Customer Service for e-tailers

Top 10 Tips for Exceptional Online Service on a Budget (Source: E-commerce Guide)

Tip #1: Provide a toll-free/800 number on your home page, merchandise pages, contact page, and checkout pages.
Tip #2: Make sure you have people who are familiar with your products answering the phone(s) — and that they answer calls in a timely fashion. As anyone who has ever been put on hold can attest to, five minutes can seem like an eternity.
Tip #3: Make your contact information easy to find and provide an e-mail address for customers who prefer to ask questions via e-mail. As with phone calls, make sure e-mails are answered promptly, if possible within 24 hours of receipt if received during normal business hours.
Tip #4: Include a return policy, privacy policy and a guarantee (regarding quality, security and/or shipping) on your site.
Tip #5: Provide a detailed, easy-to-find list of frequently asked questions (FAQs). Having excellent, comprehensive FAQs that really address customer issues is a great time and money saver, said Freedman, as the better the FAQs the less questions customers will have to call or e-mail you about.
Tip #6: Make checkout easy, and include a variety of payment options, such as PayPal and Google Checkout, in addition to traditional credit cards. Per the e-tailing group study, on the sites with the best customer service, customers clicked no more than six times from selection of product through checkout.
Tip #7: Provide online order confirmation and send an e-mail confirmation with the order number and contact information.
Tip #8: Let customers know when their order has been shipped. Order tracking has become very popular and allows customers to see the progress of their order.
Tip #9: Make sure orders are delivered on time. While this is given as the ninth tip, a late or undelivered order is often the top reason for a customer telephone call or e-mail — and why they may not do business with you again, particularly if the order was needed by a certain date or the customer paid extra for overnight or two-day shipping.
Tip #10: Provide a personal touch or a little something extra. Although this is the last tip, in many ways it is what customers remember most, as evidenced by anecdotes from online shoppers like Heather Lee, who runs a design and communications business called design/type.