A 5 Point Checkup for Your Car Wash Team’s Customer Service
When visitors stop by your car wash, are they receiving good service? Are they making a connection with your facility? Do they leave with a smile and a positive impression? Ensuring that each customer’s experience is as memorable as possible can be a challenge, and one that ultimately comes down to a single factor:
Your employees.
Whether you call them employees, staff, or team members, the men and women on-deck at your car wash are the ones who are providing instructions, maintaining the facility, addressing problems, and building that crucial inter-personal connection with your customers. Remember that they are as much a part of your wash as the walls or equipment and their behavior can be decisive in determining long-term success or failure.
This is why it is so vital that you train your employees to act and perform in such a way as to maximize customer experience and so that you can be sure your wash is operating at peak efficiency even when owners, operators, or general managers aren’t present.
1. Cell Phone Use
Do your employees use cellphones on the job, in areas where they can be spotted by customers? Using a mobile device or headphones on the job creates a dangerous distraction and signals that a staff member is not approachable, which can steer customers away when they have a question. Whether the team member is spraying down the bay, picking up the vacuum area, or working the pay window their ears and attention should be open.
2. Acknowledgement Radii
A good team member is engaged enough to notice when a customer is asking them a question. A great team member goes out of their way to acknowledge all customers in their personal space with eye contact, a smile, or a quick “Hello! How are you?” Actively interacting with customers who enter your employee’s line of sight can encourage interpersonal contact, build a sense of connectedness, and make customers feel seen, respected, and appreciated.
3. Upselling
Membership programs and extra services do provide better value for the customer, and therefore positive interactions and information sharing between customers and staff should naturally lead to upselling at the pay window or elsewhere around the wash. Train your employees to explain the benefits of different services or membership programs in a friendly and relaxed way without coming off as pushy or aggressive.
4. Regulars
Car washes thrive on repeat customers and repeat customers frequently begin to recognize and relate to the different team members they encounter. Encourage your staff to learn the names of these frequent visitors and greet them when they return, ensuring that they have a reason to keep coming back for years to come.
5. Smiles
A simple smile makes a big difference and can change an area’s entire atmosphere, associating your wash with a relaxed and positive experience and increasing the customer’s satisfaction on an unconscious level. Smiling (even on the phone!) shows that your employees are happy, friendly, approachable, and willing to go the extra mile. Reward employees who have a positive attitude and set the trend yourself by smiling and interacting positively with your employees during work hours.
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Tommy Car Wash Systems .