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The differences between customer care advocates and customer service specialists can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 6-12 months to become both a customer care advocate and a customer service specialist. Additionally, a customer service specialist has an average salary of $33,238, which is higher than the $33,219 average annual salary of a customer care advocate.
The top three skills for a customer care advocate include patients, scheduling appointments and data entry. The most important skills for a customer service specialist are customer service, strong customer service, and cleanliness.
| Customer Care Advocate | Customer Service Specialist | |
| Yearly salary | $33,219 | $33,238 |
| Hourly rate | $15.97 | $15.98 |
| Growth rate | -4% | -4% |
| Number of jobs | 248,553 | 223,323 |
| Job satisfaction | - | 4 |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 37% | Bachelor's Degree, 43% |
| Average age | 40 | 40 |
| Years of experience | 12 | 12 |
A customer care advocate is responsible for monitoring customer transactions, ensuring the highest customer service satisfaction by timely responses and complaint resolution. Customer care advocates recommend strategic procedures and training programs necessary for handling customer support. They manage customer concerns and conduct interviews to identify customer preferences and build other business opportunities to build a good reputation for the organization. A customer care advocate must have excellent communication and organizational skills to promote customer advocacy and determine the best customer service practices.
Customer service specialists are employees who are responsible for providing the best customer experience to customers, usually for after-sales transactions. They attend to customers' inquiries and provide answers to their questions on products or services that the company offers. They also address customer complaints and help mitigate the concerns by offering solutions such as instructions on how to fix defects, or processing replacements or refunds. Customer service specialists also listen to customer feedback and ensure that these are logged properly so that proper departments will be able to receive them.
Customer care advocates and customer service specialists have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Customer Care Advocate | Customer Service Specialist | |
| Average salary | $33,219 | $33,238 |
| Salary range | Between $24,000 And $44,000 | Between $26,000 And $42,000 |
| Highest paying City | Santa Barbara, CA | Boston, MA |
| Highest paying state | Hawaii | Massachusetts |
| Best paying company | University of California, Berkeley | Dell |
| Best paying industry | Insurance | Finance |
There are a few differences between a customer care advocate and a customer service specialist in terms of educational background:
| Customer Care Advocate | Customer Service Specialist | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 37% | Bachelor's Degree, 43% |
| Most common major | Business | Business |
| Most common college | - | - |
Here are the differences between customer care advocates' and customer service specialists' demographics:
| Customer Care Advocate | Customer Service Specialist | |
| Average age | 40 | 40 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 36.2% Female, 63.8% | Male, 32.0% Female, 68.0% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 10.8% Unknown, 5.5% Hispanic or Latino, 20.6% Asian, 7.0% White, 55.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.8% | Black or African American, 11.6% Unknown, 5.4% Hispanic or Latino, 20.0% Asian, 6.8% White, 55.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.7% |
| LGBT Percentage | 7% | 7% |