Tried and Tested Techniques to Make Customers Feel Special

How you make customers feel is often a key differentiator in their service experience. It can even be more influential than the product and price itself as to whether they choose to return or walk away.

But you don’t just have to wait for Customer Appreciation Day for an excuse to make customers feel special. There are lots of opportunities to make sure they feel genuinely cared for – every day.

That’s why we asked our reader panel of contact centre leaders – featuring representatives from Citizens Advice, Costa Coffee, and more – for tried and tested techniques their agents use to make customers feel special.

Spend an Extra 30–60 Seconds Personalizing the Close of a Call

We all crave that feeling: the quiet certainty that we’re seen – not just as another account number, but as a real person whose time, preferences, and story actually matter. The secret lies in what I call the critical non-essentials. 

These are the small, often unmeasured details that cost little (or nothing) to deliver but create disproportionate delight.

When I led customer service at First Utility, we deliberately introduced a handful of these “non-critical” changes:

• Agents were empowered (and encouraged) to spend an extra 30–60 seconds personalizing the close of a call, using the customer’s name warmly, acknowledging something specific from the conversation, or offering a genuine “thank you for being with us.”
• We built simple flags in the CRM for awareness. A customer calling three times in a month flagged there was an unresolved issue that a manager needed to investigate and take ownership of.
• We removed arbitrary call-time targets that punished empathy, replacing them with the “customer felt heard” as the North Star and real time customer feedback, including a manager calling a customer back within 30 minutes for a dissatisfied score.
• Small gestures became normalised: a happy birthday message or proactively checking in after a long-standing issue was resolved.

None of these were mission-critical to their core service need, but they changed everything.

Contributed by: David Neale, Founder of GBPO Solutions

Listen for the Worry Underneath the Question

Working in the NHS, a lot of the people we speak to are already feeling the strain. They’re often worried about money, unsure what they’re entitled to, or trying to support a young family.

That’s why the small things really matter. In my experience, the quickest wins come from simply taking the time to properly listen. Not just to the question, but to the worry underneath it.

When someone calls about help with their health costs or to access the NHS Healthy Start scheme, there’s often a quiet anxiety behind the conversation.

A bit of reassurance “Let’s see what we can do to help” can change everything. You can almost feel their shoulders drop.

Let Them Know What Happens Next and How Long Things Take

Being proactive is another easy but powerful way to help people feel cared for. Letting someone know what happens next, how long things take, and what they can expect makes a huge difference.

For a parent trying to access Healthy Start, understanding what support they’ll receive often lifts a weight straight off their mind. It’s a small moment for us, but it’s a big one for them.

Contributed by: Dan Britton, Director of Operations, Citizen Services, NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA)

Make Sure QA Focus on Empathy, Tone, and Rapport – Not Just Process

The easiest ways to make our customers feel special is to do the small things, use their name, build rapport, and use empathy. 

In the end, a customer will always remember how we made them feel and by focusing on this we can make every customer experience a special one.

As Maya Angelou perfectly said: “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

I have found the best way to deliver results in this area is by reinforcing these simple customer focused behaviours through Quality Assurance (QA). 

When QA focuses not only on process but also empathy, tone and rapport, customer satisfaction naturally lifts. This is the foundation we need to allow innovation and technology to enhance our customers’ experience.

Contributed by: Kirstyn Minogue, Customer Contact Centre Manager, Black & White Cabs

For the most common mistakes that compromise empathy in the contact centre, read our article: What’s Really Ruining Empathy in Customer Service?

Don’t Just Do the Bare Minimum on Every Call

As a charity and advice service, we deal with a lot of clients in crisis – and the foundation to making them feel special comes from our agents’ behaviours.

For example, making sure that they show the client that they understand the query as quickly as possible by actively listening and reflecting back to the client – giving them confidence that they will be helped and supported.

Being honest and doing what we have said we will do is key to building that trust and connection.

Our agents also take every opportunity to support the clients with income maximisation and with grant applications where appropriate, which allows them to make a real impact on the client’s situation.

(One slightly cheesy line that I’ve always used when speaking to advisors is “If you put yourself in the client’s shoes, they can’t walk away!”.)

One of our agents recently supported a client with what first appeared to be an issue with the heating in his property, but by utilizing all the skills mentioned above, they were able to build a connection with the client and identified they were without a working cooker or a bed – they were then able to source grant funding to supply those items, providing the client with a much improved quality of life, just from one phone call!

Contributed by: John Pearson, Contact Centre Manager at Citizens Advice Gateshead

Be Yourself. Share Your Personality, and Avoid Sounding Scripted

Making customers feel special doesn’t always require grand gestures – often it’s about creating genuine human connections.

Recently, I spent a day in our stores chatting with customers and watching them enjoy their drinks and cakes. It struck me how easy it is to create those “moments of heart” in person but how do we replicate that over the phone?

I believe the answer lies in active listening and authenticity. Listening isn’t just hearing words, it’s about picking up cues on how a customer feels, asking clarifying questions and responding with empathy.

Customers want to feel understood, not processed. One of the simplest yet most impactful strategies is being yourself. Share your personality, avoid sounding scripted, and let the conversation flow naturally.

Interestingly, I’ve found many customers aren’t looking for refunds or compensation. What they truly want is acknowledgement and confirmation that you’ve understood their issue, taken it on board, and are committed to resolving it. That sense of being heard and cared for often matters more than any monetary gesture.

Contributed by: Deborah Woods, Contact Centre Manager at Costa Coffee

Don’t Force Them to Repeat Their Story Three Times Over

After analyzing thousands of customer conversations and implementing improvements across different operations, I’ve realized that making customers feel special has nothing to do with fancy scripts or complicated processes. It’s about genuinely paying attention to the details.

The simplest thing I’ve learned? Speed on that first response changes everything. When you respond within seconds, you’re already showing respect for their time. But here’s the catch, being fast means nothing if you then make them repeat their story three times over.

In a recent project where I analysed over 10,000 conversations, I noticed customers were genuinely satisfied when the next agent already knew about their previous issue. Sounds obvious, but it rarely happens!

Contributed by: Jose Luiz De Oliveira Neto, Manager at Accenture

To find out more about the relationship between customer effort, emotion, and resolution, read our article: Customer Effort and Emotion – 10 Reasons to Take Action Today

Always Call Back When You Said You Would

One of the key areas we focus in on is calling a customer back or following up when you said you would. It sounds obvious, but it’s so often a missed opportunity.

When a customer is told “I’ll call you tomorrow at 10am” and that call actually happens, it lets the customer know you care and builds respect and confidence that the issue or question will get resolved.

Being proactive means the customer doesn’t have to chase, repeat themselves, or worry they’ve been forgotten. That sense of being kept in mind is powerful and turns what is likely a negative experience (customers rarely call because they’re happy!), into a more positive one.

Taking ownership and accountability is equally crucial. Customers feel more valued when one person sees an issue through from start to finish – instead of passing them between departments.

Contributed by: Darran Crook, Head of Customer Service, Connect Fibre

Validate Moments Where Customers Might Feel Disappointed

In our organization, there are situations where, due to defined policies or vendor data limitations, we are unable to proceed with further investigation or fulfil a customer’s request.

In these moments, customers may feel disappointed, frustrated, or even ignored. Our first and most important step is to acknowledge and validate these emotions.

We clearly explain the reason behind our decision, but we avoid delivering it as a cold or purely procedural response. Instead, we communicate with empathy, showing the customer that we understand their dissatisfaction and that their experience truly matters to us.

When customers feel heard and emotionally acknowledged, the tension of the situation significantly decreases, even if the answer remains unchanged.

To positively close the emotional journey, we offer a small yet meaningful gesture: a discount code for future purchases.

This gesture is not positioned as a replacement for their request, but as a sign of appreciation for their patience and understanding. It sends a simple but powerful message: “Even if we couldn’t say yes, you are still valued”.

Contributed by: Fatemeh Fasihi, Contact Centre Supervisor, Snappfood

Circle Back to Say “We Know Yesterday Must Have Been Frustrating…”

One of the most effective strategies I’ve observed is the proactive follow-up. Consider scenarios where things don’t go as planned, a family experiences a power outage, or an important delivery arrives late.

Typically, once the issue is resolved, the company moves on. However, when an organization takes the time to follow up the next day with a message like, “We know yesterday must have been frustrating; has everything been resolved to your satisfaction?” it creates meaningful connection.

It’s personal, unexpected, and demonstrates that the company genuinely cares about the individual experience. 

Contributed by: Gareth Brophy, Vice President of Customer Experience and Back Office Capabilities at The DDC Group

Positively Acknowledge a Customer’s Efforts to Resolve a Situation Themselves

Making a customer feel special gets harder when you have to correct information that’s been misinterpreted.

However, this can be eased if you acknowledge their research before sharing your correction, for example:

“You are right in certain circumstances that business do have to give refunds for faulty goods, but this depends on time frames according to the law, and in your particular case you’re in a time frame where you would get a repair or replacement first before any refund can be given for further issues that might arise from that replacement.”

What you are doing here is showing acknowledgement of the client’s efforts to resolve a situation themselves, and adding/amending their knowledge to create a better outcome for them.

If this is delivered with empathy, understanding and from a position of support, this can really impress the customer and make sure they still feel special – regardless of how the conversation started.

Contributed by: Stevie Dent, Team Leader, Citizens Advice Gateshead

You can find out more about this approach in this article on What Does It Really Take to Correct a Customer Politely?

Go Above and Beyond to Meet a Customer’s Needs (Whenever Possible)

In the contact centre space, it is not a question of if something will go wrong at some point, but when.

We have had instances where a delay on an order occurred and the customer who happened to be local to the area needed their item that same day. We arranged to have an agent pick up the item and hand deliver it themselves to the customer.

To us, this is what we do every day, we solve the issues our customers are experiencing. But to the customer, this meant the world. We understood their need and found a way to make it happen. This is the attitude we strive for every single day. 

Contributed by: Shmuel Saklad, Senior Manager, Customer Experience & B2B Contact Centre Operations, B&H Photo Video

What Have You Tried to Make Your Customers Feel Special?

Click here to join our Readers Panel to share your experiences and feature in future Call Centre Helper articles.

If you are looking for more information to improve customer experience in your contact centre, read these articles next:

• 10 Tactics to Drive Up Customer Cooperation
• 10 Ways to Make Customers Feel More Valued
• Capture Customer Needs – Just Like This!

Author: Megan Jones
Reviewed by: Jo Robinson