In this progressive world, businesses invest a significant part of their resources towards implementing and utilizing technological advancements to gain a competitive edge. Along with this, businesses target an acceleration of 2X in revenue growth, improve EBITDA and achieve customer experience. Technology will be the driving force for business operations even in the post-pandemic phase when businesses would streamline back again. Customers have diversified into a more immersive experience where the current scenario has proliferated the use of technology at every step.
Of course, the quality of your products and services, and the soft skills of your employees, make a major impact on customer experience, technology can be a competitive differentiator to help your business become more customer focused and customer centric.
Before we go any further let us look at what is Customer Experience (CX) mean. In simple terms Customer experience (CX) is defined by the interaction and experience your customer has with your business throughout the entire customer journey, from first contact to becoming delighted and loyal customer. And companies can measure Customer Satisfaction by using various tools and keeping track of NPS ( Net Promoter Score ) to ensure customers are happy with the services or products they have received. Improved customer experience can lead to higher customer satisfaction.
Let’s look at the various aspects of serving customers using technology.
1. It’s all about being connected – How can a customer quickly connect to businesses in the easiest way?
A. Toll Free phones and emails – This is one of most traditional and popular ways for customers to connect to a company for availing services and any other product or service-related information. However, in today’s rapidly changing technological world, customers would not prefer speaking to tele calling personnel or bots. The unpredictable nature of technology means that businesses should always be on the lookout for emerging trends or face the risks of dealing with obsolete processes.
B. Real Time Messaging – Messaging & Live Chats are replacing toll free & emails. In today’s world where instant messaging rules the roost, customers no longer want to wait for hours or days to get a response to their queries. Naturally, this has led to a shift in how they reach out to service providers for support. Modern communication channels, especially live chats, are being highly preferred over conventional channels like email and phone. The key advantage of a live chat is how easily customers can initiate immediate, real-time conversations with support teams to resolve their concerns.
C. Intelligent or self-service customer portal with Online Technical Knowledge – Many customers today prefer to first try to get a solution on their own before communicating their concerns to after-sales-services that almost every business provides. It has become significantly evident that self-help attributes will continue to dominate the customer service industry. Therefore, newer forms of the self-help models such as DIY videos, community forums, and embedded help content in chat widgets are growing in prominence.
D. Use of IOT and ONLINE monitoring options – This is a machine to machine communication channel for customer services. Businesses can monitor the status of the products installed at customer sites and take proactive action in case of any alarm or predicted faults via AI and data knowledge base. By using these means, businesses can drastically reduce expensive system downtime and significantly improve uptime of the equipment.
2. Service Delivery – In today’s pandemic scenario, social distancing is becoming the new normal while the physical movement of service engineers is still restricted. This is leading companies to have various channels to provide contact-less, remote ONLINE support.
A. AI and Data Analytics - Artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) are the latest technological tools that enable businesses to identify exact issues with products / components and assist them with fast and precise trouble-shooting methods. Chatbots can also be programmed to assist internal teams in providing better solutions to customers.
B. Realtime Video Assistance - No amount of conversations via chat, email, or phone can be considered quite as convenient as those via video. Businesses use video to provide comprehensive troubleshooting measures, and to also build a human connection with customers. This channel of communication has been widely adopted during the current social-distancing scenario to interact and communicate with customers, and may continue as new normal. In some cases, well-scheduled meetings with customers may also involve a realtime video meeting whenever possible.
C. Augmented & Virtual Reality (AR/VR) - Augmented reality (AR) adds digital elements to a live viewing screen, often by using the camera on a smartphone. Virtual reality (VR) implies a complete immersion experience that shuts out the physical world. Using VR devices, users can be transported into widely simulated real-world and imagined environments. A mixed reality (MR) experience, combines the elements of both AR and VR, where the real-world and digital objects interact seamlessly. As a matter of fact, mixed reality technology has recently gained a lot of traction. Extended Reality (XR) is an umbrella term that covers all the various technologies that enhance our senses, by either providing additional information about the actual world or creating a totally unreal, simulated world for us to experience. XR includes VR, AR and MR technologies all combined together in a synchronized combination. To engage with customers, an interactive product demo can be streamed through XR delivering a unique overwhelming experience right at the customer’s seat. Experiential training programs about self-help techniques and preliminary trouble-shooting can also be provided directly to the customer right where he is. Also, it becomes extremely convenient to provide hands-on trainings to teams spanned across the globe about servicing, troubleshooting and maintaining equipment without them travelling physically to their offices for training.
D. Workforce Field Automation and Mobile Field Wireless – The mobile field wireless and voice technology enables field engineers to access critical data by reaching out to the central database through wireless devices. Field engineers can also perform certain tasks using voice interface methods. With this technology, a field engineer can carry on his daily tasks using internet enabled mobile device.
E. Online Customer Training - By utilizing video and VR technologies, companies can provide customers product training and maintenance training which can help businesses provide better services to their customers, thereby ensuring customer satisfaction remains at the highest level during every stage of their interaction with business services.
To conclude, technology plays a vital role in business services to acquire, engage, serve and retain customers. Businesses leveraging technology can be improve their customer experience and become more competitive. Utilizing technology to communicate clearly, effectively and efficiently must be the prime focus of businesses to always connect and achieve that “wow” factor from every customer.
