Omni-Channel Customer Engagement Article

Today, more than ever the customer is king. And with so much weighing on each interaction it’s vital to allow customers to engage with your brand in the method and manner of their choosing. The customer journey, once initiated only by a phone call or a letter now may start in a myriad of ways including a tweet, a text, a chat or an email or phone call. With so many channels for a customer to engage you on even for just a single issue, it’s vital to provide a seamless, contextual experience across them all. By offering true omni-channel customer engagement, where a customer can begin an interaction on one channel and continue it on another and pick up exactly where they left off, organizations can deliver consistency, continuity and the kind of experience today’s consumers expect.

The time of siloed customer service operations is over. Anyone who has called a contact center with an issue and been passed around like a pinball, having to explain their query multiple times to multiple people finds only frustration, not resolution. By contrast, seamless experiences across voice, Web, SMS and social channels meets the expectations of today’s consumer and define omni-channel customer engagement.

A recent study from Aspect (News - Alert) Software found that 96 percent of respondents said that they should be able to pick up where they left off when contacting customer service about the same issue. And, because of the growing use of mobile and self-service, the need for interconnected channels is even more glaring.

Siloed communications by definition stand in isolation providing minimal knowledge sharing or connectivity between them. By connecting all channels, and capturing and sharing the context of each interaction, companies can provide not just seamless and consistent experiences which means customers will not have to repeat themselves when they switch between channels.

Spence Mallder (News - Alert), Aspect Senior Vice President and  Chief Technology Officer noted, "With the increased number of customer care options in this age of pervasive mobile computing, a smooth handover between channels such as mobile app, IVR, or Website, or when switching from self-service to live service, is more crucial than ever to providing excellent customer service."

To address this need, Aspect’s recent release of Aspect Experience Continuity leverages “context cookies” to ensure that regardless of what channel an interaction is started on, the issue is solved with a tailored experience. Mallder stated, “If executed effectively, it significantly increases customer interaction and transaction knowledge transfer which creates the feeling of a one-channel experience for the customer even though they may be communicating for several channels.”