14 simple tips to make customers feel valued

The only coffee shop I visit is 20 miles from my house — and I don’t even drink coffee. A few years ago, a barista surprised me with my favorite tea and a handwritten note: “You look like you’re working hard. Hope this helps.”

It was a small gesture, but it stuck with me. Now, I wouldn’t dream of getting matcha anywhere else. And if a two-sentence note can create a lifelong customer, just imagine what other simple gestures can do. Luckily, creating meaningful experiences like these is easier than you might think. Here are 14 tips on how to make customers feel valued.

1. Make every customer interaction feel tailor-made

Taking the time to remember customer preferences, address their specific needs, and treat them as individuals creates standout moments that improve customer satisfaction and build lasting loyalty. In fact, Adobe found personalization to be the second most impactful factor in creating memorable experiences.

To add a personal touch for existing and new customers:

• Ask for customer communication preferences (like text, call, or email) and then communicate with them using the method they prefer
  
• Offer suggestions based on the customer’s history (like a deep tissue massage for customers with frequent headaches and neck pain)
  
• Celebrate birthdays, milestones, and upcoming events (like sending personalized holiday text messages)

You can capture these details in OpenPhone’s contact notes and custom properties and reference them later. That way, the next time a customer calls for an appointment, your team member can see the note about their appointment time preferences and say: “I know you prefer morning slots! Would 10 AM work?”

Plus, with shared phone numbers, everyone in your workspace can view notes, and the customer experience feels seamless regardless of who’s on the clock.

But that’s not to say you’ll always know what’s best for your customers. More often than not, they’ll tell you themselves.

2. Let customers help shape your offerings

When customers see their ideas directly shaping your services, it shows you respect their judgment and see them as essential to your business.

Here’s how to get customers more involved: 

• Run quick polls, like on social media, inquiring about what new services or bundles you should offer.
  
• Let customers vote on limited-time offers or discounts to see which ones have the greatest amount of traction.
  
• Build new services in public while keeping what’s necessary confidential. Then, ask customers what they would like to see in the future, including how they might approach things if they were in your shoes.
  

Just keep in mind that building great products is still only one piece of the puzzle. You also have to deliver outstanding experiences, which starts by coaching your team.

3. Coach your team to deliver great experiences

Customers don’t just care about what you sell them — they also care about how you make them feel. And since positive customer interactions and experiences depend on well-trained employees, the best way to make customers feel valued is to invest in training.

Of course, good customer service coaching goes beyond sticking to scripts. Here’s how to meet and exceed your customer expectations with coaching:

• Anticipate customer needs. This could be recognizing common follow-up questions and offering solutions before a customer asks. On OpenPhone, you can use AI call tags to spot recurring questions and trends more quickly. Then you can look for ways to solve them faster (like updating FAQs or adding an audio recording to your phone menu).
  
• Turn tough conversations into customer loyalty. Show your customer that their needs are your priority. Maybe this is offering a free upgrade when resolving particularly complicated situations  or going the extra mile to prioritize VIP calls.
  
• Encourage confident decision-making without escalation. Empowering your team to make quick judgment calls, like providing expedited shipping, will help to surprise and delight customers when they urgently need help.

As you look for ways to coach your team more effectively, consider reviewing your call tags for labels like “negative customer sentiment” or “issue” to quickly identify calls worth exploring. Next, listen to the call recordings or read the transcripts. This helps you easily spot teachable moments and provide targeted feedback for improvement.

OpenPhone users can also take advantage of internal threads for coaching. That way, they can quickly tag team members under specific conversations and provide immediate feedback for future conversations.

And speaking of feedback. . .

4. Regularly request and act on customer feedback

Requesting customer feedback makes improvements more focused, effective, and impactful. For example, you might use your findings to help streamline your checkout process or fix your website’s UI if customers keep running into problems.

Surveys are one of the most common methods of gathering feedback, but you can also get information from: 

• Having a casual conversation after completing a service
• Reviewing social media posts
• Reading online reviews 
• Asking through personalized texts
• Looking at call drivers

If you’re on OpenPhone’s Scale plan, you can set up tags like “feedback,” and our AI will automatically apply them to relevant calls based on their content. Then, you can filter calls by the label to find specific conversations, review the recording, and review feedback that might otherwise get missed.

But gathering feedback is just the first step. The next is putting what you find into practice.

This makes for better services and happier customers. It’s exciting to feel like your voice matters, and customers will feel like they’re a part of something greater.

Make necessary improvements based on common feedback patterns. Then, follow up with customers to let them know what you changed based on their input — this closes the loop and shows their feedback made a real impact.

If you can’t take immediate action, still acknowledge their input and offer a realistic timeline for when they can expect changes.

Which leads straight to the next point:

5. Ensure fast responses to inquiries

Four in five customers (82%) want prompt responses to feedback. Another 92% want faster responses in general. Here are three ways to help your business reply faster:

• Coordinate message flows with your team. Be sure to establish clear internal processes for prioritizing and responding to inquiries, like assigning team members to handle customer inquiries based on urgency, skill, or topic.
• Use shared inboxes to share the responsibility of answering messages. That way, multiple people can respond to customers at the same time.
• Set up auto-replies for missed messages whenever you’re unavailable. Look for a text messaging service for small businesses that allows you to instantly respond to missed calls, texts, and voicemails. That way, you can set customer expectations with out-of-office text messages and let them know you’ll get back to them soon.

💡 Pro Tip: With OpenPhone, business owners can loop in non-customer-facing team members using internal threads. This can speed up issue resolution and provide a more high-touch service overall.

While we’re on the subject of making things easy:

6. Make it easy for customers to reach you

Maybe a customer lives in a different time zone, or maybe they don’t want to get on a call at all.  Make it easier to get in touch by offering multiple communication channels like text, calls, email, and social media.

Just make sure to organize all these conversations in one place so you can easily sort answered messages from unanswered ones. 

For example, OpenPhone’s conversation threads centralize phone calls, voicemail, transcripts, recordings, and text messages so no message slips through the cracks. Plus, all communications are visible to everyone on the number, which means you don’t need to manually forward messages or switch between your phone system and CRM.

Now let’s flip the limelight in the other direction…

7. Turn the spotlight on your customers 

Your business exists because of your customers. So why not give them a delightful reminder?

Here are a few different ways to highlight your customers:

• Feature a customer story or testimonial publicly on your social media platforms, email newsletter, or website.
• Showcase user-generated content like photos, reviews, or social media shoutouts.
• Publish a customer appreciation post and tag or quote your VIPs.

Just be sure to ask for permission before featuring customers in your content. They may want to edit or approve wording that might affect their public image.

Remember — keeping customers in the loop should be the rule rather than the exception. 😉

8. Keep customers in the loop

Nobody likes being left in the dark — and it certainly won’t make your customers feel valuable. Keeping clients informed can build trust and encourage them to stick around.

One of the easiest ways to keep in touch is by sending timely updates, including:

• Appointment reminder messages
• Service notifications
• Appointment confirmation texts 

But manually handling these updates can be a huge time drain — unless you set up an automation to make things easier.

By integrating OpenPhone with Zapier, Make, or the OpenPhone API, you can set up automatic appointment confirmations and reminders. Customers will always know what to expect from your business, and your team can free up more of their valuable time.

Here’s an example integration for Calendly and OpenPhone you can copy:

Now, let’s talk about how to make conversations feel more personal. 

9. Check in with customers, no strings attached

When customers feel like you genuinely care about them, they’ll be more likely to stick around. Considering 61% of customers say companies treat them more like numbers, these personalized customer experiences could be a major differentiator for your business. 

Start by sending a friendly message without ulterior motives — just ask how they’re doing and if they need help. You could also try:

• Sending resources to help with past purchases
• Sharing tips and best practices based on past interactions 
• Checking in with customers you haven’t heard from in a while to show you’re thinking about them (like “Is your [spouse/child/pet] feeling better?”) 
• Asking to grab a coffee the next time they’re in town

And if you don’t hear back, you might:

10. Send thoughtful follow-up messages 

Follow-up messages let customers know you still care about them even after the sale. This makes them feel valued, builds trust, and boosts the likelihood you’ll hear from them again.

Try:

• A simple follow-up text like “Thank you for your business”
• Checking in on their satisfaction with a recent service
• Providing useful next steps like care instructions, or offering additional support

Just be sure to send follow-ups that are helpful, not spammy. You don’t want customers to feel like you’re blowing up their phones.

You can send automated messages as follow-ups, but a human touch will make a bigger impact. To do this, consider creating pre-written text templates like snippets. That way, you can create boilerplate responses for different stages of the customer’s journey (like onboarding, post-call surveys, sales follow-ups, and more) and add a personal touch before hitting send. 

Now, let’s look at another category: rewarding customers for their loyalty.

11. Reward loyal customers

The average American is part of 19 loyalty programs, and it’s easy to see why: customers appreciate recognition for their continued business (not to mention the extra goodies).

Not sure what to use for loyalty incentives? Try:

• Exclusive discounts or VIP access for long-time and high-value customers
• A simple point-based system for frequent purchases 
• Surprise perks like a free service or an upgrade after a certain number of visits
• Cash back or discounts for successful customer referrals

So what about dealing with unhappy customers?

12. Don’t sweep complaints under the rug

Customer complaints are inevitable — and they’re a great opportunity to show how much you care about customers.

Here’s how to approach that:

• Respond promptly to avoid frustration and prevent escalation 
• Show empathy and take ownership, even if the issue wasn’t your fault
• Offer a resolution or next steps as soon as possible

To prevent customer complaints from getting lost in your inbox, you can use OpenPhone’s call views. This organizes negative feedback for easier access and visibility so you can easily see which conversations still need to be addressed.

Let’s take a look at other ways to ensure more considerate conversations. 

13. Practice great customer service etiquette

Even small gestures can have a big impact on customer experience.

With this in mind, here’s how to make customers feel valued by improving your customer service etiquette:

• Use the customer’s name in a conversational way. Just try not to overdo it, or it may sound unnatural, which customers can pick up on.
• Ask if there’s anything else you can do to help. Even if the customer didn’t call with multiple issues, check back in and ask, “Is there anything else I can do to help?”
• Be mindful of hold times. If you have to put a customer on hold, check in every two to five minutes so they don’t feel forgotten. Let them know you’re working on their request, and give them an update on its status whenever possible.
• Use positive language. Instead of saying, “I can’t do that,” try taking a different perspective with something like, “Here’s what I can do.” Small shifts like this keep conversations constructive and avoid frustrating your customers.

So what happens when conversations don’t go as planned?

14. Proactively take responsibility

If something goes wrong — even if customers haven’t noticed yet — proactively reach out to inform them, offer a solution, and apologize (if necessary). This shows customers that you’re honest, transparent, and take responsibility(which 81% of them say is “extremely important”).

For example, you can:

• Notify customers immediately if there’s an unexpected delay, cancellation, or service interruption. Rather than waiting for them to notice, take the initiative to keep them informed.
• Reach out if there’s a known issue and you’re working to solve it. For example, if you’re experiencing an unexpected staffing shortage or supplier delay, let customers know you’re working on a solution.
• Offer compensation or thoughtful gestures, like a small discount or waived fees. This shows customers you’re sorry for the inconvenience and value their lost time by reimbursing them.

In all cases, make sure you clearly outline the problem and explain the steps you’re taking to solve it.

Build better customer relationships with OpenPhone

Making customers feel valued doesn’t need to drain your time or resources — and with the right tools and strategies, you can effortlessly build customer relationships.

Easy-to-implement tools like OpenPhone can help growing businesses create exceptional customer service without sacrificing quality. We make it easy to:

• Share phone numbers so you can split responsibility for incoming calls
• Organize communications in a unified inbox with calls, texts, voicemails, and call recordings for your team
• Leave notes in contact properties to create more personalized experiences for customers
• Tag team members in internal threads to collaborate and solve problems quickly
• Skim conversations with call summaries, transcripts, and next steps
• Use AI to analyze calls to uncover trends and spot customer support coaching opportunities for your team 

• Set up messaging automations for auto-replies, scheduled texts, and templated messages to save time 
• Connect with third-party apps to keep all your tools in one place

Curious how OpenPhone can help you build better customer relationships at scale? Sign up today for a seven-day free trial and see for yourself.

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