Customer Service

How To Set Effective Customer Service Team Goals (SMART & FAST)

Josh Spilker

March 6, 2024

Why set customer service team goals? 

Customer service team goals are crucial because they directly impact the quality of customer experiences and, ultimately, customer satisfaction. 

These goals often revolve around key customer service performance metrics such as Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) scores, Net Promoter Score (NPS), customer churn rate, industry-specific benchmarks, and even employee satisfaction rates. 

Such metrics provide a tangible way to measure success and guide customer service strategies.

The importance of setting goals for customer service teams

Setting clear and actionable goals helps in aligning expectations, managing and measuring performance effectively, and motivating agents to deliver their best. 

Goals serve as a north star, guiding teams towards delivering exceptional customer service that meets and exceeds customer expectations.

• Recommended: How to set quarterly goals

What are SMART Goals? 

The acronym SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound, and it’s one of the most popular goal-setting techniques around. 

This method ensures goals are well-defined and attainable, fostering a culture of success and continuous improvement.

• Specific: In customer service, specificity means setting goals that are clear and direct. Questions like “What exactly do we want to achieve?” and “How will this improve our customer service?” should be addressed. This includes detailing the responsible parties, necessary resources, and expected outcomes, thus creating a roadmap for achieving customer satisfaction.
• Measurable: It’s crucial to have measurable goals to track progress and outcomes. This can involve metrics such as customer satisfaction scores, average response times, and customer retention rates, offering a clear view of performance and areas for improvement.
• Achievable: Goals must be realistic to be effective. This means considering the team’s resources and capabilities to ensure goals are challenging yet attainable, thus avoiding burnout and fostering motivation.
• Relevant: Goals should align with the company’s values and mission. This relevance ensures that the customer service department’s efforts contribute meaningfully to the organization’s overall objectives, enhancing motivation and team performance.
• Time-bound: Setting deadlines is crucial to maintain focus and urgency. Time-bound goals encourage efficiency and help teams prioritize their efforts for maximum impact.

Should you set SMART goals? Maybe not…

To be honest you’ve probably heard of SMART goals before and may even use them yourself. But did you know they’re not necessarily backed by research? They often encourage teams to set goals they can reach, making them too low. 

Instead, researchers have found these goal characteristics work better, and yes they do take some of the ideas from the SMART goals framework. 

1. Specific goals do work better than just encouraging people to do their best
2. The higher goal, the higher the effort
3. Set tight deadlines. It won’t be perfect, but more will get done
4. Public commitment to a goal works better
5. Where the goal comes from (boss or the individual) doesn’t matter as much as people think

Not SMART? Try FAST Goals

If you want to break the SMART routine of goal-setting and dusting them off once per quarter, you could also try a different approach: FAST goals. 

FAST stands for: 

• Frequent: Discuss goals in regular intervals and alter as needed. Leaders like Jeff Weiner gets feedback on team goals every week, according to the MIT Review
• Ambitious: Create big goals because as the research mentioned above, those are more motivating than sandbagging the goals
• Specific: Create tight deadlines
• Transparent: Make a public commitment towards achieving the goals

No matter the framework, goals matter

Adopting some type of goals has a lot of benefits, including increased customer satisfaction, improved customer retention, and enhanced employee engagement. 

Goals improve focus and motivation

Setting specific and achievable goals, along with regular feedback and recognition, fosters a motivated and focused team. Providing a positive work environment and opportunities for growth supports employee well-being and productivity.

Goals create clear expectations and accountability

Clear goals ensure that everyone knows what is expected of them, promoting accountability and a sense of ownership over outcomes. This clarity helps teams navigate challenges and celebrate successes more effectively.

Goals enhance performance tracking

Performance tracking is essential for continual improvement. By monitoring key metrics and analyzing data, customer service teams can identify improvement areas, adjust strategies, and celebrate achievements, driving ongoing excellence in service delivery.

How to Implement Goals for Customer Service Teams

Implementing goals in customer service teams often faces challenges such as resistance to change, lack of clear communication, and difficulties in measuring certain objectives. 

Overcoming these hurdles starts with clear and open communication about the benefits and importance of these goals. 

Engaging team members in the goal-setting process can foster ownership and commitment. 

Tools like Tettra, an AI-powered knowledge management system, can facilitate this by providing a central hub for documenting goals, strategies, and progress. This not only enhances transparency but also ensures that all team members are aligned and informed.

How can you incorporate customer feedback into your goal-setting processes? 

Regularly soliciting feedback through surveys, social media, and direct interactions can provide actionable insights. 

Tettra can be used to document and share this feedback within the organization, ensuring it’s accessible for decision-making. 

Additionally, Supportman, a tool designed to track key customer service metrics within Slack, can help teams quickly adapt to feedback by providing real-time insights into customer satisfaction and team performance. 

Supportman.io offers a straightforward way for teams to monitor their performance in real-time, making it easier to identify trends and adjust goals quickly. 

Together, these tools can create a responsive and adaptable customer service environment that evolves based on customer needs and preferences.

Adapt Your Goals for a Long-Term Vision

Aligning short-term customer service goals with the company’s long-term vision requires a strategic approach. It involves not only understanding current customer needs but also anticipating future trends and expectations. 

Alignment ensures that immediate customer service efforts are not just about solving today’s problems but are also steps towards achieving long-term strategic goals.

Incorporating tools like Tettra and Supportman.io into the customer service strategy can empower teams to address challenges, integrate customer feedback, measure success accurately, adapt to changes, and align with the company’s long-term vision, thereby enhancing overall customer satisfaction and business success.

How Tettra Helps Your Customer Support Team Find Answers

Tettra is a powerful tool designed to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of customer support teams, particularly in managing and sharing internal knowledge and docs. 

With Tettra, customer support teams can quickly create, organize, and access a centralized repository of information. 

Tettra’s search and surfacing of important docs keeps the entire team informed about the latest software updates, troubleshooting techniques, and customer service protocols. 

Tettra’s integration with various communication tools means that support teams can seamlessly incorporate knowledge sharing into their daily workflow, fostering a more cohesive and informed customer service experience. 

By leveraging Tettra, customer support teams can significantly improve their response times and the overall quality of their customer interactions, ultimately enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Schedule your demo or start your free trial today.