Customer service representatives have a big pair of shoes to fill. They’re often the face of the company since they need to deal with frustrated or angry customers and find a satisfactory solution. Not the easiest job!
If you don’t have a lot of experience, you might feel lost when applying for a customer service representative job. Fortunately, we’ve helped thousands of associates get their foot in the door and land an entry-level position with our resume and cover letter maker.
In this guide, we’ll give you resume tips and show you three entry-level customer service associate resume examples and provide all the inside info you need to start getting interviews in no time.
Why this resume works
- Have a passion for dealing with customers but have no experience to include in your entry-level customer service resume? No a problem. All you need are previous jobs where you can highlight your ability to handle customers. Regardless of what role it may be, as long as you directly served customers, add it.
How to Write an Entry-Level Customer Service Resume
Entry-level candidates benefit from a reverse-chronological resume format. It typically includes your latest experiences/projects at the top while still leaving space for certifications and other achievements.
Below, we’ll take you through:
- The entire process of creating a career objective
- Ideas for quantifying your customer-centric bullet points
- In-demand customer support skills that will get you past ATS systems
Do you need a career summary or a career objective?
As with any other entry-level role, your resume will need a career objective. This is a 3–4 line paragraph that describes your:
- Career goal
- Potential contribution
- Related project/work experience
If space allows, talk about your best customer-facing skills. However, most resume objectives do just fine with just the three things above. Here’s an example of how you can write one:
Career objective example:
Recent graduate with strong communication skills developed through school projects, volunteering, and tutoring. As someone who is passionate about assisting customers and resolving problems, I am seeking a customer service role at Intel where I can uphold your company’s reputation for unmatched online support.
How to demonstrate customer service through transferable skills
When a recruiter or interviewer is looking through customer service applications, they want to see what kind of skills you have that make you stand out. Even if you might be early in your career, drawing on your personal experience is important to showcase that you have the moxie for the job!
The focus for an entry-level position in customer service will rely more heavily on soft skills (like problem-solving), but that doesn’t mean you should skimp on hard skills.
Do you have great computer literacy skills (Excel, Google Sheets)? Were you into data analysis in college? Did you take any relevant courses in school? If you see any of those skills in the job description, include them!
9 Most Popular Entry-Level Customer Service Skills
- Microsoft Office
- Google Suite
- Cold Calling
- De-escalation
- Data Entry/Analysis
- CRM Systems
- Speed Typing
- Bilingualism
- Empathy
Sample entry-level customer service work experience bullet points
So you’ve got the skills out of the way. Now comes another part that could feel a little tricky: experience. But it doesn’t have to be!
It’s an entry-level position, so your potential employer isn’t expecting you to have a lot of experience. If you’ve worked previous customer service jobs, include those for sure.
Otherwise, focus on any projects, internships, clubs, or (extracurricular) courses you’ve taken. Remember, a customer service job is about problem-solving and people skills, something you’ve probably already done in one form or another!
When possible, try to focus on the impact you’ve made. Don’t just list what you did (like greeting customers), but focus on what benefits/pain points you solved (like helping customers check in quickly.)
- Utilized an empathetic and compassionate customer service approach, achieving a 97.5% customer satisfaction rating
- Set, achieved, and followed up on ambitious weekly quotas, exceeding them by 8% on average
- Memorized product offerings and benefits, effectively communicating the information to customers and contributing to a 14% quarterly sales increase
- Co-founded and organized weekly debate club meetings, helping 35 students each semester sharpen public speaking and debate skills
- Collaborated with Sales, Communications, and Product Marketing to increase sales turnover by 25% and client retention by 18%
How do you showcase customer service experience when you have no prior job?
Simple, just pull examples from college, volunteering, tutoring, or any part-time roles, where you solved problems. The truth is, employers will care more about examples of helping people than a formal job title.
For instance, let’s say you volunteered for a local charity event. Here’s how you can take frame things:
- Assisted 29 donors weekly, answering questions and improving understanding regarding fund allocation.
- Supported 6 charity operations by managing sign-ins, resolving small conflicts, and giving information to attendees.
- Taught online payment methods to elders during fundraisers, improving the average donor experience by 8%, as per anonymous surveys.
What customer service metrics (KPIs) should you include?
Adding to the point above, you can’t blindly write down every problem you solved at a charity. You must ensure that each bullet point has a viable customer service-related KPI or anything that comes closest to it.
Notice how in the points above, there are three customer-centric impacts mentioned:
- Assisting people
- Resolving conflicts and informing donors
- Improving average donor experience
Apart from KPIs, remember to begin each bullet point with a strong action verb, such as ‘resolved,’ ‘guided,’ or ‘explained.’
What certifications should entry-level customer service reps include?
You mainly require entry-level certifications available on platforms like Coursera, Google, LinkedIn, etc. They are a testament to the effort and investment you put into honing your support and communication skills.
Some good entry-level customer certifications are:
- Introduction to CRM with HubSpot
- Customer Service Fundamentals
- Generative AI for Customer Support Specialization
Certifications mentioning AI will attract more employer attention than others, so add as many as possible.
What should you include in the Education section?
Customer support roles typically don’t require any specific degree/diploma. However, it’s best to read the job description to ensure you don’t get cut off by the ATS system. When building your education section, simply follow this format:
Bachelor of Arts
Communication
University of Missouri
2016 – 2020
Columbio, MO
GPA: 3.6
Relevant Courses: (optional)
- Rhetorical Process
- Mass Communication Process
- Interpersonal Communication
How to tailor your customer support resume to the type of company?
Even at the entry level, companies expect different strengths depending on their size. Personalizing your resume to the exact industry and company shows you understand their environment and can thrive in it.
To tailor your resume to specific companies, follow these quick tips:
- Startups: Highlight versatility, speed, and ownership.
- Mid-Sized Companies: Showcase adherence to SLAs and emphasize teamwork and escalation judgment.
- Large Enterprises: Demonstrate volume handling, familiarity with compliance, and ability to collaborate with different departments.
Top 5 tips for your entry-level customer service resume
- Make yourself stand out
- I mentioned this earlier, but it’s worth repeating again: take whatever passion or interest you have that could be relevant to a customer service role. Social media savvy? Fluency in multiple languages? Put it down!
- Don’t exaggerate
- Conversely, don’t lie about your skills or experience for a winning edge. If you just played around with Jira Service Desk once while your roommate was on a break, don’t say you’re skilled at it.
- Focus on impact
- It’s important to focus on the results of your work and experience, even if you’ve never had a customer service representative job before. Make it crystal clear what you’ve achieved when a recruiter reads your resume.
- Don’t include a career objective or summary
- You read that right. Most objectives are generic and add nothing new; it’s something a recruiter has read a thousand times. Make the most of each second they’re reading and skip straight to the good stuff.
- Less is more
- While you might feel the urge to fluff up your resume, don’t make it a chore to read. Your skills should each be a few words max, and keep each responsibility bullet point to 1 or 2 lines. Let them find out the rest during the interview!
Key takeaways
- Use a reverse-chronological resume format with school/volunteer experience up top
- Quantify impacts like the number of people helped, response times, etc.
- List customer support certifications to strengthen credibility
Entry-Level Customer Service Resume FAQs
Yes, you should! All that means is making sure the skills section of your resume reflects the profile the job description is looking for and focusing on any relevant projects, courses, or experiences you have that could make you the best fit possible.
If you’re new to the field, include any projects or past work experiences where you’ve displayed strong customer handling or communication skills. Adding a tailored career objective will help you summarize your strengths and passion for the job.
Keep it easy to read, which means avoiding fancy graphics and images. Use one of our resume templates, use simple bullet points, and if possible, submit it in both PDF and Word Doc. That way, it’s easier to be scanned by applicant tracking systems.
The answer to this question is always one. A one-page resume is concise and sufficient to show your best skills and experiences/projects. Focus on building a strong objective and including your most impactful internships or volunteering stints where you can extract support-related KPIs.
There are various verbs you can use, such as Assisted, Helped, or Resolved, to show your contributions in supporting customers. What matters is that you place them in the beginning of each bullet point. For keywords, go through the job description and naturally include phrases that are important.
