Ideas For Customer Service Week 2022

 

Customer Service Week is almost here!

Looking for fun ideas..?

Monday 3 until Friday 7 October is all about highlighting how important customer service is.

And giving some special attention to your CS employees.

Covid is still making our lives harder than we would like to.

A lot of service staff have been showing up every day for work since the start of the pandemic.

Show these employees some extra recognition!

Here are 7 ideas for customer service week:

 

 

1. Let employees make decisions they normally can’t make

In the day-to-day, many companies limit the decisions their CS staff can make.

What would be the impact on your customers if you changed that?

Give each representative a budget and some loose guidelines on how “far” they can go.

Perhaps Martin at the till gets the right moment to give something for free to a repeat customer.

Or Sharon can give a flash discount and get a smile from a happy customer in return.

Meanwhile, Tyrone sets up a surprise free delivery for the old lady that is always pushing her trolley down the lanes every Monday.

If the customer isn’t in the shop or supermarket during customer service week, have them send a surprise to their home. Or, prepare it and deliver it once they’re back in the store.

Do you have VIP customers? How would your team choose to prepare something special for them?

Or have your CS people take over your company’s social media account for a day if this is something they normally don’t do.

What messages would they choose to send? To whom? A great learning opportunity.

Another idea is to give your team 100 dollars and have them decide, together, how to best spend it.

The outcome might surprise you.

 

 

2. All-Staff meeting

Praise your staff loudly, but also follow up and show an action you’ve already taken.

Seeing is believing.

I.e. Announce that you prepared an envelope with a surprise at the end of the week for everyone on the customer service team!

Perhaps announce that the CEO will join 5 stores or call centers to work side by side this week?

Depending on the size of your company, it could be easier or harder to get top management to show up.

To create a great “us” feeling at your all-staff meeting, remote employees can join virtually in giving praise.

Recognition, celebrations, and rewards go a long way when made with good intentions.

You can also use pre-recorded videos from customers, showing their appreciation.

 

 

3. Swaaag

Buying gifts for your customer service team can be a bit of a hit and miss.

When you’re on a very low salary, or if you have a, hrm, not-optimal company culture, it sometimes backfires.

I.e. I would rather have the 4 dollars this cost than pretend I’m grateful for this plastic anti-stress thing I’ll never use.

I’m stressed because we’re chronically understaffed and you give me THIS??

Having said that, if you’re a bit in tune with your people, you probably know what they would appreciate.

If you’re a new manager, or just don’t know, you could ask 4 random people: “what do you think your coworkers would appreciate?”.

Have them think about the group, and a few ideas they think would fly with most on the team.

Should you hand out company uniforms?

It might sound obvious, but putting on a new company t-shirt feels a lot nicer than that washed-out version.

If you’re on a very tight budget, you could write a hand-written (personal!) thank you note for each worker to spice things up a bit.

Again, personal is key here. You’re not a robot and neither are they.

What is it that makes each employee a valuable person at your company?

Find a post-it and write it down.

 

 

4. Daily Food Bomb

Bring fun food surprises each day!

Do you have a corporate color? Use it when buying the food, to optimize employer branding.

Mix it up, do one surprise breakfast, follow up with a popcorn day, and another announced brown bag lunch.

And perhaps finish off with a massive cake on Friday, the last day of the Customer Service Week?

Or plan it for the day when upper management comes to work side by side in the call center.

Even better, have them prepare pancakes for your employees

You could also organize a Lunch Roulette for your team.

They could either go with staff from the same department or have them lunching with coworkers from other areas.

 

 

5. Thank you ideas

Have other departments write hand-written letters to your team.

It only takes 3 minutes! And can have a huge impact when done right.

If the colleagues from other departments are physically around, have them deliver it in person for the best impact.

If you randomly pair people up, it’s also a great way for people to meet a new colleague.

I.e. have Jennifer from the sales team deliver her note to Robert, the latest person to join as customer representative.

If your people are more confident with phones, have them record a short video message.

You can also provide categories like “the employee who always calms customers down”, or “the biggest helper” when a colleague is in need.

What would make YOUR employees feel extra appreciated this week?

(Apart from a bonus hehe.) Going home 30 minutes early one day?

Would it work if someone from another department offered to take over for 30 minutes so a fellow colleague could make it to their kid’s football practice?

Or a voucher for a future date?

Get creative!

 

 

6. Fun decorations

Our next idea is to turn your help desk into something fun during customer service week!

What do your people considering funny?

It’s important to get this (more or less) right, as you want to be in tune with your employees.

Are you organizing a team activity, contest, or party? If you have a theme, make sure the decorations follow suit.

Other tips include having a customer pick the decorations, or for customers to send thank you notes or thank you t-shirts.

Or involve local shops you usually go to?

Think about your circumstances and what fun angles you could use.

Stuck for ideas? Ask the first 2 people you meet after reading this.

 

 

7. Share stories

This is a low-budget activity - with a high impact to boost morale.

Have your people sit down to bond over some of the craziest, fun, and positive encounters they’ve had while at your company.

What were their learnings?

What tips do they have for fellow coworkers in your company?

Do they feel other departments are customer-centric enough?

How do they overcome “tricky” situations? Or unreasonable customers?

What helps them the best?

A great chance to learn from fellow coworkers or those with more experience in your business.

Have someone take notes, and think of something fun to do with these. Perhaps HR or Marketing would like to use this when looking for new employees and to improve employer branding.

You could also have a photo booth where you take pictures of your staff, perhaps holding a handwritten quote or similar.

If you’re using smiley feedback devices, take note of what made people press green or red as they finish their shift.

How could future “red button days” be avoided?

“People need to be encouraged to speak out. Even if what they say is not positive”, is one of the leadership learnings from the manager at Metzo.

 

 

 

FAQs

When is National Customer Service Week?

It’s celebrated the first full week in October. For 2022, that means from Monday 3rd through to Friday 7th October.

How do you celebrate Customer Service Week?

Some companies go all-in and spend a lot of money and resources to celebrate. Others keep it low-key or do what they can with the budget they have. The most important is to make sure that all employees who work with customer service feel extra appreciated. We recommend adding some extra fun to your workdays! More resources at the Institute of Customer Service and CSWeek.

What is the meaning of customer service week?

This international event is for customer-oriented organizations, no matter the industry. The idea was established by the ICSA, the International Customer Service Association. It’s all about celebrating and recognizing those working with customer service.

How many countries celebrate Customer Service Week?

Every year more and more companies join the festivities and highlight the importance of great customer service workers.
More than 60 countries participate every year. It was proclaimed a national event by the US Congress back in 1992 and has spread ever since.

 

 

Measure the impact of Customer Service Week

What impact will this week have on your Employee Mood KPI?

If you measure employee morale ongoing through devices like the Celpax, check the impact.

With daily data, you directly see how your employees react as you launch and execute the ideas above.

This data helps you build a use case to get more budget for employee wellbeing in your organization.

You can then crosscheck with customer satisfaction, etc.

 

What’s the impact of your leadership actions?

Validate progress.

 

Hej! I’m Rebecca, cofounder at Celpax. We manufacture simple tech tools to improve workplaces. And build a better society while at it. Let’s talk more ideas for customer service week on Linkedin?