improve and, above all, offer discounts or special promotions for those who want to come back to your business.
In short, the busiest times of the year can be a challenge for businesses, so having a well-structured customer experience will help them to trust the brand again.
