“Always Exceed Customer Expectations” Mr. Suhail Masri – VP Sales, Bayt.com
Mr. Suhail Masri is Vice President of Sales at Bayt.com. In this interview he explains the customer service philosophy behind Bayt.com’s overwhelming success over the years.
Q: You have more than 20 years of experience in business development. In your opinion what is the relation between customer service and sales? Mr. Suhail Masri: Throughout my years of experience in the sales sector, I discovered that there is a direct positive correlation between customer service and client retention, because increase in quality of service will improve customer retention, and thus lead to repeat sales. In fact, customers need to trust the company they are working with; they need to make sure that you are ready to help them, to improve the quality of customer service if needed, and to always exceed their expectations. This trust will build a strong relationship with the customers who will then become loyal ones. The spillover effect of having a good customer service record will be that it will enhance your market reputation, and lead to positive brand association – all this will eventually help increase sales as well. Q: Bayt.com is fulfilling the needs of two diverse segments of the career services industry, job seekers and employers. How does the company ensure both these types of customers are satisfied with its services? Mr. Suhail Masri: Our mission at Bayt.com is to empower people with the tools and technology to lead better lives. From the job seeker side, we connect them to thousands of new jobs and employers in the region, and we offer access to a wealth of information through Bayt.com Salaries, research reports, career articles, a career blog and finally, a career mapping tool. For those who like to network and reinforce their professional brand while getting recognition from peers, the Bayt.com Specialties platform is also a thriving community that connects a global spectrum of dedicated professionals who share similar skills or ‘Specialties’. On the other hand, we serve employers by ensuring they have the most efficient, most costeffective ways to hire the best available talent. Bayt.com has served over 40,000 registered employers by giving them access to cutting-edge hiring tools and technology. Bayt.com also offers employers the opportunity to create customized career microsites through the Branded Career Channel platform, as well as host Virtual Job Fairs, which is a much cost-effective option for employers compared to a traditional brick-and-mortar job fair. Bayt.com serves both these segments of stakeholders through the process of constant innovation, which has allowed us to remain ahead of the curve. Q: What is the most challenging aspect that Bayt.com faces on a daily basis while dealing with customers?
Mr. Suhail Masri: One of the initial challenges we faced back in the year 2000 was that the internet was still extremely young and very much in its infancy in the region. It took a lot of time and patience to effect the transition from traditional recruitment methods to online recruitment at the professional level and across all career levels from fresh graduates to senior executive, management and board. Our work has paid off and it is no longer a challenge; there are many millions of people using online channels to find jobs. In fact, today, one of the main challenges we are constantly solving is the exact opposite; the challenge of choice. With so many top CVs online, employers need very powerful filtering tools to find the perfect candidate, while job seekers have to stand out in a large pool of qualified candidates. We have a whole team dedicated to constantly come up with tools and technologies to help both employers and job seekers solve the issue of choice by providing very powerful CV screening and filtering tools to the former and ways in which a CV or professional profile can stand out to the latter. Today, we’re proud to tackle this challenge headfirst with the industryleading Bayt.com CV Search, which allows employers on Bayt.com to use unique filtering technology to pinpoint the perfect candidates for their vacancies. Q: How does improved customer experience lead to an increase in sales? Mr. Suhail Masri: Our mission at Bayt.com is to empower employers with the tools and information they need to recruit the best talent available. Our customer service methodology is very much related to this mission: we passionately work to ensure that employers are finding the most relevant candidates quickly, easily, and cost-efficiently, and we do that by listening to customer feedback then enhancing our technology. We believe in building great products and ensuring that our experts are constantly training employers on how to use them. Because of this, employers see results, and that’s what matters at the end of the day. We’re a customer-centric business, and our services and products are created according to customer needs. We believe that satisfied customers will enjoy working with us as much as we enjoy working with them! Q: How do you see technology shaping customer service expectations in the coming years? Mr. Suhail Masri: In today’s age, with the proliferation of social networking, smart devices and apps, people are more demanding when it comes to information. With better and faster access to news, information and online reviews, people demand ‘instant gratification’. This makes customers today very discerning ones indeed. The great news is that it also makes it easier for a company to reach out to its customers and to gather feedback instantly, so issues can be tackled quickly and efficiently. This is a great opportunity for companies that care about serving their clients in the best way possible.
Q: What are the future plans of your company to further improve the service experience for clients? Mr. Suhail Masri: We value the feedback of our customers and we’re constantly improving our services based on the feedback loop that we have in place. At Bayt.com, our teams are always changing and launching new ways to improve our customer service and serve our clients
better. We have great plans ahead to improve our customer experience, ranging from more training, to an ever-evolving proactive online experience, to webinars on how to best use Bayt.com. It’s all very exciting!