Technology has changed forever the way companies interact with customers. In our world today, customers seem less patient, have high expectations for immediate service and personalized interaction, and sadly show minimal tolerance for overworked frontline support staff.
Forget about long calling queues; today, the customer experience must be smooth, quick and multichannel.
In 2022 our new customers only understand their unreasonable expectations of service, convenience, speedy resolution time and incredible agent expertise. Evolving customer preferences are tightly linked to innovations in digital technology. Inbound support will tolerate AI so long as it quickly, in two steps, resolves or connects to the correct department or workgroup. Keeping pace, brands must embrace the leading edge to keep pace with heightened expectations. For those brands that can deliver can match expectations, the rewards in tight recessionary markets are customer loyalty, retention, and the fight to survive to the next day.
So it’s safe to say, technology’s no longer a differential but an essential service lowering the costs of customer support.
The good news
The good news it’s that businesses have a wide range of tools to improve the customer experience for the endless pursuit of a happy customer. Processing what even ten years ago would be unimaginable volumes of data, we now have access to systems and processes to track, manage and ultimately gain insightful data from every step of the customer journey.
And the excellent news for both small and medium medium-sized businesses, the rise and effective use of sophisticated cloud technologies are no longer the exclusive purview of fortune 500 companies with seemingly unlimited budgets.
But besides the new options available, one adage should never change; customers are hard to win, easy to lose, but tough to satisfy. A terrible customer experience kills business; a single bad experience can be enough to stop purchasing from a company.
As a business owner, you must smartly implement these technologies to reduce the barriers and ensure the customer journey flows as intended.
This article will explain some tendencies related to customer service experience and how to embrace them smartly.
Will AI replace human customer service?
When we discuss the landscape of today’s technology advancements, mainly AI-related, a recurring question that always is on the top of the mind of everybody is: Will robots replace human jobs?
The short answer it’s no! A recent survey conducted by PWC revealed that 64% of U.S consumers want the human element in customer experiences.
Artificial intelligence is becoming more accessible for every type of business. Chatbots can be very helpful in answering simple and common questions. However, the technology still has several limitations, mostly related to personalization.
Although the advances in bot technology allow the AI to understand some nuances of the interactions, they’re not 100% reliable.
According to research by Talk Desk, 36% of customers prefer talking to an actual agent on the phone to help with requests for information or help in solving problems.
The one-on-one relationship still it’s vital, and technology is here to help improve it even more. The technology’s not precisely replacing but enhancing customer experience operations and making it more scalable.
Right now, certain manual activities can be quickly done by the software. That means that the employee will have more time to focus on the activities that rely on human interactions. This aspect represents an improvement in terms of productivity and the quality of the support since the operator will have more time to focus on one specific activity.
Interactivity matters
When we talk about tech in customer experience, interactivity is crucial. With the popularization of smartphones, customers have higher expectations of services. So you want to provide options to customers interacting with you, and IVR is perfect for this.
IVR is an interactive virtual menu that allows customers to choose to talk with the correct department. They’re an ideal example of technology used smartly: dynamic, conversational and interactive. They give more agility and improve workflow management and customer satisfaction.
IVR features include customized greeting messages, data-driven call routing and data collecting.
Self-service it’s something that has always existed, but new technologies like AI have brought a new frontier.
Why does personalization matter?
Everyone wants to feel special and cared for. A good customer experience it’s that one that looks like it was hand-tailored for that specific person. We know that this it’s logistically impossible, but new technologies let us get closer to that goal.
Research from McKinsey and Company has shown that 71% per cent of customers expect businesses to deliver highly personalized interactions, and they get frustrated if that doesn’t happen.
However, make sure to understand one thing: it’s impossible to provide an excellent customer experience without quality data. Research points out that 83% of customers are ok with sharing personal information as long as it’s used to improve the personalization of services. Luckily, today you get a wide range of data related to your customer’s behaviours, and they’re more willing to provide this data.
However, the first step to providing this personalization it’s tackling the source of the interactive: the channel used to communicate. The customer expects your company to be his favourite communication platform.
Most days, companies offer an omnichannel experience, which means being present and interacting with customers on different communication platforms.
It is essential to identify the intersecting points in your journey, ensure they’re all connected, and pass the data.
How to smartly embrace technology in customer experience?
Not even the best tool in the world will be helpful if you do not use it properly. And that it’s something that we can apply to customer experience. Some companies use the technology for its sake and do not integrate it smartly into operations. As a result, they may be harming the customer experience instead of improving it. If not used properly, technology can be inefficient and impersonal. The last thing an unsatisfied customer wants to hear it’s and default message written by a bot.
So the question, “should I use technology in customer service must be “rephrased as how should I use technology to create a better customer service?. The first step to understanding this is evaluating the tool’s possibility and how to integrate it seamlessly into your workflow.
- What are the aspects of my customer experience I need to improve?
- Which technologies companies from my niche are using?
- Will this technology simplify my customer experience?
Answer these questions can be the first step to moving from one technology to another.
How to choose the best customer experience service?
Today we have several customer service tool providers to choose from. It’s essential to evaluate all the options on the market before choosing the right one. There are some aspects that you can expect from o good software provider.
- Good UI
- Variety of features for a reasonable price
- Easy and fast setup
As we mentioned before, good and old phone calls are still prevalent, and in’s today environment, we have several providers with high-end features that allow you to take this operation to the next level.
2talk it’s a VoIP provider with over 15 years of experience in business communication. We have a wide range of cutting-edge technologies, like IVR, that can help you improve customer satisfaction and reduce operational costs. Please take a look at our features and schedule a conversation with one of our specialists to understand how can you improve your customer experience via phone calls.
