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Now more than ever, consumers are shopping digitally using various channels to buy everything from groceries to movie theatre tickets.  This trend has been accelerating since 2012 and continues to gain momentum while simultaneously creating a conundrum for some organizations on how to provide a human touch in customer care on the internet highway.

People are passionate about where they shop—online and brick and mortar; live chat is quickly becoming the main source for providing customer service and those who are not on point are likely to experience customer attrition.

It’s rarely a perfect science, but finding the right balance of giving a personal touch online and being too desperate for sales is more critical now than ever.  Here are a few ways to offer amazing customer experiences to online consumers:

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If you are experiencing customer attrition, take a look at how you treat your employees.

The key to making employees feel appreciated starts at the top.  Executive management must be accessible and show that they genuinely care about their employees – treating them the same as the company’s most valued customers.  Tapping into the employee’s creativity and allowing them to express it freely –and respectfully– is a step in a positive direction.

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For far too long, a lot of people have touted the notion that providing excellent customer service is easy and commonsensical.  It’s no big deal and simple to do.

When played by professionals, a game of darts looks effortless, solid and relaxed.  To the untrained eye, seemingly, all one has to do is throw a dart at a target, hit the board and if you’re lucky, the dart will land in the bullseye (but no big deal if you miss, you just earn fewer points).   Seasoned dart players will tell anyone that darts is a game of skill that requires constant practice; it is considered a game of marksmanship.

No.  Providing outstanding customer service is not easy.  Just like with the game of darts, customer care requires having a basic grip on knowing your customers’ wants and needs, maintaining a sturdy stance on customer philosophy (not policy) and having an inimitable technique to win the game of customer satisfaction.

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Picture it…you just walked out of a meeting that has you fuming and you HAVE to get the anger off of your chest. You send a scathing, colorful email message to a colleague that describes the pure ineptness of management and question how they successfully make it through a complete day without play-by-play instructions to ensure they don’t self-destruct. After hitting the “send” key, you suddenly realize you sent the message—to your boss—and there it is, that dreadful sinking feeling of despair and helplessness. You know there is no way to retrieve the message.  NOW what do you do?

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“A highly engaged workforce means the difference between a company that outperforms its competitors and one that fails to grow.” ~ Gallup Poll Executive

Ask any company executive or entrepreneur if customer retention is important to the growth of their organization and they will probably give you a stare that shouts, “Of course it is!”.  The truth is, many organizations focus so keenly on getting NEW customers that they lose sight on how to effectively keep the ones they already have.

If you think that customer retention is insignificant to the health of your business, take a look at what the experts say: