A high Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT) is a powerful endorsement for your MSP that indicates your customers are satisfied with the services they receive. Knowing how to improve your CSAT score is powerful information when you feel that your score doesn't reflect your customer service efforts.

Businesses have many ways to research managed service providers before choosing one, so providing excellent customer service has never been more important. Improving the customer experience is a great starting point for improving your CSAT score and boosting client acquisition and loyalty.

1. Measure Your Existing CSAT Score and Set Realistic Goals

Before embarking on a mission to improve customer satisfaction, take stock of where you are now. Improving customer satisfaction is only possible when you have a full understanding of how your customers perceive your company and if you can pinpoint areas where your MSP doesn't live up to customer expectations.

Send out a detailed CSAT survey to evaluate your customer service team's performance at every step of the customer journey from onboarding to technical support. SmileBack, Crewhu, and Simplesat are excellent MSP-specific tools you can use for this purpose. The data gleaned will offer invaluable insights into possible shortfalls in your service and areas for immediate and long-term improvement. 

Remember that there are several other customer satisfaction metrics that you can combine with CSAT to provide different insights. Track your Net Promoter Score (NPS) and Customer Effort Score (CES) if you're not already doing so. Considering these MSP KPIs together will give you a much more well-rounded view. 

Ask the Right Questions

Poorly written surveys can easily skew results and end up not giving you the input you require to improve. When composing customer satisfaction surveys, make sure you:

• Ask questions that serve a specific purpose
• Use clear, plain language that can't be misunderstood or interpreted in different ways
• Don't include any leading questions
• Ask for ratings rather than binary answers
• Encourage customers to give as much detail as possible

Track Your CSAT Score Over Time

Tracking your CSAT score allows you to gauge whether the measures you're taking to improve your CSAT score are having any effect. Your customer service team should be aware of fluctuations in your score and the factors that affect it.

2. Welcome Customer Feedback

Working proactively to boost customer satisfaction is always the best way to ensure great customer service every time. However, being prepared to take on feedback and act on the criticism you receive when things don't go to plan is also crucial when striving for a high CSAT score.

There are myriad ways to gather customer feedback including digital surveys, face-to-face interviews, quarterly business reviews (QBR), and online review sites. When gathering customer opinions, focus on any negative feedback you receive as this is what you'll need to review and change as needed. Getting a poor review can be hurtful, but feedback gives you valuable insights into how your customers perceive your company.

Be aware of customer complaints that appear time and time again. Use these as a foundation for improving customer service and raising your CSAT score.

Your customer service agents should handle negative feedback productively by:

• Responding promptly and empathetically: Take time to address customer concerns and complaints in a timely and compassionate manner and offer a solution. Offering credit when appropriate can be beneficial for both parties.
• Use feedback to make improvements: Analyze customer feedback to identify areas for improvement and implement the necessary changes right away. Update your customer service training to reflect the feedback you receive.

The Importance of Customer Satisfaction

The importance of customer satisfaction shouldn't be understated. According to a 2022 research paper on the role of customer feedback, businesses that succeed in fully satisfying their customers will continue to be leaders within their industry.

This is backed up by data that underlines the impact of providing a lower level of services than your customers expect. For example, according to a Medallia survey cited in the research paper, 96.2% of customers wouldn't use a brand again if there was a mismatch between their expectations of customer service and their lived experience. Additionally, 62% of customers stated they'd be willing to pay more for exceptional customer service (page 673 of the PDF).

Businesses that embrace negative feedback and use it as a stepping stone for growth will likely notice an increase in customer retention and satisfaction. In the days of online reviews, this is essential.

3. Provide the Best Communication Channels

Rapid communication is key to ensuring your customer service team meets your clients' expectations. Meeting your clients where they are is a surefire way to increase customer satisfaction scores and boost your technicians' productivity.

MSPs that use Thread enable their technicians to meet clients where they are through the communication platform they already use, such as Microsoft Teams or Slack. This means all communications stay in one place and prevents communications from slipping through the cracks. You can also automate the delivery of surveys via chat to gather client feedback after every interaction.

Reduce Response Times with Magic AI

Customer support, response times, and time to resolution are common battlegrounds for CSAT. Our Magic Agent chatbot automatically connects clients with the technician most suited to the job, leading to faster response and resolution times. It also prioritizes the most urgent requests, meaning costly and frustrating downtime is reduced. 

4. Satisfied Employees Lead to Satisfied Customers

Weaving strategic measures into customer relations should move your CSAT in the right direction. However, transforming satisfaction in your business requires improving employee satisfaction as well.

The best place to start applying the mindset you want to see is behind the scenes. Customer service agents who are stressed, overworked, or under pressure are unlikely to provide the level of support customers expect. 

Create a healthy, productive, and positive work environment for your support team to prevent residual stress, resentment, or discontent from spilling over into their customer service. Provide the tools required to work efficiently and access to the information and training they need to do their best work. Using automation as appropriate is a great way to eliminate repetitive tasks that overburden your agents and potentially reduce MSP burnout in your team.

5. Offer Personalized Customer Service

Personalized customer service is a tailored approach to customer support that aims to meet the individual needs and preferences of every customer. It involves going beyond generic responses and providing customized solutions and experiences. 

Customers who feel valued are bound to feel more satisfied with the service provided. Consider the following ways to provide personalized customer service:

• Collect and analyze customer data: Gather information about customer preferences, service history, and demographics.
• Meet users where they are: Analyze historical incidents and service requests to understand why they received good or bad scores. Optimize for the drivers of good scores.
• Use customer relationship management (CRM) software: Implement a CRM system or a PSA that includes it to track customer interactions and preferences.
• Train employees: Provide employees with the training and tools they need to deliver personalized service. This can take the form of contacting customers through their preferred channels, delivering personalized customer service interactions, and understanding their individual circumstances.
• Encourage employee empowerment: Give employees the authority to make certain kinds of decisions on the spot to resolve customer issues. This allows them to resolve problems quickly and provide clients with tailored solutions.
• Offer consistent follow-up: After interactions with your business, follow up on the customer’s experience to ensure their satisfaction and address any further issues.

6. Take a Proactive Approach to Problem Solving

Proactive MSPs know the importance of putting systems in place to prevent problems before they occur. Many of the systems MSPs offer—like remote management or cybersecurity—already work to stop issues in their tracks and prevent small problems from becoming service requests.

Your approach to customer service should also be proactive. Identify areas where you can put in work behind the scenes to create a seamless customer experience. Although you probably have systems in place to react to problems, stopping them from developing in the first place is always preferable.

Ensure the smoothest possible customer experience by:

• Monitoring customer interactions: Keep track of customer sentiment during all interactions and identify potential issues before they escalate.
• Taking proactive steps: Implement measures to prevent common or foreseeable problems from occurring in the first place.
• Communicating preemptively: Keep customers informed about any issues or delays and provide updates on the resolution process.

7. Develop a Support Relationship Recovery Program

CSAT scores are rarely perfect. This may mean that some customers have had a single disappointing experience or that others' frustrations have built up over time. In either case, you need to win back these customers’ approval to boost your CSAT score.

A service recovery program is a great way to get customers back on side. Your plan should deliver actionable ways to re-engage with a client when something goes awry.

Your plan should establish:

• Who gets in touch with unsatisfied customers: For more serious problems, it may be a good idea to involve someone higher up in the hierarchy.

• How they should approach the conversation: Agents should have training on how to deal with unhappy customers, including how to apologize, the questions to ask to understand the source of the customer's discontent, a roadmap to fix the problem, and follow-up.

• What records you keep on these events: Keep clear notes of incidents and use them as valuable learning tools. These will also help you gauge your progress over time.

8. Weave a Customer-Centric Mindset into Your Culture

Customer service works best when staff go beyond mere protocols and guidelines. Though you want your customer service staff to follow the signposts you provided in training, the highest quality service comes when excellence is imbued into the company culture.

This is achievable when a business's leadership leads by example, new hires are chosen carefully, and training is comprehensive. Ultimately, putting more emphasis on customer service sets you on the path to achieving your goals.

Creating a customer-centric culture is only possible when every individual in the company takes on a customer-first approach. This is possible by:

• Understanding your customers: Gain a deep understanding of your customers' needs, preferences, and challenges.
• Tailoring your offerings: Customize your products or services to meet the specific needs of your target audience.
• Exceeding expectations: Go above and beyond to deliver exceptional customer experiences.

9. Develop a Quality Assurance Process

A company with top-notch customer service will never have high customer satisfaction levels if it sells a defective or inadequate product. Keep bugs, glitches, or friction points in your system to an absolute minimum and offer your clients the best possible IT solutions.

Customers spend their hard-earned money on IT solutions and expect a good product or service and value for money. Not providing these things will inevitably end up in a low-tier CSAT score.

Establishing quality assurance is vital for maximizing your score. Run comprehensive tests on all the major features of your product or service before you release new products or updates. Companies with no internal resources to do this should outsource the testing process to QA experts.

10. Take Criticism in Stride

It's easy to explain away an under-par CSAT score, make excuses, or blame outside factors. However, this is the wrong approach as self-reflection is key for future improvements. Expecting the same results without changing anything is futile. Now's the time to ask yourself what you could be doing better and create a roadmap for improvement.

Gathering data from customer feedback should give you the pointers you need to shape a new approach to customer service. A company that steps back, takes on criticism, and is ready to try a new path will be much more likely to improve its CSAT score than one that licks its wounds.

Exceptional Customer Service Is a Cornerstone of Long-Term Success

The customer service you offer is inextricably linked to how your business is perceived by existing and potential customers. Putting customer experience at the forefront of your operations will raise your CSAT score and encourage customer loyalty.

Your CSAT score is a key way that prospective clients gain insight into what to expect from your MSP. Taking care of customer satisfaction will have a flow-on effect on how many word-of-mouth recommendations and positive reviews you receive, leading to long-term growth, satisfaction, and success.