Building customer loyalty: the three skills that every customer service rep must have.

New research has pinpointed three skills that customer service representatives must have in order to build customer loyalty.

The study, "Roadmaps for Delivering Winning Service," from The Forum Corp., Boston, says that companies with the most effective loyalty-inducing service train their representatives to:

* Resolve problems. Service representatives are often the first to have contact with a dissatisfied customer or to become aware of a situation that might cause a customer to become dissatisfied. The best reps see complaints as opportunities, since resolving them to the customer's satisfaction is known to enhance customer loyalty.

* Cross sell. Service representatives are in an ideal position to propose that the customer purchase additional services or products based on the customer's need. Doing so helps the customer by addressing his stated need or identifying new ones.

* Assure quality. Soliciting feedback and following up to ensure that service has been delivered to the customers satisfaction can have big payoffs in terms of fostering customer loyalty. Doing so can involve both simple and complex behaviors, ranging from routinely asking whether the customer is satisfied to improving delivery processes.