A lot has been said about customer success and how it differs from customer support.
Both terms share a variety of goals and skill sets. However, you’ll find that they implement clearly different approaches on close observation.
So, what exactly differentiates these terms from either one? Well, let’s look at the definitions.
What is customer support?
The needs of customers in today’s business world have evolved from where they used to be. Customer support services are aimed at resolving and educating customers on product-related issues in a timely and empathetic manner.
The professionals in charge of this are usually deeply knowledgeable about the product and are also known for their deep care and interest in the customers they serve. They help customers find answers to problems and relay common challenges to the product team.
What is customer success?
Customer success services are aimed at improving the lifetime value of customers. These teams work closely with customers to get a better understanding of their business goals with a view to helping them find success with the product.
As you can see, both teams have the same goal of helping clients get amazingly satisfying experiences. But there are still a few differences as we’ll see below.
Customer Success vs Customer Support
A close look at the definitions will open your eyes to the underlying differences.
While customer support teams have to receive queries they have to respond to, customer success teams go all out to discuss and strategize.
The objectives also differ as are the approaches. Support teams hope to resolve client issues while the customer success teams have to focus on helping clients achieve the needed outcomes throughout the customer journey.
The metrics have stark differences as well. Support teams are measured on metrics like the quality of service provided, customer satisfaction, and resolution times. The customer success team deals with different metrics like customer retention and overall lifetime value, etc.
Both of these roles require professionals with a vivid understanding of the customer, resourcefulness, and empathy. Both roles, however, require different skills and discipline.
Customer support spans engineering, marketing, and the operations team while customer success teams are usually more consultative and diverse.
And then, customer support should be more of a business feature since customers will always have issues that need urgent resolutions. Customer success, on the other hand, is more of value-added service to help boost expansion, as well as business revenue and growth.
Customer Support and Customer Success Should Work Together
Although each team assumes different responsibilities and sets out to achieve different goals, they both hope to cover important areas that will create beautiful experiences for your customers in the end.
It is therefore important to group both teams together to synergistically achieve more success. Rather than field both teams as different departments, both roles are better being in a single team where they will be able to function better.
This will even be of immense benefit to your customers as they’ll feel everyone operates right from the same team. It can also be very helpful in enhancing customer trust and loyalty in your brand from the first impression down to the last interaction.
Through all the similarities and differences, efficient customer support and customer success teams will help create many happy moments for your customers. In today’s business world, you’ll need this either to stay in business or to give you an edge to successfully compete with competitors.
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One Contact Center helps businesses and organizations boost their capability with call center and customer support services. We’ve been helping businesses building support services to make it possible to deliver quality customer experiences. Even though it may seem a hard thing to do, it is a worthwhile process. You can reach out to us if you’ll need our help in helping you restructure or set up an effective customer support structure.
Wondering how we could bring more value to your business? Contact us today! We’ll be more than happy to help.
