Key Takeaways
Good — no, great — customer service can turn first-time buyers into loyal fans, but how do you reach support excellence right away as a small business or startup?
According to the latest State of the AI Connected Customer report, about 83% of customers expect to connect with a real person immediately and want their issues resolved by a single agent. That’s a tall order, but it’s also a huge opportunity for small and medium businesses (SMBs) to stand out — and free training is a great way to start.
Let’s find out how you can excel your customer service team through training, starting with Trailhead, Salesforce’s free online learning platform — for all your service needs (and sales, marketing, operations and more). Here we go.
Why is customer service training important for small teams?
All training is important for all teams, if we’re being honest. However, customers are now needing a level of service we haven’t seen before. Hyper-personalization is becoming mandatory, as customers reach out to businesses through various ways like chat, email, social media, and more. And service teams need to know how to respond to each method. Training helps your team adapt to this omnichannel world so no customer feels ignored or frustrated.
With technology changing fast, customers expect quick, personalized help across all channels. AI chatbots and customer relationship management (CRM) tools can help your team respond quicker and smarter. If your service isn’t up to speed, customers notice, and that can cost you some serious business. Training keeps your team sharp and ready to use these tools effectively, so they’re not left behind or overwhelmed.
Small business service at your fingertips
Tech skills aren’t enough — great customer service is all about answering the question (communication), understanding feelings and problems (empathy), and then giving the solution (resolution). Training builds these soft skills, and when customer service teams are well-trained, they can resolve issues quickly and accurately, leading to fewer inquiries and directly reducing customer churn.
You can get this knowledge through a mix of online courses, taken at your convenience. The key is making learning ongoing and practical so your team can apply what they learn right away. Let’s dive into three free courses that can help your team deliver the kind of service that keeps customers coming back.
Build a loyal customer base with smarter, faster service solutions.
Cool stuff about Trailhead
For a scaling team or startup where budget and time are tight, Trailhead offers free, self-paced learning that lets your team members level up their skills on their own schedule without cutting into precious resources. Here’s a few cool things about Trailhead (even beyond customer service teams):
- Earn badges and points: Every module you complete earns you points and digital badges. These badges are proof of your new skills and knowledge, acting like mini-certifications. Your service team can collect them to visibly track their progress and expertise.
- Level up your rank: As your team earns more points, they advance in the Trailhead ranks — from “Scout” to “Ranger” and beyond. This gamified progression creates friendly competition and motivation to keep learning.
- No cost, all reward: This entire learning ecosystem is free. Startups can build a highly skilled, certified service team without incurring expensive training costs, making it the perfect tool for fast, budget-conscious scaling.
3 free customer service courses for small business
Trailhead helps you both learn and upskill with both the technical and business know-how that you need. These free courses offer a gamified approach where you earn points toward badges.
Here’s a list of online customer service courses, brought to you by Salesforce and Trailhead, that you can take for free:
1. Service For Small Business
Start with the basics of customer service for small teams. In this module, learn how Starter Suite for service works, and basic customer support terms to know.
About the course: This module is tailored just for small businesses and startups — and is all about customer service terminology and the service channels you should know about.
What you’ll learn: How to track customer cases, use a unified console to manage support requests, and tap into automation to save time. It also shows how to get started with a CRM that helps you deliver consistent service as your business grows across phone, email, chat, and social media.
Benefits:
- Improve team efficiency through customer support channels
- Provide quick, personalized service that customers appreciate
- Use Starter Suite to connect your small business service to your other business functions
2. Customer Service with Salesforce: Quick Look
In only five minutes, learn how Salesforce can help you deliver faster, more personalized service.
About the course: This is a quick look at customer service and how Salesforce can help your team deliver the best. It covers what service means with a CRM, how Salesforce makes your customers happy, improves service reps’ productivity, along with practical resources to get started.
What you’ll learn: After completing this quick look, you’ll be able to understand the value of customer service and describe some ways in which Salesforce makes your team more productive.
Benefits:
- Quick looks help you learn fast, so this is only a five-minute module.
- Understand how to improve your service team’s productivity levels with a CRM tailored to your support system
3. Agentforce for Service
In this trail, get the skinny on Agentforce 360, Salesforce’s AI agent platform specifically for service teams. Learn how AI agents help customers via autonomous, natural language responses grounded in your business data.
About the course: Understand what Agentforce for Service is and the key benefits for your team. Learn what makes it unique, the types of agents included in the platform, and how to set it up for yourself. Gain valuable resources to get going with Agentforce 360, and see how it transforms your service.
What you’ll learn: After completing this unit, you’ll be able to describe Agentforce for Service and explain how Agentforce for Service is different from other bots.
Benefits:
- Learn the Agentforce 360 features and benefits for your service teams
- See how your first AI agent automates tasks and saves you time and money
- Use Agentforce 360 to scale your service options
Learn the best customer service skills — for free
We hope these free courses help you and your team excel with your service teams. You can join the Trailblazer and the Serviceblazer Community to connect with like-minded peers, ask questions, and share product and industry learnings. Good luck and we wish you the best in service.
And if you need CRM support, we’ve got you covered. Start your journey with the Free or Starter Suite today. Looking for more customization? Explore Pro Suite. Already a Salesforce customer? Activate Foundations to try out Agentforce 360 today.
AI supported the writers and editors who created this article.
