As I say all of the time, service is not a department nor is it something to be relegated to a call center. In the book ReWork by Jason Fried and David Hansson, the authors talk about marketing as the sum of virtually everything you do. They actually make a list of things and how they act as marketing.  For example:

• Every time you answer the phone, it’s marketing.
• Every time someone uses your product, it’s marketing.
• If you build software, every error message is marketing.

Similarly, I would say service works the same way…

• When you answer the phone, it’s service…or not.
• The readability/simplicity of your invoice is service…or not.
• The ease of your self-service portal is service…or not.
• The look, feel, comprehensiveness, and ease of your website is service…or not.
• Your interactions are service…or not.

Do all of the details of your business reflect a mission of serving your customers…or have you simply made service an afterthought, a department, a call center, or someone else’s job?