Top 20 customer service training ideas

In this article, we'll look at 20 of the top customer service training ideas. We'll see why they are useful and also see how we can help train in those areas to improve the customer experience. So, let’s get started.

What is customer service training, and why is it important?

At its core, customer service training is about giving your team the tools and skills they need to assist customers effectively. It covers everything from communication techniques to problem-solving strategies, as well as a solid understanding of your products or services.

Because customer service training directly impacts customer satisfaction and loyalty, it’s extremely important to focus on these initiatives. A well-trained team can address issues quickly and efficiently, which makes customers happy. And happy customers? They tend to come back and suggest your business to others.

But, great customer service isn’t a skill everyone is born with. Like any other skill, practice with a good teacher focused on learning and development can help average customer service employees reach a whole new level. Let’s explore the many ways you can do that.

1. Start right away

The first idea to consider is that training should start as soon as possible. Any time wasted means potential customers interacting with customer service representatives who may not be operating at their full potential and may compromise the customer experience.

Of course, time should be spent to make sure you have an effective training regimen. But as soon as you feel ready enough, training should commence.

A quick way to get training up and running is through using a learning management system (LMS). One of the most popular LMS out there is SC Training (formerly EdApp). It’s also extremely intuitive and can have you create courses in minutes with its simple drag-and-drop interface. Using SC Training can launch your customer service training right away.

2. Icebreakers

Icebreakers are a great way to get people to know each other and become comfortable. This is almost an essential part of creating any training program or learning environment. With icebreakers, there can be an extended period of awkwardness between participants in the training.

An icebreaker activity involves some sort of simple learning activities or light-hearted interaction, such as playing the game Two Truths and a Lie or having participants survey each other.

With an LMS like SC Training, you can also get your trainees to engage in social interaction. That’s because SC Training has social features like Discussions and Assignments. There you can assign your trainees to engage with others to break the ice during online training.

3. Use technology

Another thing that your customer service programs need is to use the latest technology. Your younger customer service representatives may already be fluent in using various forms of technology, such as accomplishing an online course or task through mobile phones, but other workers may not be so proficient. Your technology should enable simpler, smarter training (not the other way around), making it easy for all team members to use.

Helping them to use technology when doing online training can allow them to maximize their learning experience. A mobile-first LMS, like SC Training, can also assist in this. That’s because it is designed to be adaptive to any screen size. That way, learners can do their online training and lessons on the go as easily as they can sitting at a computer.

4. Social media training

Many customers like to contact you through social media and are many of them also use social media to express customer satisfaction. However, there are new social media sites appearing all the time. Getting your customer service employees current with all the new social media sites and the norms associated with each takes special corporate training.

Having pre-built training courses that you can just plug into with your LMS can be very helpful in this situation. For example, the ready-made training course Social Media and Electronic Communication can be imported into your LMS and pushed to your learners within minutes.

5. Product demonstrations

Keeping track of all the products and services that your company offers can be a time-consuming process for customer service representatives. In today’s constantly changing world, it can be hard to keep up. Therefore, it’s important that representatives are shown product demonstrations so that they know what’s going on.

A good LMS will help you push out those product demonstrations easily to all the customer service reps that need them. This can be accomplished with microlearning. These are bite-sized lessons that can be pushed out at any time to educate employees on new products or services, perfect for corporate training.

6. Cross-team and intra-team collaboration

Cross-team and intra-team collaboration is another great idea for customer service training. This is also a form of social learning which can be effective because it increases motivation as well as puts learning into a different context.

This type of collaboration can lead to social and peer learning. This is where learners work together, like doing learning activities, to achieve a goal with some type of achievement. This can be a badge or a certificate. Working together with a group makes achieving the reward even more satisfying.

7. Role-play to understand the customer

Understanding the customer experience is something that can be helped through role-play. There are all sorts of different types of role-plays that can be done, such as role-playing angry customers, different types of telephone calls, or some sort of crisis that you can turn around to attain customer satisfaction.

An LMS like SC Training can help with this through more of its social learning options. Blended learning lets learning and development teams and trainers communicate over distances in real-time so they can engage in these sorts of activities.

8. Stress-reduction techniques

Since customer service workers can get tense from dealing with irate customers, another great idea to include in customer service training is stress-reduction techniques. This can involve teaching them techniques like taking deep breaths, getting away from their desks, or listening to music.

As with other ideas, you can freely steal content from the extensive course library at SC Training, such as using the training course called Managing Leadership Stress. Using these pre-built courses will lower your own stress as you have less to deal with when creating courses.

9. Quality assurance

Training can also be included for quality assurance. Some ideas for this include having your customer service representatives listen to or watch recorded customer service interactions and then offer their own assessments. This can help get perspective on what to do or not do in certain situations.

Quality assurance training programs can also be found in the editable course library of SC Training. The online course called Quality Control gives a good overview for learners about what it takes to ensure quality in an organization.

10. Offer additional learning opportunities

Another idea for customer service training that we will discuss in this article is about remembering to offer additional learning opportunities. This means that after their training is complete, they will not feel like they have reached the end of the road in regards to their learning opportunities.

As with many of the other customer service training activities listed here, there are numerous other courses available on SC Training that you can include in your training programs. Delivering an online course to further their knowledge and skills will ensure that your customer service trainees never run out of ways to improve.

11. Product quizzes

Customer service representatives must be able to answer inquiries that customers may have about the company’s products or services and is a key factor to customer satisfaction. You can assist your team to retain crucial information in their long-term memory by repeatedly assessing their expertise with product quizzes.

You can try using online quiz makers like SC Training’s, which allows you to create and deliver quizzes to help you reinforce learning. You’ll also have access to analytics, which can give you insight into your team’s knowledge gaps and help you understand their overall performance so learning and development can be adjusted. 

12. Five whys techniques

Another customer service training idea is teaching your employees about the five whys techniques. It works when a problem is identified with the idea of the root problem being identified by the time the final why is asked. After identifying the root problem, the countermeasure to fix this problem should be employed, which should fix the initial issue in theory. Teaching employees in your customer service team to quickly ask and answer these five questions should help with figuring out solutions promptly. 

This kind of activity can also be hosted on your LMS through a discussions and assignments feature, which opens up coach-based discussions and reflection. It would help if you did the five whys technique with your customer service team so that they can learn how to solve problems quickly and effectively on their own.

13. Include storytelling 

While frequently overlooked, storytelling is one of the most efficient learning activities to impart knowledge to your customer service representatives. By using anecdotal evidence and case studies, as well as transforming content into a relatable scenario, it’s easier for employees to recall a message or lesson. This is because stories give meaning to your data and information, which is much simpler to grasp and comprehend.

14. Spaced repetition learning

Applying the spaced repetition strategy can help your customer service reps learn, retain, and embed information in their long-term memory. Since lessons are distributed and retaken at increasing intervals, it encourages their brains to continue processing the information, rather than simply storing them in their memory and forgetting them later on.

15. Complaint handling activities

Unfortunately, not all calls will be easy and smooth-sailing— there will be customer calls that are quite challenging to handle. With this in mind, it might be worth considering implementing complaint handling exercises to build your team’s confidence and improve their skills.

For your corporate training, you can cover topics like frequent customer complaints, positive and assertive language, solution positioning, overcoming objections, and escalating customer issues to managers. This activity can also give be a great learning experience as employees get to learn from their managers and other senior members of the team.

16. Organize telephone customer interviews

This customer service training activity helps employees witness the experiences of the customers on a more personal note. Your customer service team can identify problems with products or services during client interviews, in addition to learning where customer service can be improved. Doing the telephone customer interviews as part of your training programs can also be beneficial for customers as they can feel appreciated while employees learn how they feel.

17. Translate your customer service training materials

It’s vital to translate your customer service learning materials, even more, if you’re working with remote employees all over the world. This is primarily because it eliminates the language barrier that inhibits your global workforce from learning. Allowing them to access their training course in their native tongue will make it easier for them to retain new information and apply it to their job function.

18. Offer crisis training

Crisis training can help prepare your customer service representatives for any possible problems they may encounter along the way. To give you an example, a company that has just released new keyboards finds itself facing hundreds of customer complaints regarding brand new keyboards that don’t work. Since this is a situation that they anticipated and trained for with their crisis communication plan, it is easier for the customer service team to handle these complaints and help the customers get their replacement units.

19. Secret Caller

Doing secret caller training can help identify common problems that go missed by customer service managers. This customer service training idea can highlight key areas that personnel need to be addressed. One key advantage of implementing secret caller training is your employees will be on their best behavior all the time, especially if they are aware that their managers will call them anytime. But on the other hand, this could also make them nervous and cause them to make mistakes. 

20. Reward top performers

Last but not least, reward your top performers. This customer service training idea can help boost their morale and motivate them to exert extra effort for their training. In fact, a recent survey found that affirmation, feedback, and rewards can encourage 37% of employees to improve even further their performance.

You can use SC Training’s Achievements feature to deliver certificates or customize banners and badges representing the achievements of your customer service reps.

Train your customer service teams with SC Training

In this article, we’ve explored several ideas for customer service training. The next step? Bring your ideas to life with SC Training.

SC Training is an excellent platform to boost your customer service training efforts. It allows you to create customized training modules that focus on the specific skills your team needs, such as communication and conflict resolution. Plus, with its mobile-first format, your employees can learn wherever they are, making it easy to fit training into their busy schedules without feeling overwhelmed.

Start delivering the best customer service training courses for your teams today! Get started with SC Training for free.