The future of customer experience over the next 3-5 years is
going to focus on three core principles
The right media at the right time -
Monitoring, anticipating and dynamically managing the customer
experience, bringing in the right resource, to address the right
need, at the right time, irrespective of the channel the customer
is using. The predominant method of interaction continues to be
voice interactions. But new channels are coming - these include
access methods (web self service), different media (SMS), and new
devices (smart phones). End customers expect to be able to reach
businesses when, how, and where they want. Key global results from
the Avaya Contact Center Consumer Preference Study, found that 40%
of global consumers prefer alternate methods of contact-including
web chat, self-service, and text messaging-to phone-based customer
service. 55% of consumers said that in 1 to 2 years, email is what
they will use regularly to reach customer service centers. This is
compared to 15% who said email is their most often used method
today. 18% said web chat will be their preferred regularly-used
contact method in 1 to 2 years, vs. just 2 percent who said it's
their most often used method today.
The research also showed that Resolution and Speed come out on
top from a list of 17 customer support centre attributes where
consumers rated most important the ability to quickly resolve their
inquiry . And in so doing, the way it was resolved was less
important than the speed with which it's resolved. So people don't
necessarily mind if it's resolved through self service, through
talking to someone or through some other means, as long as it's
done quickly. This ties back to the point made in the previous
slide that customers want Instant Gratification.
And importantly, end customers expect to have a consistent
experience across the different touch points with businesses
including the business knowing what happened in different
interactions across channels independent of whether they occurred
inside or outside of the contact center. They also want to be able
to move from one to other without having to repeat information.
Enterprise Wide engagement - Putting your
customer at the heart of your business, and tightly aligning the
right resources, functions and processes into resolving their
particular issue quickly and first time round. Collaboration with
your customers and within your organization to ensure that the
customer service and experience that the organization wants to
deliver is tightly aligned and enabled by the resources and
processes within the organization. Everyone in your organization is
a customer service agent in some way. The conversation isn't really
just about the ContactCenter for Customer Service anymore. It's
really about:
•bringing all relevant functions / people / resources into the
customer service realm in order to drive the best possible customer
service available e.g. - expert anywhere
•making customer service and the contact center more relevant
in the business e.g. when something goes wrong e.g. product faults,
the contact center is often the first place to know about it
such..... which requires good reporting and analytics
•linking the customer service process into other business
processes e.g. Social media as part of brand awareness - so all of
a sudden the CC becomes relevant there, or
•applying Customer service processes and systems in non
contact center environments e.g. proactive notification in
Hospitals to support patient discharge by automating the approval
process across all medical staff involved in a authorizing a
patient's discharge.
Actionable Insight - Knowing customers
preferences, understanding their situation, knowing their value and
using all of this insight to ensure the organization can match them
with the most appropriate resource to address their requirements
and this information is used to deliver a service that is unique,
personalized and enduring. But how can this type of customer driven
experience be enabled? Actionable insight requires much more than
just measuring what has happened in the contact center, and looking
at historical information retrospectively to make decisions that
are often outdated before they are even implemented. Actionable
insight is really enabled through closed loop performance
management, which is an end to end process that starts way before
the interaction starts. It's really about providing the right
customer experience, at the right cost, at the right time through
the right channel.
Overall Companies and organizations need to plan for how to
evolve and integrate their communications, information, and
processes to be able to dynamically adapt in real time to
proactively manage end customer experience expectations. The
challenge is that with every new channel and service added to
increase differentiation and stimulate growth also increases the
risk of dissatisfying the customer.But the opportunity and rewards
are huge for organizations who realize that today, the Customer
Experience is their brand and that this drives the Customer
Lifetime Value.