Staff of the Ekiti State Water and Sewerage Company Limited (EKSWSC) have been charged to develop effective customer relationship management skills aimed at achieving customer satisfaction and enhancing loyalty.
The Managing Director of the organization, Mr. Oluwole Afolabi, gave this charge during a two-day training programme organized for staff of the company in Ado-Ekiti.
Mr. Afolabi emphasized that Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is highly demanding for service providers who must strive to improve productivity and customer satisfaction in a rapidly changing and competitive world.
He urged the Business Managers to maintain and sustain good relationships with their customers in their daily interactions, especially when handling temperamental clients.
Delivering a lecture on “Understanding and Managing Customer Relationships,” the Branch Manager of Sterling Bank, Mr. Olatunji Adeyemi, described CRM as a means of creating, maintaining, and sustaining strong relationships with customers to boost loyalty and drive organizational growth and revenue generation.
Mr. Adeyemi stressed the need for continuous sensitization to enhance customer awareness and perception of services rendered. He identified some key approaches to understanding customers to, including identifying their problems, gathering feedback, analyzing customer behavior, and tailoring solutions accordingly.
He further encouraged staff to foster synergy between the organization and its customers by promptly attending to complaints to discourage them from seeking alternative service providers.
In her presentation, the Branch Manager of Unity Bank, Mrs. Osundahunsi Adebola, explained that CRM is both a system and a strategy for managing an organization’s interactions with existing and potential customers. She noted that effective CRM helps build satisfaction, trust, and loyalty, thereby improving service delivery.
Mrs. Adebola advised participants to understand and meet customers’ needs, treat each customer uniquely, communicate clearly and respectfully, and constantly seek feedback to measure satisfaction.
According to her, a strong CRM system enhances customer satisfaction, increases retention and loyalty, facilitates problem resolution, strengthens teamwork and communication, and improves organizational reputation. She thereby cautioned staff against ignoring customer feedback, inconsistent follow-up, failure to personalize services, and the habit of over-promising and under-delivering.
During the interactive session, Mrs Adebola stressed that there should be no hierarchy in resolving customer complaints, especially in a public service organization like EKSWSC, adding that teamwork should always be encouraged.
Speaking at the event, the Monitoring and Evaluation Officer on SURWASH Program, Mr. Olufemi Olatunji, urged participants to see the training as an opportunity to change their conventional ways of doing things and to apply the lessons learned for the overall growth of the organization and improved revenue generation.
Also speaking, the SURWASH Contact Person, Engr. Matthew Alabi, encouraged participants to take customer and interpersonal relationships seriously, noting that good relationships have tremendous benefits both in their personal lives and in helping the agency achieve its set goals.