Think about the last time you had a great experience with a brand. Maybe it was an online order that included a personalized thank you note. Maybe the service at a new restaurant was *mwah* (chef-kiss-good).

Now, think about your most recent “worst experience of my life” moment with a brand. Maybe you took your rant to Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc.

There’s an old saying, “You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.” While that may be true, there are three tactics you can use as a foundation to help provide a positive experience for your customers in a digital-first world.

The 3 Pillars of Positive Customer Service

1. Build a Consistent Presence for Your Customers Across All Channels

Where do your customers hang out online? Probably more than one social media channel, Google, messaging platforms, and on and on.

Once you’ve identified the channels your customers are on start building a consistent brand identity across channels. This helps maintain a consistent message and brand voice across all customer care interactions but also connects your customers with the experts at your company who can most efficiently handle their issues.

2. Find Out What Your Customers Are Feeling—And Why

Understanding how your audience feels about your product or service is paramount. Most companies know tracking customer sentiment is an important component to understanding your brand’s health, but most are only listening for sentiment words like “mad” or “happy.”

Understanding the root cause of your customer’s sentiment to your brand allows you to resolve customer friction at its source. Today, advanced omnichannel analytics and deep listening tools help companies track emotion on nearly every channel your brand and customers use.

Influencer Marketing Hub suggests 12 tools to listen for brand mentions and tracking sentiment for social media in 2021.

3. Implement AI and Machine-Learning to Enhance Positive Customer Experiences

As luck would have it, digital transformation has given us tools like AI and machine learning to be more efficient and drive even stronger relationships with customers.

Chatbots are good at solving most simple problems, and when they can’t, they can route customers to the best person to solve the issue. This helps provide a more efficient way to solve customer issues and create a personal connection with customers.

Whether you’re deciding to invest in digital technologies to help improve customer care or working to create a new process for your service team, remember that it’s better (and less expensive) to keep a customer than to replace one.