When new customers purchase service agreements you must make certain that they understand how to access and use the services they are entitled to through a formal service onboarding process.
To successfully onboard customers contact them personally by phone or e-mail (personal touch) or by automated e-mail (tech-touch) and provide them with welcome kits, service guides and even how-to videos. Help them to get setup with service access (e.g. credentials for the Support portal).
A single initial contact is typically not enough. Monitoring service entitlement use is important to identify customers that are not benefiting from their service relationship. When you enable customers to use the services they have access to, you increase the likelihood that they will receive benefit and renew their relationship.
Best Practices
- Contact new customers personally by phone or e-mail (personal touch) or by automated e-mail (tech-touch) to introduce them to their service entitlements.
- Create a welcome kit with a service guide and usage tutorials to teach customers how and when to engage services.
- Make certain customers know how to access and use services, especially self-help resources.
- Discourage the practice of attaching service contracts to products without reviewing service terms and conditions with customers.
- Monitor service use. When customers do not use services engage them to encourage consumption of service entitlements.
- Coordinate service onboarding with product onboarding activities.