PHOENIX, ARIZONA – April 3, 2018 – Advocates for customer experience professionals, Execs In The Know and COPC Inc., have announced the release of the 2017 Corporate Edition of the Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) Series. The 11^th volume in the series, titled The CX Journey: Strategic and Operational Insights, provides an understanding of the current CX landscape. Specific areas of expanded exploration include channel consistency, quality programs, and CX priorities for corporate professionals. Traditional Care (phone, email, and in-person), Interactive Care (online/video chat, FAQ, and self-help), Social Media Care (Twitter, Facebook, forums, etc.), and Mobile Care (apps, text/SMS, and mobile chat) are all explored.

Key Insights from the 2017 Corporate Survey:

– Only 50% of respondents answered “Yes” when asked, “Is your company’s leadership fully committed to a customer-first strategy?”

– Thirty-four percent of respondents didn’t believe their company had a good understanding of which channels their customers preferred, nor how these preferences differed from current channel offerings.

– Interest and investment in chatbots and artificial intelligence (AI) exploded in 2017, with more than a threefold increase in the percentage of brands naming chatbots and AI as the technology of most interest and/or investment.

– Only 14% of respondents felt their brands were doing a good job of providing a consistent customer experience across channels and solutions, while only half of brands (51%) had any initiatives to create greater consistency.

The CXMB Series is a resource for customer care professionals, looking to enhance their customer care program, improve brand opinion, and drive customer satisfaction. Brands such as Marriott, Blue Rock Energy, The Mine, The Home Depot, LinkedIn, Hyatt, Desjardins, CIBC, Williams-Sonoma, Inc., and more participated in this year’s survey.

“The leaders in the Execs In The Know community truly display a customer-first commitment in everything they do,” said Chad McDaniel, President and CEO of Execs In The Know. “Our goal with every edition in the CXMB Series, is to help brands better understand the consumer, validating investments and identifying possible areas of improvement. We are thrilled to provide this resource to our community, to further assist them in the pursuit of customer service excellence.”

“We are honored to play an ongoing role in the creation of this valuable industry research. We hope this work will continue to enlighten and inspire,” said Kathleen Jezierski, COO of COPC Inc. “We’d also like to thank the many brands that participated in this year’s survey. Their experience and expertise is what makes this report possible.”

The full 2017 Corporate Edition is available for purchase at https://execsintheknow.com/cxmbseries/2017-corporate-edition/.

About Execs In The Know

Execs In The Know is a global community of customer experience professionals, from various industry verticals, all focused on the same thing – excellence in customer service and experience. 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 their national event – Customer Response Summit – twice a year (in the Spring and Fall), giving executives the opportunity to connect face-to-face. They also hold a number of other live regional events throughout the year including Subject Matter Briefings (on topics like social media, AI, SMS, outsourcing, etc.), Lunch & Learns, Workshops, and EITK Dinners. The community is able to stay engaged long after the events come to an end through industry content and thought leadership, webinars, reports, and various social communities.

To learn more about Execs In The Know, visit www.ExecsInTheKnow.com.

About COPC Inc.

COPC Inc. provides consulting, training, certification and the RevealCX™ software solution for operations that support the customer experience. The company created the COPC Standards, a collection of performance management systems for call center operations, customer experience management, vendor management, and procurement. Founded in 1996, COPC Inc. began by helping call centers improve their performance. Today, the company is an innovative global leader that empowers organizations to optimize operations to deliver a superior customer experience across all channels. COPC Inc. is privately held with headquarters in Winter Park, FL, U.S. and with operations in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan.

COPC will also be giving an educational pre-conference seminar at CRS Denver in September, 2019.

For more information, visit www.copc.com.

Media Contacts

Alyssa Pitura
Director of Marketing and Brand Experience
alyssa@execsintheknow.com
www.execsintheknow.com
@ExecsInTheKnow

Lezli Harrell
Vice President, Marketing
COPC Inc.
lharrell@copc.com
www.copc.com

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10. The 5 Minutes of Brilliance Presentations

These bite-sized presentations were so beloved, many attendees asked for more at future events (we’re working on it!).

Andy Yasutake of LinkedIn and Mark Killick of Grubhub did an excellent job of breaking down their respective topics—Andy spoke about how LinkedIn worked on customer service request surges, and Mark spoke about using business intelligence to improve operations. We’re still thinking about their talks.

9. The Case Studies

One thing we’ve heard again and again is that our community craves presentations on what real companies do to move the customer service needle. At CRS Charleston, there were many breakout sessions to choose from. The topics represented leaned to digital and AI concerns, but they were varied enough to make the sessions useful to everyone:

• -BOTs, Speech, and Humans – Seamlessly Balanced
• -CX Measurement for the Ever-Connected Customer
• -Are You Ready? This is the Year of Consumer Messaging & Bots
• -Scaling True to Yourself
• -The Future of Customer Service is Here. Are you Ready?
• -Expanding Customer Conversations Over Digital Channels
• -University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Health Plan Delivers A High Touch, High Tech Customer Experience

8. The “Networking” Event

There’s no better way to make new connections than at our social events. The evening at Prohibition combined a 1920s-themed party with networking. Friendships and business relationships were formed—or cemented—by the night’s end.

7. The CXMB 2017 Corporate Edition Results

Every CRS Charleston attendee received a copy of the full report in their welcome packet, and COPC Inc.’s Judi Brenstein, Balsam Brands’ Caroline Tuan, Sweetwater Sound’s Salena Scardina, and Grubhub’s Mark Killick explored the real-world implications of the CXMB 2017 Corporate Edition.

Here are some highlights:

• -82% of corporate leaders feel their organization meets the customer service needs of its customers, while only 40% of consumers do
• -Just 61% of executives believe their company offers support in all the channels their customers want to use
• -Metrics CX senior leaders are using to measure success include CSAT (77%). NPS (67%), Customer Effort (28%), and Other (10%)

These kinds of benchmarking results let our community know where they’re ahead, on pace, or falling behind as compared to their peers. Hearing from other executives is one of the hallmarks of EITK events, and this report is one of the most valuable pieces of content we (in partnership with COPC) create and distribute.

From left: Judi Brenstein, Caroline Tuan, Salena Scardina, Mark Killick

6. The Keynotes

The list of keynotes was an all-star roster of corporate America’s best:

• -Scott Emmons, Head of the Innovation Lab – Neiman Marcus
• -Doug Woodard, SVP of Customer Channels for US Card Customer Experience – Capital One
• -Michele Watson, Senior Vice President of Client Success – Indeed
• -Wanny Manasse, VP of Customer Care – T-Mobile

Every one was packed full of imaginative strategies and tactics from companies that have customer experience at their core. The speakers brought us back to what we’re all passionate about: serving our customers better.

5. The Tour

Not everyone was able to make the tour of T-Mobile’s Charleston facility, but those who did will likely never forget it. The operation itself was impressive—1,300 seats—and the welcome was incredible. The employees we met serenaded us with songs they wrote just for us! The T-Mobile center was built with employee engagement in mind. The culture and heart of the center was undeniable. There were many areas where employees could relax and enjoy their workplace and build community. Hats off to T-Mobile for a tour that will be hard to top.

4. The Focus on Employees

It’s one of the bedrock principles of CX that employee engagement drives customer satisfaction. It’s also one of the hardest areas to get right. Airbnb’s presentation (not pictured) and the panel with (from left) Beth Linthicum of Aetna, Christopher Swisher of Bayer, and Jackie Craver of Nintendo gave new life to this topic, covering the challenges and presenting clever solutions.

3. The Food

The South has a reputation for providing good food, and CRS Charleston delivered on that promise. Savory options like the oyster shucking embraced local cuisine, but it was the dessert options that really shone. From the Italy-inspired lunch, to the ice cream sundae buffet, to the special cookies in a breakout session, there were enough options to satisfy every sweet tooth.

2. The Innovations Lab

Some of the most enlightening conversations at CRS Charleston took place in the Innovations Lab, where service partners and corporate brands mingled. Having knowledgeable providers available to demonstrate their products and talk about use cases was a big win for corporate leaders in search of solutions.

1. The Real-World Examples

Our pick for the most enlightening, inspiring, and thought-provoking aspect of CRS Charleston? The many real-world illustrations of customer service concepts. These examples in the presentations and breakouts spoke to how the most innovative companies demonstrate their passion for CX, every single day. We were particularly energized by:

• -Neiman Marcus’ memory mirror
• -T-Mobile’s smart approach to customers switching channels
• -Airbnb’s customer care centers tailored to their locations
• -Indeed’s orange chair to represent the customer at meetings
• -Capital One’s empathetic response to missed payments

More Highlights to Come in Fall 2018

CRS Charleston had too many highlights to name them all, but CRS Marina del Rey (Sept. 10-12, 2018) will up the stakes even more. We hope you’ll join us!

The post Top 10 Best Things About CRS Charleston appeared first on Execs In The Know.

PHOENIX, ARIZONA – November 16, 2017 – Global leaders in the customer experience industry, Execs In The Know and COPC Inc., have announced the release of the 2017 Consumer Edition of the Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) Series. The report provides compelling insights into key areas of consumer expectations, opinions and perceptions in using multiple channels for customer care. Traditional Care (phone, email, and in-person), Interactive Care (online/video chat, FAQ, and self-help), Social  Media Care (Twitter, Facebook, forums, etc.), and Mobile Care (apps, text/SMS, and mobile chat) are all explored.

Key Insights from the 2017 Consumer Survey:

– After two consecutive years of solid improvements, consumer opinion toward customer care’s ability to meet needs and expectations has flattened

– With results going back to 2014, 2017 saw the lowest percentage of consumers avoiding interacting with customer care

– Whether or not consumers self-select the multi-channel approach (as opposed to being forced into it) continues to have a profound impact on resolution and satisfaction rates for multichannel engagements

– In-Person Shoppers place far more value on good customer service than Online Shoppers

The Consumer Edition of the CXMB series is a resource for customer care professionals, looking to enhance their customer care program, improve brand opinion, and drive customer satisfaction. The 2017 Consumer Edition is the fifth consecutive year of reporting on findings of U.S. consumers, in all age groups and geographic regions. The survey findings provide both an overview of the entire customer care experience and insights regarding specific channels, as well as two new sections about the purchase experience and customer effort.

“The 2017 Consumer Edition of the CXMB Series is our most comprehensive to date,” said Chad McDaniel, President and CEO of Execs In The Know. “With every CXMB Series edition we continue to expand questions and sections that are important to today’s CX Professional, in addition to comparing data over the years to identify trends and patterns. Our community find the reports highly valuable and love using these insights to benchmark, learn, and plan their future approach.”

The full 2017 Consumer Edition is available at https://execsintheknow.com/cxmbseries/2017-consumer-edition/.

About Execs in the Know

For over 15 years, Execs in the Know has built a reputation of excellence in the Customer Management Industry and a worldwide community of over 50,000 Customer Experience Professionals. Execs in the Know connects people to engaging industry content, thought leadership, current trends, peer-to-peer collaboration, networking, and industry employment opportunities. Examples of this can be seen at their Customer Response Summit events, roadshows, webinars, workshops, Blog Talk Radio segments, Industry Benchmarking Series, blogs, thought papers, and social communities.

To learn more about Execs in the Know, visit www.execsintheknow.com. For more information on their Customer Management Recruitment Solutions, visit www.justcareers.com.

About COPC Inc.

COPC Inc. provides consulting, training, certification and the RevealCX™ software solution for operations that support the customer experience. The company created the COPC Standards, a collection of performance management systems for call center operations, customer experience management, vendor management, and procurement. Founded in 1996, COPC Inc. began by helping call centers improve their performance. Today, the company is an innovative global leader that empowers organizations to optimize operations to deliver a superior customer experience across all channels. COPC Inc. is privately held with headquarters in Winter Park, FL, U.S. and with operations in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan. To learn more about COPC Inc., visit www.copc.com.

For more information, visit www.copc.com.

Media Contacts

Alyssa Pitura
Director of Marketing and Brand Experience
alyssa@execsintheknow.com
www.execsintheknow.com
@ExecsInTheKnow

Lezli Harrell
Vice President, Marketing
COPC Inc.
lharrell@copc.com
www.copc.com

The post Execs In The Know & COPC Inc. Release 2017 Consumer Edition in Customer Experience Management Benchmark Series appeared first on Execs In The Know.

PHOENIX, AZ. April 10, 2017 – Following the recent release of the 2016 Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) Series Corporate Edition, Execs In The Know and COPC Inc. will be in Sunnyvale, California, on April 19, 2017, to host a CXMB Workshop. This exclusive, one-day event will be held at LinkedIn and offers customer experience professionals the chance to gather and share their challenges, successes and insights, while also making lasting connections in their local area.

The highlights of both the 2016 Consumer and Corporate Edition reports will be discussed in depth by COPC.

A few highlights from the findings:

– Although consumer opinion towards customer care has improved, gaps between consumer and corporate perception remain

– Preference for and use of Traditional Care slips, Email surprises and Mobile Care shines

– Consumer preference for live interactions over automated interactions remains strong, but companies continue to shift care away from live interactions and into automated channels

– Forced channel changes have a negative impact on both resolution and satisfaction rates

The featured speakers at the Workshop will be Scott Shute, VP of Global Customer Operations and Mark Quinn, Senior Director, Product Operations at LinkedIn. Scott is also a valued member of the 2017 Execs In The Know Corporate Advisory Board. Their keynote will focus on the Voice of the Customer at LinkedIn, how to best understand the needs of your customers, and tailor your customer experience.

In addition to the featured speakers highlighted above, there will also be presentations from subject matter experts on “Transforming From Customer Support to Customer Success” and “Keys for Personalized, Effortless Omnichannel Journeys”.

If you can’t attend the event, but are interested in obtaining either the CXMB Series 2016 Consumer Edition, or 2016 Corporate Edition, visit execsintheknow.com/resources/cxmb-series/.

About Execs In The Know

For over 15 years, Execs In The Know has built a reputation of excellence in the Customer Management Industry and a worldwide community of over 50,000 Customer Experience Professionals. Execs In The Know connects people to engaging industry content, thought leadership, current trends, peer-to-peer collaboration, networking, and industry employment opportunities. Examples of this can be seen at their Customer Response Summit events, roadshows, webinars, workshops, Blog Talk Radio segments, Industry Benchmarking Series, blogs, thought papers, and social communities.

To learn more about Execs In The Know, visit https://execsintheknow.com. For more information on their Customer Management Recruitment Solutions, visit www.justcareers.com.

 About COPC Inc.

COPC Inc. is an innovative global leader that empowers organizations to manage complex customer journeys.  The company created the COPC Customer Experience (CX) Standard and provides consulting, training and certification for operations that support the customer experience. Founded in 1996, COPC Inc. began by helping call centers improve their performance.  Today, the company works with leading brands worldwide to optimize key customer touchpoints and deliver a seamless experience across channels. COPC Inc. is privately held with headquarters in Winter Park, FL, U.S. and has operations in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan.

For more information, please visit www.copc.com.

Media Contact

Alyssa Pitura
Director of Marketing and Brand Experience
info@execsintheknow.com
www.execsintheknow.com
@ExecsInTheKnow

The post Execs In The Know and COPC Inc. Hold 2017 CXMB Series Workshop in California at LinkedIn appeared first on Execs In The Know.

To hear further discussion about CXMB Industry Insights: Travel and Hospitality, join Execs In The Know, COPC Inc. and guest speakers from Choice Hotels and Marriott International next Tuesday, December 6, at 1 p.m. ET for a webinar. To register, visit http://ow.ly/iGaO306Bmsy.

The post CXMB Industry Insights: Travel & Hospitality Survey Results [INFOGRAPHIC] appeared first on Execs In The Know.

PHOENIX, AZ — (November 21, 2016) — Execs In The Know, a global network of customer experience professionals, together with COPC Inc., announce the results from their first travel industry survey, CXMB Industry Insights: Travel & Hospitality. The survey focused on the customer care experience, the purchase experience, and customer loyalty.

The findings show that both leisure and business travelers are using multiple customer service channels to resolve issues. However, customer satisfaction is higher when travelers self-select a channel that they want to use rather than being forced into one. Furthermore, a consistent experience across channels is so important among travelers that it ranks higher than competitive pricing and a personalized experience.

Survey participants were U.S.-based individuals traveling for business only, leisure only or both. Here are some key travel and hospitality industry findings for both leisure and business travelers. See the infographic for more details.

– Business and leisure travelers still prefer to talk to someone in person or on the phone to resolve their issues. Both groups were equally open to using new channels of communications — social media, text, mobile chat and smartphone app — at 27 percent for business travelers and 30 percent for leisure travelers.

– When multichannel communication is a choice rather than a forced approach for issue resolution, customer satisfaction increases. Conversely, when forced into a multichannel approach to resolve an issue, both business and leisure travelers stated a dissatisfaction rate at nearly 50 percent.

– Both business and leisure travelers consider a consistent customer experience across communication channels significantly more important than competitive pricing. In particular, 60 percent of leisure travelers stated a consistent experience was important.

“We are pleased to provide the results of this survey, showing how a multichannel approach to meeting customer needs can affect the traveler’s experience. For companies focused on providing excellent customer care, our findings reveal a choice of communication options is the key to customer satisfaction. Travel and hospitality brands should not only be present in the channels their customers prefer, but also need to be capable of resolving their issues through these channels,” said Kathleen Jezierski, chief operating officer, COPC Inc.

“CXMB Industry Insights allows us to dive deeper into different industry segments and provide the important insights that our community members in each vertical are looking for,” said Chad McDaniel, president, Execs In The Know. “Our findings provide a better understanding of the customer landscape in the travel and hospitality sectors, and hopefully will spark some ideas for brands to improve the customer experience and enhance overall customer satisfaction.”

This travel survey is the first in the series of industry-specific research, and is part of the larger Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) Series, also published in partnership between COPC Inc. and Execs In The Know.

Download http://ow.ly/OxT3306onPG, or sign up to receive future survey results produced by COPC Inc. and Execs In The Know. Other industry-specific reports will follow in early 2017.

To hear a further discussion about CXMB Industry Insights: Travel and Hospitality, join COPC Inc. and Execs In The Know on Tuesday, December 6,at 1 p.m. ET for a webinar. To register, visit http://ow.ly/yYyY306onpY .

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About Execs In The Know

For over 15 years, Execs In The Know has built a reputation of excellence in the Customer Management Industry and a worldwide community of over 50,000 Customer Experience Professionals. Execs In The Know connects people to engaging industry content, thought leadership, current trends, peer-to-peer collaboration, networking and industry employment opportunities. Examples of this can be seen at their Customer Response Summit events, roadshows, webinars, workshops, Blog Talk Radio segments, Industry Benchmarking Series, blogs, thought papers and social communities. For more information visit www.execsintheknow.com.

About COPC Inc.

COPC Inc. is an innovative global leader that empowers organizations to manage complex customer journeys. The company created the COPC Customer Experience (CX) Standard and provides consulting, training and certification for operations that support the customer experience. Founded in 1996, COPC Inc. began by helping call centers improve their performance. Today, the company works with leading brands worldwide to optimize key customer touchpoints and deliver a seamless experience across channels. COPC Inc. is privately held with headquarters in Winter Park, Florida, U.S. and has operations in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan. www.copc.com

The post COPC Inc. and Execs In The Know Publish Travel and Hospitality Findings as Part of New Industry-Specific Customer Experience Research appeared first on Execs In The Know.

PHOENIX, AZ. October 24, 2016 – Following the recent release of the 2016 Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) Series Consumer Edition, Execs In The Know and COPC Inc. are headed to Toronto, Canada on November 29^th for a CXMB Series Workshop. This exclusive, one-day event presents an excellent opportunity for customer experience professionals to gather and share their challenges, successes and insights, while also making lasting connections in their local area.

As with past CXMB Series Workshop events, great attention will be paid to the results of the 2016 CXMB Series Consumer Edition, which focuses on customer journey insights from the consumer’s perspective. The Consumer Edition of the CXMB Series brings a host of new content in 2016, while a number of topics from last year’s report are clarified and expanded further, including the consumer’s preference for live interactions over automated ones and the consumer’s perception of the multi-channel journey.

This year’s Consumer Edition report also features two new sections: The Millennial Consumer and The Alternative Channel Customer Journey.

A few highlights from the findings:

– While much work remains to be done, there was a measurable improvement in the consumer’s overall impression of the customer care they received in 2016

– While the preference for Traditional Care remains strong, there was a slight pullback in 2016

– Consumer preference for human assistance over automated/self-help systems remains strong

If you’re interested in attending this event, visit the CXMB Series Workshop section of the Execs In The Know website at execsintheknow.com/events/cxmb-workshop, or contact Chad McDaniel via email or phone at chad@execsintheknow.com or 623.234.2843.

If you can’t attend the event, but are interested in obtaining the CXMB Series 2016 Consumer Report, visit execsintheknow.com/cxmbseries/2016-consumer-edition/.

About Execs In The Know

For over 15 years, Execs In The Know has built a reputation of excellence in the Customer Management Industry and a worldwide community of over 50,000 Customer Experience Professionals. Execs In The Know connects people to engaging industry content, thought leadership, current trends, peer-to-peer collaboration, networking, and industry employment opportunities. Examples of this can be seen at their Customer Response Summit events, roadshows, webinars, workshops, Blog Talk Radio segments, Industry Benchmarking Series, blogs, thought papers, and social communities.

To learn more about Execs In The Know, visit www.execsintheknow.com. For more information on their Customer Management Recruitment Solutions, visit www.justcareers.com.

 About COPC Inc.

COPC Inc. is an innovative global leader that empowers organizations to manage complex customer journeys.  The company created the COPC Customer Experience (CX) Standard and provides consulting, training and certification for operations that support the customer experience. Founded in 1996, COPC Inc. began by helping call centers improve their performance.  Today, the company works with leading brands worldwide to optimize key customer touchpoints and deliver a seamless experience across channels. COPC Inc. is privately held with headquarters in Winter Park, FL, U.S. and has operations in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan.

For more information, please visit www.copc.com.

Media Contact

Alyssa Pitura
Director of Marketing and Brand Experience
info@execsintheknow.com
www.execsintheknow.com
@ExecsInTheKnow

The post Execs In The Know and COPC Inc. to Host 2016 CXMB Series Workshop in Toronto appeared first on Execs In The Know.

PHOENIX, AZ. March 16, 2016 – The 2016 CXMB Series Workshop, organized by Execs In The Know and COPC Inc., is headed to two cities this spring, with stops in San Diego, CA (May 4th) and Toronto, Canada (June 7th). These exclusive, one day events present an excellent opportunity for industry professionals to gather and share their customer experience challenges, successes and insights. This year the spring events will be hosted by two exceptional brands that are strongly committed to the concept of Customer First: Petco and RBC Royal Bank.

As with past CXMB Series Workshop events, great attention will be paid to the results of the Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) Series reports — 2015 Editions. The CXMB Series is a collaborative effort between Execs In The Know and research partner, COPC Inc. Published bi-annually, the CXMB series provides valuable customer experience insights from both the consumer and corporate perspectives. This year’s reports reveal intriguing discoveries in the areas of consumer preference, channel growth and the multi-channel experience. The CXMB Series proves especially insightful when viewed as a whole, directly comparing results between the two editions.

A few highlights from the findings:

• 79% of corporate survey participants believe they are meeting the needs and expectations of customers, while only 33% of consumers report having their needs and expectations met

• Overwhelmingly, consumers reportedly favor live assistance over autonomous or self-help solutions, yet most companies continue to divert focus away from Traditional Care

• 67% of consumers took a multi-channel approach to resolving a customer service issue in the previous 12 months, but more than half of these individuals (62%) reported that they were “forced” to do so

The featured speaker at the San Diego event on May 4th, hosted by Petco, will be Razia Richter, Chief Customer Officer at Petco. Razia brings a wealth of retail experience, and is passionate about delivering on Petco’s promise to its customers. Her responsibilities at the organization include customer relations, the call center, CX, the net promoter program and Petco’s customer/market analytics center of excellence. Razia is also a valued member of the 2016 Execs In The Know Corporate Advisory Board.

The featured speaker at the Toronto event on June 7th, hosted by RBC Royal Bank, will be Cathy Honor, Senior Vice President and Head of Global Contact Centres at RBC. Cathy has been with RBC since 2001, leading the way in a variety of roles with a focus on RBC’s Global Call Centres beginning in 2013. Cathy is a true champion of the customer, and she will share insights into how RBC is taking a unique approach to creating customer experience excellence.

Along with the featured speakers highlighted above, each event will also include presentations from COPC Inc., Digital Roots and each event’s title sponsors. COPC Inc. will provide a detailed readout of results from the 2015 CXMB Series, along with key customer experience best practices. Digital Roots will lead an exploration of use cases highlighting brands that are utilizing social media data effectively and efficiently, while sharing social care best practices and ideas on how companies can retool their current programs.

If interested in attending one of these events, visit the CXMB Series Workshop section of the Execs In The Know website: https://execsintheknow.com/events/.
Or contact Chad McDaniel via email or phone: chad@execsintheknow.com or 623.234.2843.

About Execs In The Know

For over 15 years, Execs In The Know has built a reputation of excellence in the Customer Management Industry and a worldwide community of over 50,000 Customer Experience Professionals. Execs In The Know connects people to engaging industry content, thought leadership, current trends, peer-to-peer collaboration, networking, and industry employment opportunities. Examples of this can be seen at their Customer Response Summit events, roadshows, webinars, workshops, Blog Talk Radio segments, Industry Benchmarking Series, blogs, thought papers, and social communities.

To learn more about Execs In The Know, visit www.execsintheknow.com. For more information on their Customer Management Recruitment Solutions, visit www.justcareers.com.

About COPC Inc.

COPC Inc. is an innovative global leader that empowers organizations to manage complex customer journeys. With a focus on driving improvement, the company provides consulting, training and certification for operations that support the customer experience. With improved operational performance, COPC Inc. clients create loyal customers and achieve increased revenue and reduced costs. Founded in 1996, COPC Inc. began by developing the COPC® Family of Standards and helping call centers increase their performance. Today, the company works with hundreds of leading brands worldwide to optimize key customer touch points and deliver a seamless experience across channels. COPC Inc. has conducted assessments in more than 70 countries, and has operations in North America, Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan.

For more information, visit www.copc.com.

Media Contact

Alyssa Pitura
Director of Marketing and Brand Experience
info@execsintheknow.com
www.execsintheknow.com
@ExecsInTheKnow

The post Petco & RBC Royal Bank to Host 2016 CXMB Series Spring Workshops appeared first on Execs In The Know.

Author: Cyndy Edwards, Senior Consultant, COPC Inc. Learn more about COPC Inc. at http://www.copc.com.

Today’s customer fully embraces technology and expects companies to do the same. This is especially true when it comes to providing customer service. Customers are still calling into the contact center to resolve many issues. However, two-thirds of consumers surveyed by Execs In The Know and COPC Inc. utilize multiple channels, including self-service options.

The use of multiple channels is not the whole story. Customers expect an effortless and seamless experience throughout their journey with your organization, with a convenient path to issue resolution. This means that customer engagement must be connected and relevant between your assisted and unassisted (or self-service) channels.

A key component of your self-service channel is having an effective knowledgebase, or the online library that stores and delivers your customer care content. Yes, your self-service program relies on technology to deliver information to your customers. But it is the content, organization, and search functionality within your knowledgebase that will make your self-service program a useful and reliable part of your omnichannel engagement.

Here are seven ways to design, build and maintain a knowledgebase that will meet expectations during any part of the customer journey:

1) Start by establishing a knowledgebase strategy.

If the goal of your knowledgebase is to answer customer questions and help resolve their issues, then you need to make sure you understand your customers’ needs. You can get this information by documenting questions that customers are asking when you are monitoring calls, emails or chats. Make sure to capture questions that customers escalate to Tier 2.

Also, structure your knowledgebase with “simple” in mind. Stick to fewer generalized categories so customers are not confused. Over time as more content is added, there may be opportunities to add section headings or categories. These will become clear as they are needed, so be prepared to grow your knowledgebase organically.

2) Identify and build your knowledgebase team.

While this may seem obvious, an established team with well-defined roles is key to providing relevant content to the knowledgebase, in a timely manner. This team usually includes a content and/or project leader, agents, and content authors. The leader decides how the knowledgebase will be designed and organized, which topics will be covered, and to what extent. Agents can provide suggestions for content development, while authors are those who are both technically competent and in touch with day-to-day customer contact inquiries. Usually a knowledgebase solution takes about three months to implement, after planning is completed, and includes three to four full-time staff.

3) Create an internal and external knowledgebase

Build an external version of your knowledgebase with customer-facing instructions. At the same time, build an internal version with more technical details for use by support staff only. Having two different versions of your knowledgebase allows you to use the internal version to teach new agents how to use the knowledgebase. This training gives them experience with both the detailed internal version, as well as knowing where all the content is located in the external version that the customer is using. In turn, agents can more easily advise customers where to find information in the external version of the knowledgebase.

4) Customers want quick access to information, so provide a robust search capability.

Your knowledgebase should be the fastest customer service channel you manage. Customers want to be in and out and have their solution. Do not require them to register, sign in, or enter a product or case number, as this will slow them down and cause dissatisfaction. Also, your search algorithm should be extremely accurate and automatically provide a few possible answers to each inquiry. Be sure to test your search functionality to ensure key phrases return the correct content. Confusion is one of the major reasons customers abandon and are dissatisfied with a self-service channel, so your top priority is to ensure customers get the right answers to their inquiries.

5) Consider offering a chat option in your knowledgebase.

Chat is a great way to offer on-demand help to your customers. It also provides you an excellent source of valuable feedback regarding both the customer issue and the content they are reading. You should also set up a feedback button on each piece of content for customers to respond whether they found the content useful and/or solved their issue. This information will alert the content owners which articles are helpful and which need to be improved.

6) To increase efficiency, the knowledgebase should be able to learn new questions and answers from the other customer service channels.

To allow customers to ask and suggest new questions, consider connecting your knowledgebase to your multi-channel ticketing software and customer service widgets. Then, once a question is answered by a human, automatically add that question and answer to the knowledgebase. This allows your knowledgebase to provide the same answer automatically to future customers.

7) Analyze usage of the knowledgebase.

This will help identify what customers are using, what they perceive to be the most valuable content, and what content is missing. You can do this by tracking both the most popular pages in the knowledgebase, along with trends in overall usage. You also can review search engine usage. Log all uses of the search engine and generate summary reports that show the most common searches, along with failed search terms. This will tell you both what terms people are using and how your content matches up to their searches.

Not all customer issues can be resolved through a self-service program, but having a robust self-serve system that is continually improving is both cost effective and beneficial to your customer. However, it is essential to have a clear path to issue resolution within your self-service offering and a quick way for a customer to contact a live person if their inquiry is not resolved.

If you would like more information about how to improve the operational performance of both your assisted and self-service channels, go to www.copc.com.

To hear more about this topic and others like it, join us at Customer Response Summit Phoenix, February 23-25, 2016.

The post Seven Ways To Ensure Your Customers Actually Use Your Self-Service System appeared first on Execs In The Know.

PHOENIX, AZ and WINTER PARK, FL — January 22,  2016 – Execs In The Know, a global network of customer management professionals, and COPC Inc., a leader in customer experience operations, have announced an Executive Summary release for the 2015 Corporate Edition of the Customer Experience Management Benchmark (CXMB) Series.

The 2015 Corporate Edition is the seventh report in the CXMB Series and extends trend lines revealed in past editions, including specific data comparisons with the 2015 Consumer Edition.

“While the gulf between corporate and consumer perception has narrowed, the divide shows us that there’s still work to be done,” said Chad McDaniel, President and CEO of Execs In The Know. “The strength of our reports lie not only in the data points that trend year-over-year, but also in the direct comparison between the corporate and consumer perspective. We hope that the information can be used to assist corporations in identifying, prioritizing, and addressing the needs, wants and expectations of their consumers.”

The complete Corporate Edition of the CXMB survey will be released at the Execs In The Know Customer Response Summit Phoenix, February 23-25, 2016. COPC Inc. will lead a panel of executives who will explore the findings of the report in greater detail.

“The 2015 Corporate Edition of the CXMB Series tells the other side of the customer experience story, from the company’s perspective,” said Cliff Moore, chairman of COPC Inc. “Delivering an exceptional and consistent experience across channels is the only true differentiator in today’s competitive environment. The brands that do this best are the ones that are succeeding in building customer loyalty. This report will be a valuable resource for our clients as they build and manage their customer experience operations.”

The CXMB Series has been providing customer experience insights since 2012. Each year the survey offers a consumer version that is released in the fall and a corporate version that is released in the winter.

To download the 2015 Corporate Edition Executive Summary, visit http://ow.ly/Xi6lg. To download past editions from the CXMB Series, visit https://execsintheknow.com/resources/cxmb-series/.

About Execs in the Know

For over 15 years, Execs In The Know has built a reputation of excellence in the Customer Management Industry and a worldwide community of over 50,000 Customer Experience Professionals. Execs In The Know connects people to engaging industry content, thought leadership, current trends, peer-to-peer collaboration, networking, and industry employment opportunities. Examples of this can be seen at their Customer Response Summit events, roadshows, webinars, workshops, Blog Talk Radio segments, Industry Benchmarking Series, blogs, thought papers, and social communities.

To learn more about Execs In The Know, visit www.execsintheknow.com. For more information on their Customer Management Recruitment Solutions, visit www.justcareers.com.

About COPC Inc.

COPC Inc. is an innovative global leader that empowers organizations to manage complex customer journeys. With a focus on driving improvement, the company provides consulting, training and certification for operations that support the customer experience. Founded in 1996, COPC Inc. began by developing the COPC® Family of Standards and helping call centers increase their performance. Today the company works with hundreds of leading brands worldwide to optimize key customer touch points and deliver a seamless experience across channels. COPC Inc. is privately held with headquarters in Winter Park, Florida, U.S., and with operations in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan. To learn more about COPC Inc., visit www.copc.com.

Media Contacts

Alyssa Pitura
Director of Marketing and Brand Experience
info@execsintheknow.com
www.execsintheknow.com
@ExecsInTheKnow

Lezli Harrell
Vice President, Marketing
COPC Inc.
lharrell@copc.com
www.copc.com

The post Execs In The Know and COPC Inc. Release the Executive Summary for the 2015 Corporate Edition of the Customer Experience Management Benchmark Series appeared first on Execs In The Know.