I have been in the customer service industry for almost 20 years and remember a time when email support was considered revolutionary. While technology has provided more ways in which we interact and communicate, it hasn’t changed the fundamental problem that occurs when a customer can’t find the information they need.
While customers are increasingly more savvy users of email, SMS, social media or chat, and businesses continue to enhance the level of support they provided in these channels, the statistics show the overwhelming channel customers use when interacting directly with the business is the voice channel. This provides a unique and valuable opportunity for businesses to “WOW!” the customer by making the transition between a stalled chat session and a live agent resource.
While I anticipated this to be a wildly unpopular topic to discuss with businesses as part of an omni-channel strategy, I was pleasantly surprised. This is a real dilemma that companies are facing as they focus on building customer loyalty in an omni-channel world.
Here are three key initiatives every business should adopt in order to deliver an enhanced, continually improving customer journey.
1. “GET OUT OF JAIL FREE” Cards
Customers value their time. When they hit a dead-end or delay along their journey, its synonymous with sending an opponent in Monopoly straight to jail. They can’t continue their journey until they pay the price. Winning customer experience strategies deploy “GET OUT OF JAIL FREE” cards with intelligent, integrated click-to-call options that allow the business to identify where the dead-ends and delays are occurring and allow the customer to continue their forward momentum.
2. “GO BACK TO START” Cards
Customers dislike repeating information. When they do talk to your business directly, they expect you to know a little bit about them. If your customer experience strategy doesn’t allow for context to follow the customer, it’s the same as handing them a “GO BACK TO START” card. It forces them to go backward and frustrates an already stressed situation. Customer focused companies’ work hard to ensure that when they do hand out “GET OUT OF JAIL FREE” cards they don’t accompany them with “GO BACK TO START” cards.
3. “ADVANCE TO GO” Cards
Customers want the fastest path to resolution. Often this can be accomplished online; sometimes it requires them to call you. Integrating and leveraging your voice resources across all channels is the best way to give customers an “ADVANCE TO GO” card. Just like in the game, they get to skip a few non-productive steps and you’re the one who got them to their destination faster.
The trick to winning the customer game is to deploy strategies that continuously improve your understanding of their journey. Don’t be afraid to leverage your voice channel in this pursuit. Intelligently integrated call back software in your omni-channel strategy provides you with insight as to where customers are struggling allowing you to improve your operations and increase customer satisfaction.
Want to learn more?
Check out the blog series, Callback: Does It Do More than just Call Them Back?
