Getting ahead today in any industry is increasingly difficult, competition is rampant everywhere. There are now so many ways for consumers to spend their hard-earned dollars. If you want to be the one they pick, you need to stand out — you need to provide them with a great experience.
So how do you elevate the customer experience enough to gain an advantage? There are many strategies to implement, but perhaps nothing is more important than maximizing each and every interaction you have with a customer.
One great way to ensure that these interactions go well across the enterprise is through a contact center strategy based around sophisticated, high-level software solutions. By systemizing customer engagement, there will be more consistency, efficiency and quality control. And the following key elements of a contact center suite are sure to improve the customer experience.
1. Inbound Voice Calls
We now live in the digital age where social media and mobile communications are the norm, but you simply cannot forget about the phone. Especially when issues and concerns are more pressing, this is still the preferred method of interaction for so many customers. Inbound call management — including a way to minimize wait time — is simply essential. You have to get this right, and call center software makes support more intelligent.
2. Outbound Voice Calls
Customers will call you when they have a problem, so it is vital to get that part of the equation right. But you also can’t forget about outbound voice calls. Outreach is necessary for any brands that want to develop and maintain a connection with the customer, and doing so with smart software will help make sure that more of these contact attempts are useful and appreciated by the person answering the phone. While few people want spam calls, many do greatly appreciate appointment and bill payment reminders. And by having everything organized, it is easy to manage and schedule these calls for the right times.
3. Omnichannel Support
Calls remains important, but social media is also a popular form of communication between brands and consumers — and it is a place where you can really differentiate yourself. Even today, so many enterprises are merely scanning their mentions and trying to triage problems in an ad hoc way. While this can work to a degree, it is far from optimal. Not only do many problems fall through the cracks, but it’s hard to track who you’re talking to.
Omnichannel support solves this problem. Now, whether someone first engages your brand through Facebook or Twitter, everything is tracked the same as it is with e-mails or calls. Rather than playing a guessing game and forcing the customer to re-state their issue for a second — or third or fourth time — to every representative they speak to, there is continuity. It’s hard to overstate how much better this is for the overall customer experience.
Elevating Customer Experience
Nothing is more important than the customer experience. And nothing is more important to elevating customer experience than organization and instituting a systematic approach.
New contact center strategies and software can make such a large difference. From inbound and outboard voice calls to omnichannel support, every enterprise needs to take charge of this critical element of its business today.
If you can get this right, everything else will start to seem so much easier. Because if you can keep your customers happy, they are that much more likely to keep coming back — again and again — for years to come.
