Who doesn’t want their business to deliver world class customer service for their customers?

The short answer to this is no-one, but it’s surprising how many businesses struggle to manage their customers’ expectations when they successfully grow the business. Growing the business is something to celebrate, but delivering on it is hugely important if a business wants to continue to grow, get repeat business and become renowned for a class leading service. 

Every human being on the planet is a customer - we all buy products and use services. What I personally don’t enjoy is having to individually contact every service provider and follow their rules to deal with them, so I can spend my money with them.  And if I don’t like the service, I can then go to social media and publish my views on the experience and include my own opinions for good measure. 

How a company deals with increased demands in volume, products, and/or services is ultimately what drives customer experience. If it’s a bad experience, then its hard to forget anytime soon. The strain this brings to a company’s resources is also not cost effective, so the right balance needs to be established. 

Doesn’t sound fair does it? Both the consumer and service provider get a raw deal. 

From a business perspective, social media can be a blessing or a nightmare. From a consumer perspective, adapting to different service levels is a continued source of frustration. I’m sure there are execs out there that would love it if Alexa would do more than just provide information; like renew the car insurance, or purchase stuff online and even make phone calls and put them through.

What next for Contact Centres?

Both parties here could do with a simplified process of completing a transaction where the business would benefit from optimised processes that are cost effective, and the consumer would benefit with getting what they want (without any surprises), get it quickly and save time. Achieve this and the foundations are set to add the building blocks for a class leading service. Mess it up? – then expect customers and employees to be miserable and disengaged.  

The days of the traditional contact centre are no more and evolution in IT has enabled seismic changes to customer behaviours and expectations. Any business that wants to differentiate will need to move with the times and deploy innovative ways to achieve customer satisfaction. 

Even BPO offerings have evolved into services that are multi-channel (web, chat, automation) to digital innovation (SEOs, search engine marketing, data-driven campaigns) and strategy and consulting where customer journeys are mapped. Each of these have lead generation drivers across vertical markets. 

Technology Enabled Solutions

Some good examples in business to consumer activities are where businesses use crowdsourcing to turn their key customers into brand ambassadors using SaaS platforms that offer artificial intelligence. Rewarding ambassadors is not only more cost effective, but credible. 

The biggest downside currently is how social media deals with disgruntled consumers. Transforming customer experience and creating value through innovation is easier said than done. For a business to reach world class (and stay there), it is important to design and implement an effortless customer experience using digital channels, analytics, automation and digital marketing. To achieve this requires careful planning and understanding of customer expectations, but to align this with optimising service operations internally to ensure that service delivery is cost effective.  

Some key questions to consider; 

1. What is trending in CX?

2. How we use customer data?

3. Which processes should be automated first?

4. How can social media be integrated?

5. How we guide customers to the right service channels?

6. The need of scalability and agility

7. Hearts and minds - How the employees deliver the vision and bring it all together

Digital Experience

Choosing the right digital experience platform will improve business outcomes. Ideally, ensure that the business benefits with operational optimisation and effectiveness. Get this wrong, and you will know about it through complaints – simple!

Author: Renee Kalia