Training Plan for Phone-Based Customer Service

This plan will help you train employees who serve customers over the phone.

It guides you through the Phone-Based Customer Service course on LinkedIn Learning. Make sure your team has access to LinkedIn Learning before you begin.

Phone-Based Customer Service focuses on essential phone skills:

  • Building rapport

  • Exceeding expectations

  • Solving problems

The course is ideal for anyone who serves customers over the phone. This includes contact center agents, customer support representatives, and office receptionists.

This training plan uses a unique approach to training videos.

It divides the lessons into short segments, spaced out over four weeks. This approach maximizes learning and application while minimizing the disruption to your regular operations.

This guide covers:

  1. Resources Required

  2. Preparation

  3. Pre-work

  4. Week 1: Kick-off

  5. Week 2: Building rapport over the phone

  6. Week 3: Exceed expectations over the phone

  7. Week 4: Solve problems over the phone

Resources Required

You'll need these resources to use this training plan.

  1. Access to Phone-Based Customer Service for all participants. (via LinkedIn Learning)

  2. The exercise files from the course.

  3. Workshop planning tool (free download).

Contact LinkedIn Learning for pricing and subscription options if you don't already have access.

Estimated time needed: 1 hour per week

  • Group activities: 30 minutes per week

  • Individual learning: 30 minutes per week

Prepare for Training

Get ready for the training by preparing yourself and your team.

Step 1: Create a training plan. Use the Workshop Planner to create an action plan.

  • Identify a goal for the training

  • Decide how to prepare your team

  • Create a plan to help the team use their new skills

Use this how-to video for more details:

Step 2: Announce the training. Tell your team about the training and what to expect. Address three questions for participants:

  1. What is the training about?

  2. Why is it important?

  3. How are employees expected to use what they learn?

Keep your announcement simple. Consider sharing it in a team meeting. Follow-it up with a short email that contains the pre-assignments.

Step 3: Schedule team meetings. You'll be meeting with your team once per week for four weeks. Each meeting should take 30 minutes.

Step 4: Share pre-work. Share the pre-work with your team. I've included that in the next section.

Pre-work

Ask participants to complete two short assignments before the first meeting.

Assignment 1: watch these videos:

  1. Phone service still matters

  2. Understand the phone's unique challenges

Assignment 2: Complete page one of the Learning Plan worksheet that's included in the course's exercise files.

This includes:

  • Discussion questions

  • Learning objectives

Week 1: Kick-off

The initial meeting should set the tone for the course. Start by reviewing the overall goal for the training that you identified on the Workshop Planner.

Next, discuss the following questions:

  1. How is this course relevant to the team?

  2. What are some opportunities to apply new phone skills?

  3. What are some unique challenges when serving customers over the phone?

It's helpful to share a few best practices for getting the most out of this course:

  1. Watch just one video at a time.

  2. Complete the activity that goes with each video.

  3. When possible, try using what you learned from the video before moving on to the next module.

Assignments for next week: Ask your team to watch the following videos and complete the activities described in each one. Videos with an activity at the end are marked with an "A."

  1. Develop the perfect phone greeting (A)

  2. Create personal connections (A)

  3. How to fill dead air (A)

  4. Manage holds and transfers

  5. Control the call with friendliness

  6. Complete the quiz at the end of Chapter 1

Week 2: Building rapport over the phone

This week's theme is building rapport with customers.

Rapport is a process of getting customers to know, like, and trust you. Start by reviewing the week one assignments.

Discussion questions:

  1. What impact does your phone greeting have on customers?

  2. What is one way that you build personal connections over the phone?

  3. How have you filled dead air?

  4. Describe one takeaway from the holds and transfers module.

  5. What is one technique you can use to move the call forward while still being friendly?

Assignments for next week: Ask your team to watch the following videos and complete the related activities.

  1. Tune out distractions

  2. Listen over the phone

  3. Use advanced communication techniques (A)

  4. Deliver moments of "wow" (A)

  5. Complete the quiz at the end of chapter 2

Week 3: Exceed expectations over the phone

The focus is understanding customer needs so you can consistently meet or exceed their expectations. Start by reviewing the week two assignments.

Discussion questions:

  1. How can you tune out distractions?

  2. What are examples of listening techniques you use to understand customers?

  3. How have you used visual references when communication with customers?

  4. What is one opportunity you've had to delight a customer?

Assignments for next week: Ask your team to watch the following videos and complete the related activities.

  1. How to express empathy (A)

  2. De-escalate angry calls

  3. Friendly follow-up (A)

  4. Stay focused while you work (A)

  5. Create your action plan (A)

Week 4: Solve problems over the phone

The final week is focused on service recovery. Start by reviewing the week three assignments.

Discussion questions:

  1. How can you express empathy with customers?

  2. What techniques have you used to de-escalate angry calls?

  3. How can you apply the friendly follow-up technique?

  4. What have you done to stay focused at work?

  5. What is your top takeaway from the course?

Remind participants that they can earn a certificate for their LinkedIn profile by doing the following:

  1. Watch all the videos

  2. Complete the chapter quizzes

This how-to guide provides additional help with accessing certificates.

Conclusion

It helps to go back to your original goals for this training and note the team's progress.

Your employees should show improvement in their phone skills, but it's likely they also have areas for continued growth.

Set aside time to provide each person with coaching and feedback. You can also give them weekly reminders from the Customer Service Tip of the Week.

Help phone customers faster with visual communication

Your customer struggles to describe the problem over the phone. "The doohickey won't connect with the thingamajig," they stammer.

Their words don't make sense.

You try to walk them through some diagnostics. It's equally muddled. The customer can’t see something that should be right in front of them.

Are you two even looking at the same thing?

This would be so much easier if you were face-to-face. You could see exactly what the customer was talking about and vice-versa.

In this post, I'm going to share three techniques you can use to solve this problem when serving customers via phone, email, or chat.

You don't need any special software, though I will show you some ways that software can make it easier.

Use visual words

Visual words can often help you quickly get on the same page with a customer. The goal is to establish a common frame of reference.

I primarily use this technique over the phone. A support agent named Janelle recently used this concept brilliantly to help me diagnose an issue with my cable modem.

Janelle: “Do you see some lights on the front of your modem?”
Me: “Yes.”
Janelle: “What does the top light look like?”
Me: “It appears to be the power light. It’s solid green.”
Janelle: “Great. What about the next light?”

Janelle guided me like this until the issue was fully resolved. It seemed a bit slow in the moment, but I realized by the end of the call that it was really pretty fast. Janelle’s visual communication saved a lot of confusion and gave me confidence.

Visual communication works well for email and chat in two situations:

  1. Quickly explain simple concepts

  2. No other visuals are easily available

Customers often contact me for help downloading the exercise files that come with my LinkedIn Learning courses. Many ask for help on the course's Q&A page, where I don't have the option of attaching a screenshot.

I try to guide them with visual words since I can't share visuals. Here's how it works:

  1. Identify a visual reference

  2. Use that reference to guide the customer

I used visual words to guide the learner to the exercise files:

The way my response is formatted is outside of my control. All the text gets squished together in one paragraph, so I kept my answer short to make it easy to read.

This technique works really well when you and your customer can both look at the same thing, such as a website or a document. Here's a short video that provides a demonstration, including a good and a bad example.

Share a picture

Pictures and graphics can quickly put you and your customer on the same page. There are many situations where this is helpful:

  • Troubleshooting software

  • Diagnosing a product quality issue

  • Generating a price estimate

Customers can often access photos on their phone or email while they talk to you.

When my car got a minor scratch on the rear bumper, the salesperson at the bumper company asked me to text a few photos of the damage. I snapped some photos with my phone and got an instant quote. Happy with the price, we scheduled the service for the next day.

Email and chat is perfect for sharing photos.

LinkedIn Learning customers sometimes contact me via email or LinkedIn messaging to ask for help downloading exercise files. Those channels allow me to attach an image, so I can share this screenshot:

Share a video

Video can take visual communication to the next level. It works especially well for a multi-step process. Your customers can also use it to review what you shared with them.

My mechanic calls me to walk me through the vehicle inspection whenever I drop off my car for service. He then sends a video that provides a detailed walk-through of everything he shared.

Video is great for email and chat, too.

Osprey makes awesome backpacks for hikers and other outdoor enthusiasts. They post really helpful product walk-through videos that customer service reps can reference when assisting customers.

Writing this post gave me an idea for helping people find the exercise files for my LinkedIn Learning courses. A short video shows people exactly how to access them. I can share a video link in situations where I can’t attach a picture or a video.

Additional Resources

There are software tools that can make it even easier for you and your customers to share visuals via phone, email, or chat.

Technical support teams can use Birdie to enable customers to share a screen capture video when they submit a ticket. Customers don't need any special software, which makes it easier for them to share.

Birdie integrates with a lot of customer service platforms, such as Zendesk:

Another option is Gryyp. It allows screen sharing and even co-browsing, so you and your customers can literally be on the same page while you talk on the phone.

Here's an example:

Take Action

Try experimenting with these techniques. Use visual words, share pictures, and find opportunities to share short videos.

Visual communication doesn't need to be slick to be helpful. The video I created to help people find the exercise files in my courses is pretty low-quality. I could spend more time making it pretty, but it gets the job done.

The goal is to use visuals to establish a common frame of reference so you can help customers faster.