Customer service has become an increasingly relevant component of your online marketing. 

Addressing and resolving your customer’s issues in real-time is something that can make or break your business, especially now that customers’ demands have become increasingly competitive. 

However, in this post, we’re discussing the Customer Service Paradox, which is a concept that allows us to understand customer service from a completely different angle.

Want to learn all about it? Let’s dive right into it!

What is the Customer Service Paradox

The customer service paradox is a paradoxical scenario whereby the customers who have experienced challenges in the customer journey but have still been able to overcome them thanks to the support of customer service, end up developing a stronger loyalty to the brand over time.

Let’s imagine a simple scenario. You go online, you make a purchase, you wait for its delivery, you get your package, you like your purchase, that’s it, the end. 

In this case, even though the experience was seamless, it did not really build much of an experiential component. You had essentially no connection to the brand at all, aside from clicking and buying an item on the website.

If someone asked you about the shopping experience, you would say it was a happy one, but there is no story behind it. Everything went smoothly and that’s that. 

Let’s look at a different scenario. You order a dress for an important event, there seems to be a delay preventing you from getting your dress by the day you need it. A crisis hits!

You contact customer service, and you’re upset, the late delivery makes the purchase pointless. You are very concerned that the product will not get to your doorstep in time. Customer service, however, stands up to the challenge, quickly traces the package, contacts the shipping company, and gets them to deliver the package on time. Also, customer service provides you with a discount code for your future purchase.

In this second instance, you experienced a few challenges with the delivery, but customer service was able to help and save the day.

From one end, it could be argued that these issues should be avoided altogether, but the fact is that facing this challenge gave you an opportunity to engage with the brand in a more meaningful and memorable way.

If someone asked you about the experience, in this second case you’d have a lot to say, as the story lends itself to be told and retold. 

This is somewhat paradoxical, but it does shed light on the value of customer service.

Let’s discuss some of the insights we can draw from this concept in the next section of our post.

What Does the Customer Service Paradox Tell Us About Customer Service

What the customer service paradox teaches us is that we should not think that the value of customer service can be found only in relatively “uneventful” relationships. 

Of course, we want to make sure our customers have the most pleasant and enjoyable experience when purchasing from our brand. 

At the same time, when unforeseen issues present themselves, we should be more aware of how solving a problem for a client can lead him or her to build an even stronger relationship with the brand.

In this sense, overcoming these challenges together can help your brand make the most of a difficult situation, using it as an opportunity to demonstrate the values and quality consistency your brand is bringing to market.

By all means, we don’t advise a brand to take this approach too far, but it’s important to acknowledge that there’s a lot of value to be found in helping your customers overcome their issues.

There’s an opportunity to build valuable customer stories that will definitely contribute to the value of your brand and its word-of-mouth advertising.

Great! Now that we’ve clarified the matter, let’s move on to draw a few conclusive remarks.

Conclusions

There you have it! In this post, we analyzed the relevance of customer service for your business, and we’ve clarified what we mean by the customer service paradox, whereby customers are more likely to become loyal clients if they are able to test firsthand the quality and reliability of your customer service when addressing a situation of crisis.

If you’d like to read more about customer service, in this article, we discuss some of the best practices to manage your customer service team.

If you’d like to learn more about customer service, especially in the context of digital services, here’s a book we recommend reading on the topic: Digital Customer Service: Transforming Customer Experience for an On-Screen World

Moreover, don’t hesitate to explore our blog to access a wealth of information on customer retention and customer service strategies. Enjoy!