STERIS Corporation isn’t new to online marketing. They’ve been utilizing search, analytics and email since 2008 to increase RFQs (request for quotes) through Endai’s proprietary Playbook™ methodology – a process that has generated $45 million worth of opportunity to date. But, STERIS wanted to build more of a focus on customer retention to make sure that they were providing the best customer service possible to their customers.

With the 24/7 nature of online, customers are always connected to your brand and the window of time that’s deemed acceptable to respond to customer service queries and issues is quickly dwindling. Where a week was once a standard time frame to respond to a customer problem, many people expect a response within 24 hours – and sometimes near instantly when they reach out via social channels like Facebook and Twitter. For many companies, this switch in how customer service is handled means that they need an efficient automated solution for dealing with customer outreach.

In order to negate any customer service issues, Endai suggested that STERIS develop a strong client satisfaction program that reached out to current and past customers to make sure that they were happy with their purchases and the service that they received.

Customer service can be a costly and time-consuming effort for many companies. And, in the same way that email does a great job of automating a large portion of the sales funnel, it makes sense to take those same principles and apply them to the customer service process.

Endai’s suggestion to STERIS’s need was to pull recent service recipients into an email list and send automated emails asking customers to fill out a survey about their experience. Their responses were then used to determine an individual Net Promoter Score which helps STERIS quantify their customer service success. Even without an incentive to fill out the customer survey, the response rate from STERIS’s Scorecard initiative has seen an average open rate of 16%, a click through rate of 13% and a conversion rate of 12%.

While this information is great for giving an overall view of how well the healthcare company is at responding to client issues and dealing with customers, there’s a smaller piece that adds even more value to STERIS’s customer service program. District Service Managers, who are in charge of customer accounts, are automatically sent an email whenever a customer reports an issue or isn’t happy with overall service (noted by a lower Net Reporter Score). The instantaneous nature of these emails allows district service managers to immediately respond to a customer to remedy an issue and provide follow-up support.

The results from this program have been overwhelmingly positive. In its first year of implementation, the service survey produced 2,500 survey responses, and an average Net Promoter Score of 9 (out of a possible 10). In addition, there’s been a 70% adoption rate among district service managers, meaning the process is simple enough to implement into a daily routine and easily adaptable.

Customer service is a field that’s been transformed over the last decade by faster and more convenient technology.  With a change in the way customers reach out to companies, it’s important to stay on top of new trends and understand how to best keep in contact with your customers and respond to them in a timely and efficient fashion. These solutions, like the one that Endai created for STERIS, help companies manage their customer flow and make customer service just as streamlined as their automated marketing counterparts