Each “customer” had different goals, expectations, and pain points, and it was the job of the attendees to guide them through the booking process as quickly and easily as possible through this journey mapping activity. During the panel discussion prior to breaking into groups, panelists noted the key considerations for journey mapping to be non-linear, rely on data, and contain many variables.

The six different customer personas were:

Ethan: The budget traveler who is always on the go, both for work and pleasure

Kate: The tech-savvy business woman who works hard and rarely takes vacations

Doris: The grandmother who loves to connect with people and is very involved with her family

Dave: The do-it-all father who is always busy and heavily influenced by ads and what other parents say

Betty: The new mother of two babies who is heavily involved in her online mom groups

Mary: The millennial law student and part-time waitress with little time for herself

The panel described the process of journey mapping by highlighting the importance of looking at the experience from end-to-end, finding milestones, and figuring out what happens at each junction to examine what is working and where there is untapped opportunity. During the exercise, attendees mapped along five different customer journey stages – awareness, considerations, purchase, post-purchase, and pre-arrival. Collectively we dove into the completed journey maps and evaluated the various responses to get a better idea of what drives decision-making processes from a CX leader’s perspective, and below is what we found.

Word of Mouth Still Matters

A few of the personas involved in the exercise had attendees design their journey maps with a parent, or middle-aged buyer in mind, and each map showed that word of mouth is still a crucial aspect to a customer’s journey.

Attendees fleshed out their journey maps for Dave (a father) under the presumption that he would likely seek out the opinions of other parents as influential factors in his journey. Groups also felt that Betty (a new mom) would probably follow suit and might even go a step further and seek out the opinions of those who are a part of a mom group or blog. Doris (a grandmother) mapped out to prefer voice communication and to be influenced by personal recommendations.

Technology can provide many wonderful luxuries in 2020, but it’s impossible to replicate the value of the spoken word from a trusted source. The younger crowd values word of mouth. Brands realize this, only they see that persona’s discussions happening more often through a different channel.

Nearly Every Map Documented Social Media as an Awareness Channel

Aside from Doris’ (the grandmother’s) mapping, all the other personas were partly designed with social media as a key awareness channel, particularly for the youngest personas. In many cases, this is now the most important channel when it comes to raising awareness for a brand.

Social media is a perfect tool for connecting with customers who haven’t heard of you yet. PPC advertisements and other campaigns can quickly show value to relevant users within the target audience.

Even though social media can serve as an incredibly effective tool at every stage of the buyer’s journey, we noticed it show up most consistently in the Awareness category, as perhaps this is where major brands still find it to be most impactful.

The Value of Celebrity Endorsements

In 2015, Microsoft released a study that showed how human beings now have an attention span of roughly eight seconds, which is less than that of a goldfish. Attention spans have been on a gradual decline, and are continuing to do so.

This plays directly into the value of celebrity endorsements. In advertising, a celebrity endorsement is an impactful way to grab attention, establish credibility, provide an associative benefit of the product, ensure higher degrees of recall within the customer, and leverage the love and adoration the celebrity’s fans have for them as a person to sway fans towards the brand. In an era where we all have 8-second attention spans, any method that consistently grabs eyeballs and establishes value immediately is a method worth implementing.

Our attendees knew that, as a good portion of the journey maps showed celebrity endorsements as consistent influences, namely with Mary’s (the millennial’s) journey maps. As a member of a younger demographic looking to book a spring break trip, Mary was mapped to be influenced largely by celebrities, trends, or Instagram influencers.

Most Common Thought or Feeling: Excitement

A critical part of the journey mapping exercise was to keep the customer’s thoughts and feelings in mind through each stage of the journey, both positive and negative. The most common feeling we saw, by far, was excitement.

Excitement was most prevalent during the awareness and pre-arrival stages of the journey, understandably so (as no money is spent during these stages). There were some mixed emotions during the middle stages of the journey maps, as customers were worried about getting the best deals possible, overwhelmed by a flurry of options, unsure if they made the correct decision, and at times even a bit frustrated with the process in general and how long it takes.

The emotional aspect from a customer’s point of view may vary from one industry to another, so it is always crucial to put yourself in the buyer’s shoes at this part of the exercise. Most purchases are not as fun as booking a vacation, and therefore not as exciting, so to map them out as such might be biased and wouldn’t make the most of the exercise. That being said, it was interesting to see what negative feelings the attendees would envision customers having despite buying something so exciting.

Wrap-Up

Customer Engagement Live is always a fun, collaborative way to get inside the minds of our attendees at Customer Response Summit to see the processes that have made their brands so successful be put to use on the spot. In this installment, we learned so much about how brands shift processes to accommodate for each persona, which proved to be an impactful new wrinkle in this year’s session. We can’t thank Interactions enough for providing such an organized, creative, and engaging activity for our attendees and we can’t wait until Customer Response Summit: Coronado, CA where we will host the next Customer Engagement Live session.

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Blog post, written by: Execs In The Know and featuring the Customer Engagement Live Session at Customer Response Summit, Hollywood-FL, presented by Interactions

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With so much game-changing information in such a short amount of time, we know CRS can be a lot to digest – so we’d like to recap ten of Hollywood’s most memorable takeaways from all the spirited keynotes, panel discussions, breakout sessions, and overall recurring themes and topics of conversation that made this particular Customer Response Summit one for the ages.

1. Operational Preparedness: Addressing Global Impacts to Your CX Operational Readiness

Obviously with the recent unfortunate worldwide circumstances regarding the coronavirus, industries of all types are having to look inward to figure out how to keep internal processes on track during this unusual, uncertain timeline that came out of left field.

At CRS, we proactively faced the elephant in the room by starting the conversation on how to deal with the impacts of coronavirus on the CX industry. As such a new development, there is a lot of fear and uncertainty around what to expect. No sessions focused on the topic, but many conversations were had among those who were thankfully able to still make it to Hollywood despite the virus bringing on plenty of travel issues for people around the world.

To continue the conversation and pull together as a community, EITK hosted  a webinar on March 11^th with some of our most respected board members and partners to help execs gain a clearer understanding on operational preparedness. Nobody could have seen this coming, therefore it shed light on the importance of learning about questions you should be asking now and gaining insights, hearing perspectives, and discussing considerations for the short and long term. This webinar is available on replay and a Virtual Briefing Series is now scheduled to continue the collaboration amongst CX Leaders through this difficult time.

2. Happy Employees Are Still The Way to Generate Happy Customers

During one of our panels, a question was asked about how call center skills and training have evolved over the past five years and the impact that it has had on the hiring process. With so much change towards becoming more of an omnichannel world, call centers have more tools and resources than ever, which subsequently provide more opportunity for agents to develop various skill sets and hone their craft by keeping up with industry trends to best serve the customer.

In response to this, one panelist shed light on the importance of understanding expectations and recognizing the differences of how people learn. Being too rigid can prevent call centers from getting the most out of their agents, which becomes a major issue due to the tremendous cost of mis-hiring.

There is no one-size-fits-all call center agent, and it is imperative to make it as easy as possible to onboard, train, and train agents. Having these internal processes in place will prevent companies from feeling as if they mis-hired, when it’s possible they hired the correct person but never put them in the right position to thrive. This panelist noted how many agents do not want to be call center agents forever. With so much opportunity, agents nowadays are hungry to learn new tools and advance their careers. If your call center doesn’t allow them to do that, you may lose an A+ player you were unaware was even under your employ.

3. The Importance of Journey Mapping

Our always exciting and interactive Customer Engagement Live session for this Summit was focused on journey mapping. Attendees were broken into groups to explore the best ways to provide customer care to various buyer personas in the travel space.

The panel discussion on this topic generated a mixed bag of approaches to journey mapping, which made it a perfect topic for Customer Engagement Live. We learned about how one company makes sure to utilize all areas of their organization to empathize with the customer and get a broader approach focused on customer pain points. This process shed light on the fact that many of the company’s customers were having to deal with as many as 15 agents at a time and having to tell their story to each one, highlighting the need for a new approach. We learned how another company’s journey mapping strategy was born of crisis and focused on supply chain, which led to the creation of a CX taskforce. Another highlighted the process of reverse engineering by working with the end goal in mind since getting started was the hardest part of this company’s strategy.

There is no single way to handle journey mapping since many customers have different needs and preferences depending on industry, and it is always great to see how peers are handling putting the customer first. We can’t wait to show you a whole lot more of this session when we release our piece on Customer Engagement Live takeaways, where we’ll examine all the responses and insights that came from the groups who participated. Stay tuned.

4. Artificial Intelligence: Is it the Right Choice For Everyone?

It is evident that while AI adoption is increasing, we heard in Hollywood why it’s not for everyone. As with everything, it really depends on the state of the business, the goals, defined opportunities, and outcome expectations.

On one end of the spectrum, one of our Shop Talk sessions gave an interesting look into debunking some of the myths around AI with two myths being heavily discussed.

Myth #1: Technology isn’t quite ready to be the default.

Myth #2: Many customers would rather speak with a human.

This Shop Talk breakout session explored one example where the company’s CSAT rates were at 4.4 when customers connected with both agents and bots, which was higher than when interacting with just one or the other. In this same example, the average number of messages per ticket sent by bots rose by 9%, while messages per ticket sent by agents dropped 14% quarter-over-quarter – proving how the adoption of bots has made agents more productive by freeing up time to handle more pressing and sensitive issues.

On the other hand, one of our keynote speakers discussed how they chose not to incorporate AI into their strategy and instead continued to focus on drastically improving CSAT scores within their traditional and thriving customer experience strategy. We learned how this company determined most of its internal conversations around AI were focused on cost savings – which quickly led to the team realizing it was not worth the investment. If the conversation isn’t able to be started with a focus on agent productivity and customer experience, it might not be the proper investment even in a world leaning more into technology with each passing year.

5. Data Personalization

We learned during a keynote session that between 75-80% of consumers are more likely to buy from a retailer that recognizes them by name, recommends options based on past purchases, knows their purchase history, and understands their needs and expectations.

As we mentioned earlier, frustrating processes that require a customer to retell a story to multiple people will drive buyers away quickly. Establishing trust with the customer through data is key, as people put a hefty amount of trust in a company when supplying it with their personal information. The info is sent over with the assumption that it will be treated with respect and used properly.

We heard plenty of conversations on this topic and are curious to see what’s in store for the next ten years of personalization, as well as how the importance of data protection grows right alongside it.

6. The Expanding Capabilities of Automation

It was a powerful experience learning how certain companies are currently implementing automation processes to improve their agents’ productivity. With each passing year, AI becomes better at not only solving problems, but proactively identifying small problems before they become big problems.

In one session, we learned about how a company’s automation technology gathers data to identify patterns at scale and poke holes in existing internal processes to then tell the company which parts of said processes need to be automated. This data is then swiftly put into a ranked list of processes, detailing how many hours are spent on a specific task and how many systems are involved before receiving an overall score to determine how well the process is functioning. When corralling data in this way, agents and other employees see plenty of time freed up due to the avoidance of meetings to discuss how these processes can be improved – a company can simply look at the data, easily evaluate, and make decisions, all thanks to automation.

7. The Gaming Industry’s Applicability Across the Board

“What works in gaming and invocation applies to anybody with a digital experience.”

On more than one occasion, we received a look into how the gaming industry is a trailblazer when it comes to providing a great customer experience. With such a dedicated and fiercely loyal consumer-base often exclusively living on digital platforms, it is always worth examining how the giants of the gaming industry are keeping customers happy in an industry that will quickly let you know if everything isn’t up to par.

8. Zig When Others Zag: The Most Resounding Resolution Tidbit of the Event

One of our keynote speakers devoted some time to problem solving processes. We learned how this company has a strict policy where agents do not have the ability to compensate customers. No matter what happens, the customer will not receive a gift card, discount, or any other type of compensation to smooth things over when something goes wrong with a purchase or interaction. They noted that 90% of the time, it is much better to solve the problem.

When opening the idea up to the audience, only one other attendee in the entire room noted that their company had a similar policy. It’s a creative strategy from a keynote full of creative endeavors, but nobody can argue with KPIs and long-term growth.

We always love hearing creating problem solving techniques, and this was easily one of the most interesting ones of CRS.

9. Keep Listening

Sometimes the simplest ideas are the most effective. Listening seems easy enough, but it was insightful to hear more about the different ways that companies are listening to their audiences with the intent of discovering new ways to satisfy them.

Attendees’ feedback on the topic of surveys was mixed. While some companies seemed to not get much value out of them, others had distinct strategies to use surveys in order to better listen to customers and understand pain points. General surveys can be easily forgettable, but detailed ones centered around interactions can uncover vital data points that can transform a CX strategy.

It’s encouraging to notice more companies dedicating specific programs to listening. It spreads across departments and channels, but is more critical than ever before. We can’t wait to see what the next developments of escalation tracking and page-level feedback are over the next few years.

10. The Attendees

Many attendees, along with EITK team, verbalized the fact that this specific Customer Response Summit felt more communal, social, and collaborative than ever before.

We take pride in having created such a unique, engaging community and it means the world to everyone involved to hear that attendees are truly having a great time and getting value out of the proceedings. The news of the virus and the many last-minute travel cancellations could have easily put a damper on the entire Summit, but all in attendance banded together to make it the best Summit to date, and we can’t thank everyone enough for joining us in Hollywood.

Thanks to those who joined us in Hollywood, we hope to see you at our next CRS in Coronado, California – October 5-7^th. In the meantime, please take advantage of our Virtual Briefing Series focused on COVID-19 and take a look at our COVID-19 CX Readiness page with CX resources and more.

Blog post, written by: Execs In The Know

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At our recent Customer Response Summit session on AI, a show of hands revealed a surprising number of senior CX executives are still stuck at square one or two on the path to full implementation. Here are the five biggest stumbling blocks they cited (hint: it all comes down to #5).

1. Absence of a clear long-term strategic plan

In their enthusiasm for new tech, many brands plowed ahead on small-scale applications without creating a long-term blueprint for success. “Our approach started out very piecemeal,” said one executive. “We’re looking to bring various elements into a more cohesive strategy.”

2. Lack of ownership and internal collaboration

Too often, the teams tasked with developing AI products are working at loggerheads with the departments their programs are supposedly designed to support. “Sometimes our IT group doesn’t bring us in to ask us how something should work because they don’t like what we have to say,” said another attendee. “They assume, ‘customer service will just figure it out.’”

“We went to chatbots to drive our costs down, but it hasn’t worked out as we’d hoped,” said another. “It was a result of too many cooks in the kitchen.”

3. High levels of complexity within the existing organization

Many brands cited concerns that AI could further muddy some already highly complex organizational structures. “When you’re a Tier-3 vendor, you have 40 different systems to navigate,” said a vendor in the CX space. “We need AI to have these systems talk to each other, but we’re afraid to exacerbate existing problems.”

Said another, “In many cases AI seems to be adding to the complexity, not reducing it.”

4. Predicating resource allocation on achieving short-term goals

“How do you get your organization to be patient with AI?” an attendee asked. “Implementation is a long-term process.”

“The leadership obviously wants a return on its investment sooner rather than later, so it’s a question of managing expectations and providing clear and specific metrics to capture incremental improvement,” another suggested. “But that’s easier said than done.”

“It’s been hard for us to secure the funding to clean and integrate our data without a near-term ROI,” another agreed.

5. Poor foundational data and data governance practices

“How do we get from here to there?” one attendee asked. “Our challenge is the capacity – systems in the support organization were not in place. We’re tasked with laying the data foundation system we need to implement AI.”

“Our customer service organization has a pretty good data foundation but not all departments do,” said another senior executive. “There needs to be more integration. Who ‘owns’ the data?”

“You need to be thinking about your underlying data sources,” another added. “Without that piece, your AI will never function as you envisioned. You must have a strong foundational data element to build on.”

The Bottom Line

Given the importance of building on a strong data foundation for any AI strategy, square one isn’t necessarily a bad place to be. It’s far easier to begin your AI journey by implementing a data governance framework than it is to go back and clean your data and data-storage structures after AI products are already in place.

No single CX Leader can go at it alone. If armed with a long-term strategic plan, a solid support network of cross-functional stakeholders, and clear expectations for incremental improvement, you can gain buy-in for taking that critical first step.

The post AI for Customer Experience: 5 Things That Hold Brands Back appeared first on Execs In The Know.

The fact is, brands are learning to expect a different kind of unexpected. “We’ve all prepared for a snowstorm – a day or two,” said one executive. “What’s the long-term strategy? Quality can’t stop because we’re working from home. How do we as a company guarantee that we remain consistent in our operations and the service we deliver? What are we doing for the customer, for the employee, and the business?”

Taking a Realistic Stance on Travel

Companies are struggling to “right size” their response to the potential health risks associated with travel. “There’s a lot of misinformation going on,” a CRS attendee pointed out. “We have to have a proportional response, not an over- or under-response.”

“Everyone is sitting on edge waiting to see how it’s going to expand,” another said. “Everyone is doing everything they can do without going overboard. Right now, we’re telling our employees they don’t have to travel if they don’t feel comfortable with it.”

“Safety first and foremost – partners and clients,” said an executive whose company recently grounded all international travel. “You could end up sick yourself, or you could end up quarantined just because you got on a flight with someone who is sick.”

Focus on Hygiene Reinvigorates Existing Policies

Many CRS attendees with operations in Asia said they have doubled down on workplace hygiene policies already in place. “We have strict regulations around compliance but over time we’d gotten a bit lax,” admitted one executive with 80,000 agents in the Philippines. “In addition to providing more tissue packs and antibacterial products we are also doing daily temperature checks – every person gets one. If they are running a temp they are sent to our full-service medical staff for assessment and, if necessary, they can self-quarantine.”

Said another, “We’re doing the basics – we’ve got thousands of masks ordered, and they’re in the centers. Hand sanitizers have always been there but we’re doubling up or tripling up on quantities. We’re also trying to find ways to make hand washing fun and less of a chore.”

Attendees agreed that transparency in internal communications is key. “We’re keeping consistent messaging in terms of ‘sanitation’ of the workspace. If someone thinks they need to be quarantined they can self-declare without fear that their job is in danger. It’s all about comfort and clarity around who’s coming into the center to work, when it’s safe to do so, and why we have these policies in place.”

Benefits and Limitations to “Work from Home”

In the most severely affected areas, governments are telling workers to stay home. But even in industries where working from home (WFH) is a viable option in theory, a lack of supporting infrastructure poses significant challenges as quarantines stretch from weeks to months.

“In China first and now Japan, when people started working from home volumes went through the roof because they couldn’t use their laptops due to security and privacy issues, and we couldn’t send enough desktops to their homes,” said an outsourcing manager at a global consumer electronics company. “How do you solve for 30% of capacity at 200% of volume? You can’t,” he said, adding that, “We’re using translation services to reroute volume from China. We’re also relying on gig workers to bridge the gap.”

“WFH may make sense if it’s just a few people, but it just doesn’t work for 600 employees,” the executive pointed out. “And you can’t move equipment around because of travel bans.”

“We don’t have an at home model, and it’s just not something you can pull the trigger on unless you already have something in place,” another agreed.

Some forward-thinking companies have been stress-testing WFH as part of their BCPs, however. “Business contingency planning is hard. There’s no way to just think your way through it – you have to test it,” said an executive from a major car manufacturer. “One challenge we encountered around WFH was server capacity, so we addressed that. You have to try these things out before something happens. You can’t just do it in theory.”

“We’ve equipped our agents so they can work from home both for flexibility and convenience but also in case of emergencies,” said an attendee with a call center in earthquake-prone Mexico City. “We’re switching this month to make my entire department WFH.”

An executive from a smaller company said, “All of our workers have desktops and “go bags” to be equipped at home. We’re a small team so we can’t afford to lose people.”

“WFH doesn’t always work for every country and every culture,” one attendee noted. “You have to get buy-in for the model if you want to explore this as a long-term solution.”

How BPOs Are Handling the Crisis – and Clients’ Concerns

For business process outsourcers (BPOs) — particularly those operating in Asia — the situation has made clients uneasy. A few attendees said their BPOs had contacted them proactively to explain the precautions they are taking in their contact centers, but many said they are still waiting to hear from their business partners. “Getting that proactive communication really made me feel more comfortable,” said one attendee.

“As an outsourcer we’re taking another look at our response,” said one BPO. “It’s a partnership between us and our clients and it’s going to lead to some interesting discussions on how best to move forward.”

A representative from a gig sourcing provider said his company is offering to allow clients’ in-house agents to use its platform in a pinch. “This is a contingency plan – the platform isn’t really set up for in-house teams,” he cautioned. “But it does work on personal devices.”

A Potential Shift to New Business Models

How can brands leverage their current experience to strategically prepare for a future that may include more long-term global disruptions down the road? What’s the role of technology in mitigating their impact?

“This coronavirus situation definitely makes us think about offering more self-serve options and speed up development on those services. Machine learning and predictive service models could help deflect volume as well,” said an attendee. “We’re just at the cusp of a lot of these service offerings but, given the current outlook, it seems these technologies might limit our exposure in future.”

The Bottom Line

As the business impacts of coronavirus continue to reverberate across the globe, brands are being forced to re-evaluate contingency plans designed primarily for short-term and potentially long-term operational disruptions. Companies that take this opportunity to leverage new technologies and strategies that can help insulate them from major global events like coronavirus will be well-positioned to maintain continuity of service if — or when — the next long-term crisis occurs.

Are you a CX Leader at a consumer brand? Continue the conversation on “Know It All” (KIA), our private online discussion forum where senior CX executives are connecting across industries to innovate and share best practices. Click here to visit and request to join.

The post Global Disruptions to Customer Service: How Top Brands Are Adapting Contingency Plans Amidst Coronavirus Concerns appeared first on Execs In The Know.

This will all be transparent to customers, and you can’t do it by stringing point solutions together or patching add-ons to an aging system. Instead, a holistic approach needs to be put in place to understand where complexity is impacting customer experience (CX), and which technologies can address that to support seamless customer service. Understanding and then managing that complexity is another key 2020 trend we’re seeing in this space. As a starting point for developing that holistic approach, the following are two forms of complexity that all contact centers must address.

Complexity of Technology

There have never been more technologies for contact centers to manage, and new technologies are transforming every aspect of contact center operation including support for omnichannel engagements. Although telephony may still be the dominant channel for customer interaction, new technologies make other channels viable options, such as video, web chat, mobile messaging, and various forms of social media. These offerings are complex for IT in different ways, but they provide new elements that makes seamless CX possible.

Digital transformation and the emerging world of AI is also bringing chatbots and new forms of self-service, along with predictive analytics that drive more personalized customer interactions. In all of these cases, the technologies are complex by nature, but with the right vision from IT, they can be deployed in ways that reduce complexity for agents and enable them to provide seamless CX, where the customer journey can be understood in ways never before possible.

Complexity of Meeting Customer Needs

On the receiving end of customer service, your customers are being impacted by these same technologies, and that adds another layer of complexity. They now expect the same CX regardless of how they engage with your contact center – via mobile, from a home phone, PC, or even social channels – and sometimes a mix of these during the same session. Not only must agents have omnichannel capabilities to seamlessly roll with this in real time, but they must also have a broader mix of communication skills, as each of these channels has distinct rules of engagement.

With these new technologies, we have a far greater range of touchpoints for collecting data about customers. There are numerous repositories of customer data that feed into the contact center’s collective understanding of customers. Agents are supported by multiple information sources including databases, contact center and business applications including CRMs – all adding to the complexity of the agent desktop and the understanding of the customer journey. As buying behaviors shift online, AI applications are now able to map out complete customer journeys and provide agents with highly specific and prescriptive guidance that extend their role beyond being reactive problem solvers.

How to Move Forward

A holistic approach is needed to reduce the complexity on the agent desktop, leverage existing and emerging technologies to streamline and automate workstreams for greater efficiency.

These are just a few examples of the increasing complexity in contact centers and the need to understand and support customer needs. The relationship between agents and customers has never been so complicated, and it’s increasingly being shaped by today’s technologies. IT decision-makers don’t need to have a granular understanding of all this complexity but need to understand how these technologies can make that complexity manageable.

What’s most important is being able to deploy complex technologies in a way that both enables and empowers agents to provide a seamless CX. This is harder than it looks, and the process begins with focusing on the end result – seamless CX – and working backwards to collaborate with the right technology partners who know how to support that.

Upstream Works provides enhanced omnichannel contact center solutions that make CX personal, seamless, and effortless. We empower agents with a feature-rich, unified desktop and seamless integration across multiple applications and CRMs for data-driven CX engagements and better outcomes.

Contact us and see how we assist organizations like yours reduce contact center complexity with a holistic approach to an amazing, seamless customer experience.

Guest post written by: Upstream Works

The post Why Seamless CX Matters More Than Ever appeared first on Execs In The Know.

For the majority of CX history, companies have been primarily focused on repairing their relationships with customers, instead of preparing for issues. Although proactive customer support is not a new idea, companies still struggle with how to heighten its impact with big data.

The combination of technology and proactive support is creating a monumental shift in CX by making strategies more customer-centric, improving customer loyalty by 5%, and increasing overall revenue. By curating thoughtful customer experiences and meeting customers on their terms, CX operations can be less of a cost center and more of a profit center.

Proactive customer support is critical to any CX strategy because of its ability to anticipate customer needs and their preferences, and provide a well thought out experience with a brand. By keeping simple customer queries at bay, it reduces operating costs and unnecessary friction which keeps bottom lines low and CSAT scores high.

Proactive Customer Support: The Stats and Facts

A proactive approach to support is an organization’s ability to foresee certain problems before they occur and implement early processes to help contain the negative impact it might have on customers.

For instance, if a retailer is experiencing a hiccup with a logistics company that’s causing mass order delays, they can do one of two things:

Quickly train agents on their response to the influx of calls they are about to receive (reactive)

Promptly send out an SMS message to impacted customers letting them know their delivery is delayed by X amount of days (proactive)

 Option two clearly offers the least amount of friction with customers and immediately decreases the amount of potential call volume and thus, reduces costs long term. By strategically implementing proactive support, companies have reported a:

• Reduction in inbound call volumes by 20-30% in 12 months
• 25% decrease in operations costs
• 3-5% increase in customer retention

But being proactive isn’t just something companies should strive for, it’s what customers want. A survey found that 87% of customers want to be contacted proactively by a company about service issues.

When Shift Happens

Although in the moment proactive support decisions make an immense impact on operational costs and brand perception, the real value and shift in CX comes when it’s powered by big data.

Big data is the collecting and analyzing of data and should be used throughout the customer journey, not just the beginning micro moments–an opportunity I see a lot of CX leaders overlook. When you couple big data and proactive support approaches, you move away from the break-fix style of support and shift toward a strategic predict-pivot methodology.

For example, if a customer is trying to upgrade their subscription, and have no luck using self-service tools, email, or chat the last resort is calling the company. When the customer is prompted by the IVR, a company should know their channel hopping history. Ideally, a proactive automated message that addresses the customer and asks if they are calling about switching to a different subscription or something else. Once their selection is made, they should be routed directly to an agent for help. This proactive approach eliminates the stress and frustration of a customer repeating themselves and increases speed to solution.

By consistently monitoring how customers use your products, services, and self-help resources, it empowers CX teams to proactively respond to issues before they arise. By piecing together the breadcrumbs of a customer’s journey, companies can utilize that data to view the full distance of the customer, past purchase behavior, and their likely next step.

How to Get Started

A lot of ideas and concepts in CX take a lot of time and money upfront, but proactive customer support that’s powered by big data works with what you have already. To begin the process, review your customer feedback from last quarter and extract the weaknesses customers noted.

What do these problems mean for this quarter and the quarters to come? What data do you have around the issues to inform what a proactive approach might be?

Start making a new chapter in CX history by starting a proactive, data-based shift in the way you deliver experiences to your customers. Once you get started, you will definitely notice a positive difference in key metrics like AHT, call volume, CSAT, and NPS. The combination of big data and proactive customer support has saved some companies up to $10 million. How much will you save?

Guest post written by: Jennifer Turner, Vice President, Business Development, Retail, TaskUs

The post The Next Monumental Shift In CX: Combining Big Data and Proactive Customer Support appeared first on Execs In The Know.

CRS Hollywood is set to take place at the beautiful Margaritaville Hollywood Beach Resort as attendees will learn, share, network, and engage to innovate while overlooking the one-of-a-kind Hollywood Beach. Guests are in for three days of collaborating with top-level executives from some of the world’s biggest brands with the shared goal of collectively setting the agenda for the future of CX. For 100 years, the Margaritaville Hollywood Beach Resort has enchanted visitors with lavish amenities amidst a quaint, relaxing vibe. This 17-story venue inspired by the lyrics and lifestyle of Jimmy Buffett will set the stage for a year of inviting and educational beachfront Customer Response Summits.

Additionally, save the date for CRS San Diego at Hotel Del Coronado on October 5-7, 2020 as Customer Response Summit promises more insights into customer experience hot topics, powerful speakers, and breathtaking beaches on the West Coast. Stay tuned for more information to follow on CRS San Diego.

“We are excited to celebrate our 10-year anniversary and look at 2020 as a banner year to attend our Customer Response Summit events,” said Chad McDaniel, President and Co-Founder of Execs In The Know. “With powerful speakers in the lineup, we’re looking forward to setting the agenda for the next 10 years of customer experience excellence.”

Customer Response Summit is one of the world’s most interactive gatherings of customer experience leaders featuring execs from household brands seeking to expand their networks and take away key insights into how to delight their customers. Top-level brands and select Execs In The Know business partners and associates will be on hand to deliver spirited keynotes, interactive sessions, expert panel discussions, and data-driven case studies. Additionally, the event includes an exciting industry tour, the release of the latest Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) report to detail the hottest year-over-year trends within the industry, and so much more.

To register for CRS Hollywood, visit this link below:
https://www.cvent.com/events/crs-hollywood-florida/registration-4ef475911d9849d3bd12a4b23ca269da.aspx?fqp=true

If you are interested in becoming a part of our prestigious community of customer experience leaders, you can request to join our online community called Know It All (KIA) here: https://community.execsintheknow.com

About Execs In The Know
Execs In The Know is a global community of customer experience (CX) professionals focused on setting agenda for CX by providing opportunities for CX leaders to learn, share, network, and engage. Execs In The Know gives brands a platform to share and gain insights, benchmark their brand, stay on top of the latest trends in CX, and create lasting relationships with their peers – “Leaders Learning From Leaders.” Execs In The Know holds numerous live events each year including Customer Response Summit, Subject Matter Briefings, Lunch & Learns, and Leadership Dinners. They also offer industry content and thought leadership through their webinars, reports, Know It All online community, and various other social media groups. To learn more about Execs In The Know visit: www.execsintheknow.com.

Media Contact:
Gina Morkel
480-687-5326
gina@execsintheknow.com

The post Execs In The Know Is Taking Customer Response Summit Coast to Coast in 2020 appeared first on Execs In The Know.