Call Center Management Featured Article
Not Seeing a Bump in Customer Satisfaction from Digital Support Investments?
In the business-to-business (b-to-b) realm, today’s consumer is smarter, self-sufficient and in constant evaluation of brands. Customer loyalty is low, and brand-switching after a ho-hum customer experience is high. Accenture’s (News - Alert) recent 2015 B2B Customer Experience report found that only about 23 percent of brands are seeing strong returns from their investments in the digital experience, while another 20 percent say they are generating either a minimal return or no return at all. So what gives? Why are companies investing in these customer support solutions if a majority of them aren’t seeing any benefits?
Many companies appear to be in the dark about how they should be implementing omnichannel, digital customer experiences. They're buying the wrong solutions, they implementing them incorrectly, they’re not integrating the channels properly and they’re still viewing the customer as an individual trouble ticket rather than a whole customer. There is evidence that that the more a company invests in the digital customer experience, however, the better they will be able to win new customers and keep the ones they have.
So how can you be sure you’re making the right investment in digital customer support? For starters, you need to fully evaluate your customers’ needs, wants and goals. Too many companies waste money and time on features that their customers don’t really care about, which is why they’re not seeing a “bump” after their investments.
“Knowing how your company fits into your clients’ overall goals is necessary for its success,” wrote Victoria Vessella for Business2Community recently. “This is especially true in the B2B space. Many businesses assume that their clients are seeking them out to solve a problem, but in reality they are seeking out businesses to ‘produce an outcome’ for them. If businesses don’t know their role in client relationships, they run the risk of underperforming. Moreover, businesses need to be aware of their clients’ expectations and be flexible when those expectations change.”
Talking to customers or surveying them won’t be the only way you get to know them. For starters, it’s time-consuming and not all customers are willing to give the input. While that shouldn’t stop you from conducting some well-placed person-to-person surveying, another way to gain the intelligence you need about your customers is by gathering data from everywhere you can, according to Vessella.
“Check up on their social media pages to see what kinds of conversations people are having,” she wrote. “Research your clients’ Web sites to learn more about them. Some mobile software tools enable field representatives to create custom forms for each individual client, allowing them to digitally collect, organize, and share in real-time whatever information is relevant for a particular client. Software with geo-tagged photo sharing capabilities aid in the data collection process because images are able to convey information when text alone doesn’t suffice.”
It’s clear from the Accenture report that established brands are struggling with the transition to omnichannel digital customer support. First, determine what your customers want, via which channels, and how you can help them meet their goals. Then go shopping for a business-to-business digital customer support solution that allows you to meet these needs and goals from a single perspective: that of the customer. And keep in mind that the ideal customer experience is ever-evolving as the popularity of some channels wane and others wax, so it’s imperative that businesses keep up with their clients’ preferences.