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8 plays to deliver an integrated customer service experience
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Today, multi-channel usage is a way of life, but the trend seems to have bypassed customer service at most organizations. Surveys show that having to narrate the same problem to multiple service agents on the same or different channels is the biggest cause of customer frustration. Not surprisingly, service agents are just as frustrated, given that they spend a huge chunk of their workday attending to repeat calls. They end up at the receiving end of customer ire, when they aren‟t really to blame. But is it really their fault, or are they just not equipped with the right contact center software? It‟s ironic how customer service channels - contact centers included - have always survived having functioned as tools of efficiency or problem resolution, rather than as a medium of service delivery that creates customer delight. But we are unlikely to have this luxury for much longer. Consumers are becoming increasingly demanding with respect to the products and services they consume, including after-sales service. After all, how can a bank justify why customers cannot track the status of their loan application, when they can monitor so many everyday services - like a courier shipment in transit - in real time? If you‟re a senior executive overseeing customer service operations, ask yourself this question: “Is my contact center really just a contact center?” Or can it be much more? A revenue generator? The source of stellar customer service experience? If your answer is yes, we have 8 plays that should interest you. The focus of these plays is integration — from applications to service channels to social media, and more. On behalf of the Infosys AssistEdge team, I hope this playbook adds value to your business. If you‟d like to discuss how you can improve your customer service experience, please drop us a line by writing to askus@infosys.com Regards, Gopal Devanahalli Vice President - Products, Platforms and Solutions for the Energy, Utilities, Communication & Services Business Unit of Infosys
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Integrate disparate applications to give agents a unified view of the customer‟s service history
At the average contact center, agents need to toggle between as many as a dozen applications to build a complete 360-degree picture of the customer, which is obviously both inefficient and time consuming. This is popularly called the „Alt + Tab‟ effect - where agents constantly hit these keys to find the right information, and is of the reasons why calls aren‟t resolved in the first instance. What you need is a way to capture the history of every interaction on every channel - contact center, email, Web, chat, social media, and so on - and after integrating and sequencing the same, offer this up to the contact center agent in a single view. This will create a „casebook‟ of sorts for each customer, and will straightway eliminate the need to seek the same information twice from customers.
Quick questions How many applications do your agents need to toggle while interacting with a customer? For each application that the agent has to consult, what is the impact on first call resolution? Does signing on to each application impact agent productivity? Do your agents have a „single view‟ of customer history during interactions?
Next steps If you‟re looking to integrate applications into a single dashboard view, look for a technology solution that can be implemented straight „out of the box.‟ The solution should be easy to integrate with other enterprise applications without disrupting processes or business. This will minimize your time to value, and reduce total cost of ownership.
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Integrate customer interactions across channels
Customers get frustrated when they have to repeat their issues - whether it‟s speaking to different agents, or going through the same process on IVR and chat. Here‟s a thought: if your customer started resolving an issue on your self-help portal, can she/he pick up where they left off when they talk to your agent? Now that‟s an integrated service experience. Add to this a solution to route a problem call to the right expert based on skill, location, workload or other business priorities, and you‟ll have found your way to up the rate of first call resolution.
Quick questions
Next steps
Check your quality logs - how often has a customer sounded frustrated because she/he had to repeat their problem? How did this impact your service experience?
Evaluate your contact center software based on whether it can analyze the context in which the user has initiated contact and guide them to the correct expert based on skill, geography, priority, and other business rules.
Can you streamline, intelligently route, and schedule customer conversations based on the customer‟s situation or problem area?
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Integrate knowledge repositories and online channels to provide comprehensive selfhelp options
One way to improve the service experience for both customers and agents is to reduce workload and fast track complaint resolution at the contact center by enabling self-service through online channels. Just tune in to what research points to — while a majority of customers say that they are willing to take their service issues to an online self-service channel, provided it works well, barely half of those same customers actually make the attempt, citing inaccuracy and incompleteness of such channels. Possibly, they are waiting for the emergence of a reliable self-service channel, which is supported by a single, online knowledge base. The benefits: happier customers, and less traffic to your contact center. And why restrict self-service to customers alone? Why not extend the self-help to create a diagnostics system that walks agents through a step-by-step process of issue resolution?
Quick questions How comprehensive is your self-help knowledge base? Can you update it in real time by letting agents create new customer service scenarios? How social is your self-help capability? Does it enable your customersâ€&#x; peers and friends to suggest solutions and reward them for it?
Next steps Look for ways to provide self-options for customers on their channel of preference. Make knowledge deployments more agile and more social with an application that will make content grow quickly, in line with customer demand, and with minimal overhead management costs.
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Integrate your analytics capabilities into real-time performance dashboards
The power of analytics is best realized with a single view of overall contact center operations. One that provides heads of customer service and other senior executives real-time statistics on the total number of calls handled, with customer sentiment analysis - positive, negative and neutral feedback. Taking your contact center to the next level of performance will require a powerful analytics application that provides supervisors instant information about various queues, calls handled, agent performance, average call handling time, average customer wait time. This application should also enable supervisors to allocate resources to call queues in real time, based on need and traffic.
Quick questions Are you still using multiple applications to integrate different contact center performance parameters? Does your analytics application provide a real-time view of contact center operations, with comprehensive drilldowns of individual parameters? On Break
Next steps Evaluate your contact center software based on whether it is equipped to help your executives make real-time decisions on workforce optimization and monitor process compliance.
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Integrate service and transaction history with social preferences to cross-sell and up-sell more
Rethinking customer service as an investment, rather than cost, is what triggers success. This kind of forward thinking is yet to percolate into most enterprises, which still perceive the contact center as an expense item. You need to pause and consider industry data, which shows that every satisfied customer improves the cross-sales acceptance rate by 20%. All it takes is some simple arithmetic to estimate the derivative revenue potential. A customer service solution with a powerful analytics component can process the unified service and transaction history and social preferences of customers into actionable product recommendations to improve cross- and up sell-rates. These same recommendations can also be made available through a self-service window. With these capabilities, you can transform your contact center into a revenue generator.
Quick questions What is the cross-sell acceptance rate at your contact center? Do your agents cross-sell more when they resolve customer issues in the first instance? For each product or service, have you made available one-click competitor information to your agents?
Next steps Equip your agents with a real-time application that recommends the most suitable products and services for customers based on preferences, spend patterns, competitor value propositions, and predictive analytics.
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Integrate social media into your customer experience management strategy
When customers hear from someone facing a similar issue, they see it as credible advice. Social media is a really cost-effective self-service channel. Here, you can facilitate integrated chat service, greater crowdsourcing options, and a peer-to-peer community approach that not only resolves issues, but also deepens engagement and improves loyalty. Youâ€&#x;ll also benefit by reducing traffic to your contact center.
Quick questions Are you proactive about tracking customer sentiment on the social web? Is this a capability that your customer service teams and contact centers possess, or do your marketing teams alert you about customer issues as seen on social media? Have you noticed any instances where customers resolved their own issues on social media? Do you encourage customers to help other customers with their issues on social channels? Do you reward them for their contributions?
Next steps Provide customers quick access to self-service content on the social web. Look for an application that goes beyond sentiment analysis — any social care application should empower your contact center to create personalized content and proactive alerts, while enabling a collaborative peercare experience.
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Integrate loyalty management programs with contact center software
Chances are you already have a dedicated team taking care of your loyalty management program, with an application that enables your teams to create and manage loyalty campaigns. However, many enterprises still havenâ€&#x;t tapped into the opportunity of blending loyalty programs with day-to-day contact center operations. When you equip your contact center software with loyalty management data and capabilities, you give your agents the power to deliver a truly personalized and crosschannel experience. Add strong customer analytics to the mix, and your agents can target customers with the right offer at the right time.
Quick questions Do your loyalty management systems increase levels of customer engagement by using social and mobile channels? Can you incentivize self-care for customers by embedding it into your loyalty management programs?
Next steps Look for a contact center software that includes end-to-end loyalty management capabilities, with rich mobile and social features. Key capabilities should include targeted campaign and offer management and dynamic customer segmentation capabilities
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Integrate varied customer service capabilities with a single contact center software
If enhancing contact center effectiveness and delivering a consistent service experience are your top priorities, you shouldn‟t have to grapple with challenges like accelerating selfhelp adoption, delivering an integrated cross-channel experience, providing single-window customer view to agents, and evolving contact centers from problem solvers to revenue enhancers. What you need is a solution that provides an integrated service experience to both agents and customers. You should also look to leverage a cloud-based solution as a way to improve efficiency, drive down costs, and increase agility - all at one go. The best part: when you use a cloud-based solution, you‟ll be able to accelerate your customer service transformation and effect big changes in matter of weeks.
Quick questions Have you invested in contact center solutions that only address point problems? Does your contact center software have social, mobile, cloud and analytics features? Is your contact center software helping you realize your true potential to generate revenue?
Next steps If 2013 is the year you want to transform customer service, don‟t get stuck with an application that gives you returns in 2014 or beyond. Choose an application where the proof is in the pudding. If the provider doesn‟t have a case where the application delivered returns in a few months, then it shouldn‟t even make your shortlist.
assist Customer Service Experience
Infosys AssistEdge is the first customer service product for contact centers that delivers an integrated crosschannel experience. AssistEdge provides an integrated customer service experience across channels including web, chat, phone and social media, transforming contact centers from issue resolution centers to revenue generating units. Our unique contextpassing capability and self-help technology - provided in an intuitive dashboard - enhances agent productivity by 25% while delivering a superior customer experience. AssistEdge enables organizations to realize faster return on investment through improved agent efficiency, reduced call volumes, and quicker go-live periods. Enterprises have been able to breakeven on their investments in 3 months while tripling their returns in their first year. Differentiated capabilities • Self-care • Loyalty management • Context passing • Unified dashboard • Expert connect • Service analytics Compelling business results • Deployed in 350+ contact centers across 40 countries • 100,000+ agents and technicians, 12+ million interactions per year • ~50% reduction in Average Handling Time • ROI realized within 6 months • $35 million in estimated savings
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For more information, contact askus@infosys.com
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