Anyone with children knows that every child will inevitably resort to throwing a tantrum to try to get their way.  If they continue to do it, it’s probably because they end up getting what they wanted.  Customers  can often be the same way and in a world where so many companies believe “The customer is always right” the customer usually does get their way.

On Friday, September 13 at 1pm Eastern, Jenny Dempsey (@jennysuedempsey) and Jeremy Watkin (@jtwatkin) will be hosting a Coffee And Customer Service Hangout with a couple of our awesome customer service representatives to discuss this topic from the perspective of a customer service professional.  You can tune into the hangout live on YouTube or go to CommunicateBetterBlog.com to see it in its entirety.  They will tweet a link to the hangout from @commbetterblog prior to the event.  We hope you can join us!

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… and if you missed it live… here is the video: 

Companies are learning that sometimes the old method is best, at least when it comes to communication. Emailing has it’s place but when giving a sales pitch to a potential customer or conducting an interview, a phone call is usually the better choice if it can’t be done in person.  Granted voice calls can be obtrusive and force people to stop what they’re doing to talk but isn’t that better than losing a sale because the customer didn’t feel like typing?

Younger workers may be fluent in technologies that their older counterparts may have never heard of.  On the other hand according to Mary Jane Copps a phone-use consultant: “For many people, it’s a lack of confidence that they’ll be able to say the right words in the right order in the right amount of time,”.  Those “older” employees are typically more comfortable on the phone. They may be faster on their “feet” in terms of answering questions because they didn’t grow up taking their time to respond to a text message, when someone called they had to talk to them at that moment.

Some small business owners have seen a decline in sales due to their younger Millennial employees sending sales pitches to potential customers instead of making a call.  It’s much harder to build a relationship and rapport with a client via email then it is by phone.  In a Wall Street Journal article last week “Jason Nazar, a 34-year-old Santa Monica, Calif.-based technology entrepreneur, says his company has missed out on potential hires because his 20-something employees schedule interviews by email, rather than phoning applicants” Jason was quoted saying “If you can do something more quickly and more efficiently by using older technology, then do it,”

Dana Brownlee a Corporate trainer explained in the WSJ article that one of her clients “recently had to teach his young employee what a dial tone was and explain that desktop phones don’t require you to press “Send.”  So pick up a phone next time it is beneficial to talk to the recipient.

Ari Rabban, CEO will be speaking at the NJTECH Meetup on Monday, September 16 2013.

The event will be sold out and will take place at the Howe Center – Stevens Institute of Technology. For More information click here.