One bad customer service experience is enough to tarnish someone’s brand relationship. Consistently good customer service does the opposite. It turns customers into loyal brand advocates who spend more and drive new business through word of mouth, which remains important, with two-thirds of consumers saying they will recommend a brand they love to friends and family.
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Winning that loyalty is harder than ever in a crowded market. A great product is the baseline requirement. Customers expect more in return for their ongoing loyalty, and good customer service bridges that gap. Good customer service makes customers feel appreciated and valued, and solving their problems quickly is a core part of that experience. A fast resolution shows the brand respects their time and genuinely cares about their happiness and success with the product.
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What is good customer service?
Good customer service is timely, empathetic, and omnichannel support that solves a customer’s problem and leaves them feeling valued. Great customer service teams incorporate feedback loops for continual improvement and offer self-service resources for customers who want to solve problems independently.
Good customer service means building relationships with your customers. This can mean teams have a rapid response time to service requests, respond to all customer feedback (positive or negative), have self-service help documents, and create a frictionless process for getting in touch with support.
“For complex problems, good customer service looks like active listening and even discovery questions like, ‘What troubleshooting have you already done for this?’ [It also looks like] repeating back the problem statement to the customer before offering a solution so that we are both on the same page,” says Caleb King, senior inbound consultant at HubSpot.
Beyond rapid response times and omnichannel support, here are six additional common characteristics of good customer service teams.
1. Rapid Response Times
Customers are always looking for fast solutions. In fact, 66% of adults say that the most important thing a company can do is value their time. Customer support teams must focus on efficiency and develop a workflow that streamlines different support functions. Consider adopting a help desk tool to manage and automate various service tasks. Service Hub includes a built-in help desk that centralizes incoming requests, automates ticket routing, and gives managers real-time visibility into team performance and response times
2. Customer Feedback Collection and Analysis
Although customer service needs vary depending on the type of business, the best customer service teams use feedback collection tools to identify the specific needs of their customer base and create personalized solutions.
Rather than assuming what customers want, reach out to them through surveys and interviews to get their perspective on your business. These feedback collection methods will help service teams uncover new opportunities to enhance their products and improve the customer experience.
3. Customer Self-service
When customers want to resolve service issues, they should use the self-service resources a business provides. For example, one of the most common self-service resources is a knowledge base.
Knowledge bases consist of categorized support articles and FAQ pages that supply customers with solutions to common user roadblocks. As more customers seek to solve problems independently, self-service tools like these are valuable for providing high-quality customer service.
4. Omnichannel Support
It should be easy for customers to contact a support team, regardless of the channel they use. Teams should be equipped to respond to incoming service requests via phone, email, social media, live chat, and any other communication channel that customers prefer. Providing this omnichannel experience makes teams more accessible and creates less stressful service interactions.
5. Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence refers to the ability to read and react to other people’s emotions. This skill is precious in customer service roles because it helps diffuse difficult customer interactions. Every business experiences a frustrated or upset customer, but the best service teams can de-escalate the situation and prevent potential churn. Avoidable churn represents $35.3 billion lost revenue annually, much of it driven by poor service experiences that could have been turned around with the right response.
6. Creative Problem Solving
At the end of the day, the best customer service teams solve their customers’ problems. They’re tenacious and determined to help their customers achieve their goals. This often requires agents to be creative and develop unique solutions to customer issues. As you’ll see in the examples below, sometimes excellent customer service means finding a solution that falls outside of normal company protocol.
Benefits of Good Customer Service
The benefits of good customer service are increased customer loyalty, advocacy, satisfaction, and retention. Good service also drives repeat purchases and protects revenue. HubSpot’s State of Customer Service report reveals that customer retention is a top goal for service leaders, and rightfully so, as 88% of consumers are more likely to make a repeat purchase following a great customer service experience.
Customers delighted by great service experiences don’t just come back to purchase more. They bring other potential customers with them. When asked what earns their loyalty, 70% of consumers cite friendly, convenient, and fast customer support as a deciding factor. After a great experience, these loyal customers are 5.1 times more likely to recommend a product or service to their friends and family.
Good customer service results in tangible business outcomes, i.e., more money. Three in four consumers say they’ll spend more money with businesses that consistently deliver good customer experiences. On the flip side, poor customer service will drive customers away fast. 73% of consumers say they’ll switch to a competitor after multiple bad customer service experiences, and for as many as half, one bad experience is enough to churn. In a crowded market where strong products are everywhere, customers have no shortage of options, and top-tier customer service becomes a real competitive differentiator.
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Types of Customer Service
Good customer service is omnichannel, meaning customers can get support across all channels, and those channels are connected in a shared inbox so they never have to repeat themselves when they switch.
Customers prefer different support channels for different situations. For quick problems or how-to guides, many customers would rather use self-service resources in a knowledge base. Some customers may prefer to speak directly with a representative on the phone, while others prefer the instant feedback of live chat, whether powered by an AI agent or a real human. Bottom line, it’s up to businesses to offer omnichannel support so customers can get in contact when they want, how they want.
Phone Support
Phone support is the most traditional customer service channel. A customer calls a dedicated support line and, ideally without a long hold, speaks directly with a human rep who troubleshoots the issue and guides them to a solution. It remains the channel of choice for urgent or complex problems, and for customers who simply prefer talking to a person, such as older adults, with 50% naming it as their top channel.
As a customer service representative at HubSpot from 2015 to 2017, I spent most of my time on the phone queue, fielding multiple calls a day. The calls tended to fall into two camps: older customers, often Boomers and Gen X, who were used to getting support the old-fashioned way, and customers who knew they had a thornier issue that needed hands-on, back-and-forth troubleshooting.
Email Support
Email support is an asynchronous channel that’s great for non-urgent issues. A customer sends a message to the support address and goes about their day, getting a reply whenever a rep works through the queue. It is a familiar channel that customers are comfortable with, and one every support team should offer.
Email support teams benefit from experienced representatives who can quickly assess simple requests and provide complete answers in a single reply. Because email is a one-shot reply with none of the live back-and-forth a phone call allows, a rep has to read the situation correctly the first time, which requires experience to quickly spot simple requests and answer them briefly yet completely.
Live Chat
Live chat is a newer channel that lets customers message a support agent in real time through a widget on a company’s website or app. It works best for quick questions and status updates that don’t call for deep troubleshooting.
HubSpot offers free live chat software that automatically connects website visitors and customers with the right team members via a customizable widget.
Social Media Support
Social media support meets customers on the platforms where they are already talking. Customers often post about a product on X or Instagram, praising it or airing a complaint in public. A dedicated social support team can turn those moments into loyalty by resolving issues out in the open, answering questions quickly, and celebrating customer wins in real time.
I was on HubSpot’s Twitter support team back when it was still called Twitter. In those days, social media support was still a relatively new channel, and customers were often delighted just to be recognized and helped when they didn’t expect anyone to respond at all. These days, social media support is an expected channel, but it is still one of the best ways to surprise and delight customers and build goodwill with an audience.
Self-service and Knowledge Bases
Self-service resources and a knowledge base are non-negotiable support channels for modern businesses. Customers are busy, and most would rather solve a problem themselves than wait for a call or an email reply. Salesforce found that 61% of customers prefer to use self-service for simple issues instead of contacting an agent. Given the choice, they will find the right help article and handle it themselves.
Personally, I’m a huge fan of self-service. Anytime I have a support issue, I’ll research extensively to find the answer on my own rather than call in for an awkward conversation or have to wait for an email reply. As a former support rep, I also leaned heavily on our self-service resources, both for my own troubleshooting and for sending to customers. Sharing those articles helped me teach customers to solve problems themselves if they came up again.
Modern solutions such as HubSpot’s knowledge base supercharge self-service resources with powerful AI features. The software can automatically surface appropriate self-service content to customers based on natural-language queries, or within the help desk to streamline reps’ troubleshooting and communication.
AI Chatbots and Interactive Voice Response (IVR)
AI chatbots and interactive voice response (IVR) systems can automatically deflect incoming support inquiries. An AI customer service chatbot like HubSpot’s Breeze Customer Agent can be embedded directly in a website or an app and interpret customers’ natural language queries to answer questions instantly. IVR provides AI-driven phone support, using voice prompts to answer simple questions or route callers to the right rep.
Because the AI agent draws its answers from verified knowledge-base content, it is far less prone to inaccurate answers and hallucinations that can affect general-purpose LLMs. These systems can also hand off complicated or escalated cases directly to human reps.
These tools are useful for high-volume, repetitive questions like:
- Order status
- Password resets
- Business hours
- Basic troubleshooting
By deflecting common tickets, these tools shorten wait times and lighten the load on human reps, allowing them to focus on complex, high-stakes issues that require actual human judgment.
How to Provide Great Customer Service
1. Prioritize the customer’s goals and needs.
Good customer service is meeting customers’ needs and helping them achieve their goals. Solving technical issues is baseline, but customers also need to feel valued and understood. Prioritizing their needs is an organizational mindset, not just a job for the customer service team. In practice, that means going above and beyond, escalating cases when necessary, and giving reps the freedom to decide what exceeding expectations looks like.
As a HubSpot support rep, the key was cultivating genuine empathy — truly wanting to know what a customer was trying to accomplish and how to help them get there. A customer-obsessed organization sends that value trickling down through every team and product.
2. Be responsive and fast.
Good customer service is fast. It’s also thorough and empathetic, but speed significantly shapes how customers perceive the quality of support. Customers are busy, and a quick response is not just a convenience. It shows that a company values them and their most precious resource: time.
Delivering fast customer support at scale increasingly depends on automation. 92% of CRM leaders say AI has improved their response times. Automated customer service tools like HubSpot’s Breeze customer agent and others act as force multipliers for support organizations, enabling them to handle significantly more incoming requests by deflecting simple questions and freeing up bandwidth for human reps.
Pro tip: As a support rep at HubSpot, I learned that a timely response was always appreciated, even when I didn’t have the answer yet. I’d often reply with something simple like, “Thanks so much for your email. I’m looking into it now and will get back to you as soon as I can.” Just setting that expectation with a quick first reply, answer or not, consistently left customers feeling valued.
3. Show genuine interest and enthusiasm.
Good customer service requires a support team that shows genuine interest and enthusiasm for helping customers. This is, of course, easier said than done, and customers can see through feigned excitement or an overly effusive greeting. In terms of concrete behaviors, it shows up as actively listening, acknowledging the customer’s feelings (not just what went wrong), and seeking to understand the customer’s goal before jumping in with a solution.
In my experience as a former support rep at HubSpot, genuine empathy, interest, and enthusiasm start at a cultural level. When a company values both its customers and the reps who serve them, that care flows naturally into conversations. At HubSpot, I found I could connect with customers and was enthusiastic about helping them achieve their goals. I didn’t have to fake enthusiasm because I believed in the company’s mission.
4. Be accountable when things go wrong.
Good customer service means owning it when things go wrong. Taking responsibility for a mistake, instead of hiding or deflecting, can turn a bad interaction into a great one. Seventy-five percent of shoppers say businesses can win back their trust by responding with great customer service in the wake of a mistake. Accountability means clearly communicating the status of issues, acknowledging how the customer feels, and never denying that a problem exists.
As a HubSpot support rep, I found that leveling with customers honestly when something was our fault and keeping them posted on the fix turned a frustrating situation into a positive one almost every time. Customers just want to be kept in the loop.
5. Provide omnichannel support options.
Good customer service is reachable wherever customers choose to reach out. When customers move from one channel to another, they should be able to pick the conversation up with full context, without ever having to repeat themselves. That means offering omnichannel support. Omnichannel support includes:
- Phone
- SMS
- Live chat/AI chatbots
- In-store
- Social media
- Self-service
Omnichannel support enables more personalized service experiences and increased customer satisfaction. It delivers 67% CSAT compared to just 28% for disconnected multichannel setups. When reps have full context of the customer’s ticket history and overall history via an omni-channel shared inbox and connected CRM, they can provide a consistent, efficient support experience that drives customer loyalty.
6. Learn from feedback.
Learning from customer feedback is a cornerstone of good customer service. Teams that listen to what customers tell them and act on it tend to see stronger loyalty, higher satisfaction, and lower churn.
When teams create simple, low-friction ways for customers to submit feedback, whether directly to a rep or through a feedback form, they show customers that their voice matters and that the company wants to build products and services around their needs. Complaints and recurring questions are also feedback, and they’re often more useful than praise.
Recurring complaints can point to feature gaps or product issues that need fixing. A question that keeps showing up in the support queue points to a gap in the self-service content, an unclear part of the product’s UX, or a need for better training for reps. Service Hub’s feedback tools make it easy to collect CSAT and NPS scores at key moments in the customer journey and surface recurring themes across the support queue
As a HubSpot support rep, I saw how much customers appreciated being heard. They were ecstatic when their feedback led to real updates or changes in the product, because it showed we were listening and valued their input.
Good Customer Service Examples
1. Grubhub
Grubhub, the popular food delivery platform, exemplifies good customer service by turning a common issue into a dependable fix. When an order arrives late, customers can file a quick claim in the app and receive a Grubhub Guarantee Perk worth at least $5 towards a future order.
Grubhub successfully turned a common food-delivery pain point into a predictable driver of customer loyalty. Food deliveries are sometimes late, and that’s not even GrubHub’s fault, but by consistently owning the issue and making it easy for customers to claim, they cultivate goodwill and encourage customers to return, knowing they have their backs.
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The Takeaway
Even a small gesture or remedy in the face of a customer problem exemplifies good customer service. Especially when customers can rely on a brand’s customer service to take care of them when something goes wrong, they will return the favor with loyalty and continued spending. GrubHub successfully turned an inevitable problem into a reason for customers to keep coming back.
2. Target
In 2023, Target implemented a return policy change aimed at customer convenience. Target’s Drive Up return policy allowed customers to drive to Target, park, and have a team member meet them at the car to process their return. It’s an easy, stress-free option for Target customers who may have disabilities, have kids or pets in tow, or just want to stay in the comfort of their car, get the return done quickly, and keep moving to the next destination.
The Takeaway
Target’s free return policy is an example of good customer service because it’s purely a convenience-and-satisfaction play. It’s a policy change squarely aimed at making the customer’s life easier and at helping them do business with the company. The result is that customers feel like Target values their business and their time, which is a boon to customer satisfaction and loyalty.
3. Bombas
Bombas is a socks and apparel company with a values-driven mission that customers can feel in the service they receive. Bombas has a 1-to-1 donation model, where for every pair of socks purchased, the company donates a pair to someone in need. When it’s time for customers to get support, Bombas’ support team extends those values to them. If a customer requests a return or a refund, the Bombas team will often encourage the customer to donate the item, help them locate a local charity organization, and deliver them a full refund.
The Takeaway
Bombas is an example of a company that aligns its customer service objectives with brand values and goals. Customers feel good about spending their money with companies that share their values. Bombas shows how brands can permeate those values to customers through great service, which results in increased loyalty and spending.
4. Klarna
Klarna, the global digital bank and flexible payments provider, exemplifies good customer service through a systems-level improvement. They didn’t implement a flashy return policy or send customers handwritten notes to boost satisfaction. Instead, they streamlined internal support operations using AI-powered tools to solve customer inquiries more quickly.
Klarna’s Average resolution time dropped from 11 minutes to 2 minutes, and they saw a 25% drop in repeat inquiries after implementing AI customer service agent tools. In addition, their implementation of AI tools powered 24/7 support in more than 35 languages, allowing them to provide personalized support to their entire customer base.
The Takeaway
Good customer service is fast. Customers simply want their issues solved quickly, and ideally, the first time. Klarna shows how businesses can provide good customer service by optimizing systems and processes on the business side, ultimately saving customers time.
5. JetBlue
JetBlue provides an example of good customer service with a personal touch. This is a personal example, because it literally happened to me. In October of 2025, I had a flight to Orlando. It was a painful 6 AM flight on the day after my birthday. As I was getting on the plane, I felt a little down because of the 3 AM wake-up and being slammed with work the day before. I didn’t even get to celebrate my birthday, and I had just turned 33, which I have mixed, mostly negative feelings about.
JetBlue surprised me with the handwritten note pictured above when I got to my seat. A kind flight attendant came up to me, put his hand on my shoulder, and asked me if I was Rami (I am). At first, I thought I was in trouble, but after I confirmed my identity, he handed me that little card, signed by the whole crew, and told me I could have an extra snack, on the house, or the plane, rather. It was really such a small gesture, but it solidified my loyalty to JetBlue. Case in point: me evangelizing them in this blog post.
The Takeaway
Personalization and customer service go a long way in making customers feel valued and appreciated. Even the smallest, cheapest gestures can build real loyalty. A signed card and a free snack cost almost nothing, but making a customer feel remembered on a hard day is what turns a one-time buyer into a long-term advocate.
6. Basecamp
Basecamp’s customer service strength comes from how they prioritize the needs of its support team. Basecamp ensures good customer service by reducing employee stress and improving the well-being of its customer support team, knowing this leads to better outcomes for customers.
To improve the service team’s well-being, Basecamp intentionally schedules time when reps can be away from queues to focus on research, innovation, and creativity. Every day, Basecamp customer service reps get a full two hours away from emails to focus on other projects. The extra time ensures reps don’t burn out and remain in tip-top shape to solve customer problems. Since they’re happier and more fulfilled in their work, customers receive better service outcomes.
The Takeaway
Time spent away from the queues isn’t time wasted. Support teams that build in regular time for employee enrichment and allow support reps to pursue projects within the organization, or even outside of it, will see the benefits. The result is a more engaged and energized support team who can meet customer needs authentically, empathetically, and with genuine enthusiasm.
Frequently Asked Questions About Good Customer Service
How do you describe good customer service?
Good customer service is fast and effective. It solves customers’ problems quickly and empathetically, with the end goal of meeting their needs, not just closing the ticket. Good customer service teams have fast response times and first-contact resolution rates; they offer omnichannel support; and they act on customer feedback, leaving customers feeling understood and valued after each interaction.
What’s an example of excellent customer service?
Excellent customer service means going above and beyond to meet customer needs, solve problems, and create moments of delight. A well-known example is the Ritz-Carlton, where any employee is empowered to spend up to $2,000 to resolve a guest’s problem on the spot, without manager approval. Smaller gestures count too, like a rep following up days later, checking in on customers, sending a replacement, or issuing a refund before the customer even has to ask.
What are the qualities of a good customer service rep?
A good customer service rep has strong communication skills, high levels of emotional intelligence, and solid product knowledge and troubleshooting ability. Good customer service reps listen actively to understand customers’ needs and goals, not just to close the case. They remain patient, empathize with frustrated customers, and take full ownership of issues, especially when they make mistakes.
What kind of customer service is best?
The best customer service meets customers on their preferred channel, maintains context throughout the interaction so customers never have to repeat themselves, and solves issues with an emphasis on customer needs and delight. Good customer service builds trust. It is fast, empathetic, and consistent.
You’re on your way to great service.
The best customer service is firmly pointed toward customer needs. Teams that position their service around timely responses, empathetic communication, and an authentic desire to help customers succeed with a product or service will see stronger customer retention, greater trust, and lower churn.
Ready to start prioritizing great customer service? HubSpot Service Hub is a great place to begin. It’s an omnichannel platform that helps service teams deliver fast, connected support across every channel.
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in August 2021 and has since been updated for comprehensiveness.
The State of Customer Service Report
Unlock essential strategies for exceeding customer expectations and driving business growth in a competitive market.
- Exclusive insights from worldwide CRM leaders
- Analysis of modern customer behaviors
- Closer look at the AI opportunity in CRM
- Strategies for staying agile in 2024 and beyond
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Customer Service
