In a recent KiwiHost Customer Service pulse respondents said the most important part of service was ‘for somebody to listen to me and understand my needs’. Active listening – to understand – is not only important in customer service, it is essential if you want to make sales, give more referrals and recognise additional opportunities.
To put it bluntly we miss dozens of opportunities because we fail to listen intently.
This is because our mind is on what we’re going to say next, or because something distracts you or perhaps your inner voice is worrying about the mortgage (or that odd noise you heard in your car’s engine on the way over to the meeting).
Most of the time we tune out of the small talk and this is a mistake.
‘How are you’, ‘how’s your day’, ‘how was your weekend’ blah blah blah blah… I would suggest that there are plenty of opportunities in small talk – it is important that you make the small talk count! – that’s when most of your opportunities will be revealed (particularly for referrals).
Tune out the distractions. Focus intently on the person you are talking to and listen to their replies, to the exclusion of all other thoughts.
Forget trying to multi-task your thoughts – the brutal truth is that men and yes, even women, can only focus on one thought at a time.
Don’t interrupt, even if you want to be perceived as a good listener by asking plenty of questions.
What happens most of the time is your mind is busy framing the next question so you’re not actually listening properly to the reply to your first question.
Some quick fire tips to be a better listener:
1. Take notes.
2. Listen to the reply and ask yourself what you can do with that response.
3. Mentally repeat what you’ve just been told.
4. Ask questions that are actually going somewhere. Don’t start with ‘how’ (as in ‘how was your weekend?’) but with ‘what’ and ‘why’ (as in, ‘what did you do this weekend?’). It forces the other person to reveal more, rather than getting away with inane noises.
When the person has to think about their response, you’re building rapport.
