By Mary Morris, Customer Service Training specialist at the KONA Group. You may ask, “Why bother building rapport”? Well, building rapport is one of the foundations to delivering exceptional customer service. Our ability to influence customers with whom we have rapport is ten-fold. Rapport will bridge the gap between parties and pave the way for future business relationships. When we communicate with people that we admire, or share similar interests; our body language is mirrored with the person that you are speaking with. This mirroring action will result in both parties being relaxed and positive. – This is building rapport! It’s actually pretty easy to build rapport, if we just stop and think about what we do when we talk to our customers. Building rapport with our customers can occur when we listen openly to their comments, find some common ground and deliver upon expectations. Storing knowledge of our customers, where possible, such as birthdays, family members or hobbies as well as details on their organisation is critical when wanting to develop rapport. So, some easy tips on how to build rapport.

1. Mirror/match body language, tone, verbal cues. Don’t copy! That looks contrived. If you are really listening this will happen naturally.
2. Flowing on from the first tip, Listen. Listen with the intent to understand, not to be understood.
3. Ask questions, this really shows you are listening and getting to know the client.
4. Deliver upon expectations.

If you can follow these simple tips, rapport comes naturally. Our ultimate aim is to ensure our customers become advocates of our business and us as individuals. We can ensure this by building loyalty and rapport. You might look at the above tips and think, “yeah-I already do that “. Remember there is a difference between, knowing and doing. For more information on how Mary Morris can assist your sales team or call centre team please contact Mary on info@KONA.com.au or 1300 611288