A Force for the Future

A force for future growth

Navigating the COVID-19 crisis has been challenging for customer service organisations of all sizes, industries and staffing levels. In a short period of time, online enquiries and demand for non-contact services increased, and with them came a rise in customer expectations. Here we talk with Salesforce Regional Vice President of Service in Australia Belinda Burgess about how Salesforce helped businesses pivot their operations to navigate the pandemic with tailored contact centre and digital solutions for changed markets.

Many businesses had to rethink the way they operate over the past 18 months. What were the biggest challenges your customers and clients faced?

The pandemic’s impact was not felt evenly across all industries; many service heavy industries such as retail faced significant challenges as customer behaviour changed on an almost weekly basis. While manufacturers who previously had little end-customer contact found new opportunities to go direct, building new digital first capabilities. Overall 81% of decision makers said they accelerated digital initiatives.

How can Salesforce help organisations navigate these challenges with contact centre and digital solutions?

Accelerate digital transformation – Move voice channels to cloud-based digital platforms for greater agility and improve agent effectiveness. Also, bring online chat and messaging powered by bots and backed with robust knowledge management capabilities.

Deploy automation and AI – Automate simple service enquiries to reduce caseload, easing cost pressure and making time for agents to deliver better experience in the moments that matter to increase satisfaction. Make the chatbots available 24/7 as 83% of customers still expect to interact immediately.

Evolve the workforce – As customer behaviour shifts so does the availability of skilled resources and the desire for flexibility. Use tech to forecast and optimise resourcing levels and drip feed onthe-job training to ensure you have the right skills.

Unleash teams – Customers hate handoffs. Utilise collaborative service delivery to bring in expertise while retaining continuity. Swarm as incidents emerge bringing in departments and partners to the process.

Act on Insight – As channels come together analyse signals together to detect systemic problems emerging. See trends and opportunities for continuous improvement and close the loop back into sales and marketing.

How important is the need for workplaces to be agile and flexible, and for employees to be open to reskilling?

The skills required of agents are becoming broader and more complex than those traditionally associated with the role. Hard skills such as product knowledge and digital literacy are highly valued, agents act as trusted advisors with . necessary knowhow and cater to an increasingly online service landscape. Salesforce allows companies to move to a continuous training model, deploying micro-modules during gaps in the workday and validating the skills required to handle certain types of work before rostering. This requires a change in the way companies think about workforce engagement.

How does Salesforce reward and engage their people to deliver the best outcomes for customers?

This starts with organisational alignment. At Salesforce we created a process to do this we call the V2MOM. It stands for Vision, Values, Methods, Obstacles and Measures. Employees at every level create a V2MOM and map that V2MOM to their team, and the company. This ensures staff can connect their personal actions and plan to company objectives and see their impact

According to the State of the Connected Customer report, 71% of customers have made purchase decisions based on the quality of customer service. What are your golden rules for delivering outstanding customer service?

Focus on outcomes – Customer service has a big impact on decision making but is not in itself the goal. Keep teams focussed on what customers are trying to achieve.

Single view of customer – It’s important to have service channels sharing the same views as the customer. I might start applying for a new mobile phone online and then pick up the conversation later on the phone or in a store.

Single knowledge base – Give customers your best information. Discover new solutions and make them accessible to all communication channels including self service through chatbots and search.

Automate easy wins – Once your knowledge base is humming make sure customers know it’s the fastest way to get help.

Team to win – Assist agents using AI to uncover the best information, next best action and access expertise by swarming on difficult issues using collaboration tools like Slack.

Salesforce has sponsored the ASEA awards for the past six years. Why is it important to recognise and celebrate the achievements of those working in customer-facing businesses?

Deploying technology alone does not ensure excellent customer service. An online form cannot show empathy the same way a human can; it does not know how long you’ve searched for an answer, and cannot sense how frustrated you are. And, with technology at our fingertips, consumers have developed higher expectations of customer service and those they come in contact with.

A human centric approach is so important, and why the individuals working in customer-facing businesses need to be celebrated and recognised as one of the most valuable assets of a modern customer-focussed organisation.

ABOUT SALESFORCE:

Salesforce is the world’s #1 customer relationship management (CRM) platform. They help your marketing, sales, commerce, service and IT teams work as one from anywhere — so you can keep your customers happy everywhere. Salesforce has been a partner of CSIA and sponsor of the Australian Service Excellence Awards for the last six years.

ABOUT BELINDA:

Belinda Burgess has more than 20 years’ experience working in global technology organisations. She is a passionate CX leader who leads the Service Cloud portfolio at Salesforce as Regional Vice President. Her current responsibility is to build upon Salesforce’s strong Service Cloud business across Australia with a dedicated specialist team that is customer centric and outcome focused.