Excellent Customer Experience as an Expectation: Trends in 2023

Contributed Article by Liza Smyth, SVP of Customer Experience for Formstack

With an economic downturn on the horizon for 2023, customer experience is paramount. A positive customer experience drives customer loyalty, leading to retention and, ultimately, a stronger bottom line. According to McKinsey, improving customer experience is the fastest-growing priority for surveyed customer care leaders.

Let’s look at how we expect customer experience to evolve in 2023 and how it will impact forward-thinking organizations.

Keeping pace with customer expectations in 2023 

In the coming year, companies will continue to focus on customer experience, but must also keep up with heightening customer expectations amid stiffer competition. Because of the last few years of digital-first experiences driven by the pandemic, customers now increasingly expect personalized interactions and a secure, seamless buying experience that intuits their needs, regardless of the channel they choose to make a purchase.

An exceptional customer experience is a key factor in your organization’s competitive edge. In fact, 73% of surveyed customers said that experience was a driving factorin their purchasing decisions. Exceptional customer experiences keep customers coming back, and retaining existing customers is essential during times of economic turmoil when new customers are difficult to come by.

Look at the customer experience holistically 

In 2023, the responsibility of customer experience will be shared across the company — from tip to tail, every segment of an organization will play a role in improving the customer experience. Ensure your departments are communicating with each other to deliver the most unified experience, as 85% of customers expect cohesive interactions across departments, according to Salesforce data.

But how do you know if you’re improving your customers’ experiences? The best way to measure CX is to listen to your customers. Customer satisfaction surveys will clarify what you’re doing right while allowing customers to provide feedback. These results will let you dig deeper into what is working and identify pain points to address. This information can help you recognize any silos to break down between departments, which will ultimately improve interdepartmental communication and the comprehensive customer experience.

Invest in digital transformation 

Digital transformation’s second wave will bring humans into the digital experience. This is crucial, as 82% of surveyed Americans said they want more human interaction in their customer experience. Even as digital transformation becomes more commonplace, the human touch is still integral to customer satisfaction.

The most forward-thinking organizations will invest in digital transformation even with the forecasted economic uncertainty. The shift to digital will determine how to personalize experiences, anticipate customers’ needs, and offer a smooth customer experience from start to finish, overall increasing value for the customer and strengthening customer relationships — a result that 72% of surveyed leaders said they expected from a digital shift. Strong customer relationships are linked to improved retention and increased loyalty, both of which will play a part in where consumers decide to spend their money during 2023.

In the coming year, vendors will commence this next wave of digital transformation by using different channels and forums to communicate with customers. Using multiple channels for communication will lead to better data to analyze to identify key insights. Using this data, you can more effectively fulfill customers’ needs and facilitate seamless, intuitive self-help. This pivot to digital will contribute to improved customer experiences.

As the importance of customer experience continues to trend upward, businesses will increasingly look to differentiate themselves through their offerings. The smartest organizations will look at the customer experience as a whole to better unify experiences, while also investing in digital transformation to personalize experiences and assume customer needs in 2023 and beyond.

Is Customer Experience The Ultimate Marketing Tool?

Contributed article by Frank Hamilton

Advertising surrounds us everywhere. Companies have to try hard to stand out from the crowd and prove that their product or service is trustworthy to customers. Improving marketing customer experience is one of the top opportunities to turn customers into brand ambassadors, win more clients, raise brand awareness and get a competitive edge. But is customer experience the ultimate marketing tool in 2022? Let’s find it out.

What Is Customer Experience?

To put it simply, customer experience in marketing is a general term that covers all the impressions the customers have when interacting with a brand. In response to digital marketing development, customer experience has become one of the strongest digital trends of recent years.

This marketing tool creates the conditions for interacting with customers to meet or exceed their expectations. Customers go through many points of interaction with a company. And it is very important that at each of these points your customer is satisfied.

Modern marketing is customer-centric so the customers are the only ones to decide what kind of products to buy, and what level of service to choose.  In a couple of clicks, customers can view product features, reviews, and ratings, and decide “To buy or not to buy?” They can quickly change brands without compromising themselves if a competitor offers a better product, or service or anticipates their desires.

In such an abundance of choice, when the customer experience is far from being enjoyable, 32% of modern users are willing to give up on their favorite brand. At the same time, one unsatisfied customer will tell about their negative experience to 16  friends and damage the company’s reputation with the word of mouth.

Why Is Customer Experience So Important?

Let’s be honest with each other – there is no perfect marketing tool that will fit every company and every brand. But improving customer experience day after day is a must-follow strategy for every company. Firstly, a positive customer experience is a confirmation that your core business processes are set up right. After all, if at any point of interaction your customer isn’t happy, you need to make adjustments to your team or your marketing strategy. What’s more, the customer experience is directly dependent on employees being competent, responsible, and proactive.

Here are a few more reasons why companies should care even more about a successful modern customer experience:

 1. Increase the Check

Modern customers will never be satisfied with little. Today, they want the most from brands and companies at every stage of interaction. Studies show that 86% of customers are willing to pay more for good service. This means that companies with a customer-centric marketing strategy will be able to earn even more and grow their company faster.

 2. Win More Customers

Customers want a personalized approach that will cater to personal wishes and requests. Targeted advertising, smart content marketing and blogging increase customer trust and loyalty, allowing you to stand out from other similar brands. And as a result, grow the number of leads and customers. Surveys show that 80% of consumers are more likely to make a purchase if a company offers a personalized approach.

 3. Stand Out From the Competition

Customers today have a wide range of services and products to choose from, so companies should try hard to stand out. A positive customer experience is one effective way to stand out from the competition, and most importantly, to build loyalty and retain customers for a long time.

 4. Lower the Cost per Lead

Word of mouth is free advertising for your company. And it’s worth noting that it’s very effective. According to studies, more than 92% of consumers use reviews to make a purchase decision. Therefore, every satisfied customer can become an ambassador for your brand in the future and help you attract new leads with the power of social proof. Here is how you won’t have to spend any extra money to acquire new customers.

 5. Create a Recognizable Brand

Loyal customers help take a brand to the next level. After all, globally popular brands have become popular because of the consistent digital consumer experience they delivered for years. One of the ways to create a recognizable brand is to tell your potential customers about it as much as possible through highly qualified content since to date, content importance for blog is growing. This is the tool to build loyalty and improve your SEO performance at once.

How To Improve Customer Experience? 

Customer experience is one of the most important marketing tools that determine how successful your company or brand will be. So here are some important tips that can help you stand out with the best customer experience.  

• Develop an omnichannel strategy to enhance the customer experience. Always be accessible to your customers. For example, if the customer feels more comfortable contacting you through social media, you should be ready to support them via social channels. If the user likes to find information on their own, run a meaningful blog. If the customer wants to contact you after business hours, it would be nice to offer them a chatbot. It will stay in touch with your customers 24 hours a day, which will allow for a better customer experience. Look here for more insights into omnichannel customer experience and the benefits it drives.
• Train your employees. At certain stages of interacting with the brand, your customers will work with your employees. Be sure that they correctly communicate the company’s values and culture, and have perfect knowledge of the product and the algorithm for dealing with various atypical situations. Regular training sessions can help your sales, customer support, and marketing teams provide impeccable assistance.
• Provide feedback on time. Listen to and read feedback from your customers. Use this information wisely to improve your service and product. Once you have worked out the weaknesses, try to keep your customers informed about the work done, the troubleshooting, or the improvement of the service.
• Optimize the customer journey. Identify all stages of the customer’s interaction with your company. Think about how you can make customers’ experience of choosing, buying, using, and committing to your brand stronger and more positive. Use analytics and Big Data to keep up to date with your customers’ preferences and desires.
• Collect feedback and ratings. Monitor the feedback and ratings you get from customers. If some of these are negative, respond immediately and try to rectify the situation by offering an alternative, a discount, or a personal offer. This will help to retain the customer and save your reputation. Encourage satisfied customers to leave positive feedback as well.
• Implement loyalty programs. The main aim of a loyalty program is to build long-term relationships. Only sincere attention and a personalized approach will persuade customers to stay with you for the long term. A good loyalty program helps increase lifetime customer value (LTV), the loyalty index (NPS), and grow brand advocates, who are particularly useful in attracting new leads at no extra cost. 

Conclusion

Customer experience is the ultimate marketing tool. If consumers like you, they will happily spend money on your product and recommend it to others. In a world where competition between brands is huge, the one who manages to make more people fall in love with you wins.

Discovering the Value of Attended Automation as a Digital Transformation Tool to Enhance the Productivity of Remote Agents

It was a transition that was already in progress before the current emergency unfolded. The migration to a reduced population of work-at-home agents, coupled with the unprecedented spike in demand for information, has dramatically accelerated the need for digital transformation. While just about every business already knew it had to digitize its operations to remain competitive, many are now scrambling to get up to speed.

Three key process automation technologies: Robotic Process Automation (RPA), Cognitive Intelligence and Attended Automation are the core elements in any digital transformation initiative. Attended Automation is the orchestrator that binds them together by ensuring that agents are aligned to both customer-facing and back-office processes. It acts as a kind of digital personal assistant to all employees, giving them real-time, context-specific guidance when needed in interaction processes.

In its truest form, Attended Automation is comprised of software robots that reside in each employee’s desktop. These robots have cognitive intelligence that enables them to navigate the dynamic desktop environment: a robust functionality that empowers them to bubble up when they sense an employee needs guidance. They communicate with employees via intelligent, interactive screens that are fully customizable.

When businesses adapt Robotic Process Automation (RPA) or chatbot solutions to support both the automation of repetitive tasks and the accessibility of self-service channels, the central focus will continue to be on humans. It is live people who are responsible for the proper functioning and sustainability of these solutions. Applying Attended Automation technology to customer-centric operational processes further augments the role played by humans.

Attended Automation was initially designed to work in collaboration with live agents to enable them to focus on high-value tasks that require a human touch. But with the need to keep business continuity in crisis mode becoming the new norm, it has also become a tool to allow people to achieve their full potential while helping them adjust to organizational change. This in turn helps companies maintain service consistency and process efficiency while keeping their growing number of remote agents on-target.

Learn more about the benefits by attending a complimentary webcast presented by NICE on CrmXchange on Tuesday, May 19 at 1:00 PM ET. It’s entitled “Keep Your Remote Agents Engaged and Productive with Intelligent Attended Automation” and will be delivered by Karen Inbar, Director of Marketing for NICE Advanced Process Solutions, an expert with a 20-year track record in the high-tech field, including stints at leaders such as Microsoft and SAP.

Among the topics she will address include using intelligent attended automation to:

• Positively impact service operations and consistent delivery within a new distributed working environment.
• Enable remote agents to adapt to their new working environment during an uncertain and turbulent period.
• Practical ways in which intelligent Attended Automation helps agents stay informed, productive and empathetic to customer issues.

Register now at no cost for this timely and informative webcast. If you are unable to at attend the live session, a link to the webcast will be posted within 24 hours of the presentation.

Can we build machines that understand us?

Tobias Goebel,  Mar 2020

The question of whether we can build machines that truly think is a fascinating one. It has both practical and philosophical implications, and both perspectives answer a key question very differently: “how close to the real thing (human thinking) do we need to get?” In fact – does rebuilding the exact human ways even matter? And are we too easily impressed with anyone claiming they have accomplished this Franksteinian feat?

From a purely practical perspective, any machine that improves a human task on some level (speed, quality, effort) is a good machine. When it comes to “cognitive” tasks, such as reasoning, or predicting what comes next based on previous data points, we appreciate the help of computer systems that produce the right outcome either faster, better, or more easily than we can. We do not really care how they do it. It is perfectly acceptable if they “simulate” how we think, as long as they produce a result. They do not actually have to think like we do.

The question of whether machines can truly think has become more relevant again in recent years, thanks to the rise of voice assistants on our phones and in our homes, as well as chatbots on company websites and elsewhere. Now, we want machines to understand — arguably a different, more comprehensive form of thinking. More specifically, we want machines to understand human language. Again we can consider this question from two different angles: the practical, and the philosophical one.

John Searle, an American professor of philosophy and language, introduced a widely discussed thought experiment in 1980, called The Chinese Room. It made the argument that no program can be written that, merely by virtue of being run on a computer, creates something that truly is thinking, or understanding. Computer programs are merely manipulating symbols, which means operating on a syntactical level. Understanding, however, is a semantical process.

Searle concedes that computers are powerful tools that can help us study certain aspects of human thought processes. He calls that “weak AI”. In his 1980 paper, he contrasts that with “strong AI”: “But according to strong AI, the computer is not merely a tool in the study of the mind; rather, the appropriately programmed computer really is a mind, in the sense that computers given the right programs can be literally said to understand and have other cognitive states.”

Cognitive states are states of mind such as hoping, wanting, believing, hating. Think (sic!) about it: proponents of strong AI, and they do exist, claim that as soon as you run an appropriately written computer program (and only while it is running), these computers literally are hoping, are wanting, etc. That surely must be a stretch?

Searle’s thought experiment is summarized by him as follows:

“Imagine a native English speaker who knows no Chinese locked in a room full of boxes of Chinese symbols (a data base) together with a book of instructions for manipulating the symbols (the program). Imagine that people outside the room send in other Chinese symbols which, unknown to the person in the room, are questions in Chinese (the input). And imagine that by following the instructions in the program the man in the room is able to pass out Chinese symbols which are correct answers to the questions (the output). The program enables the person in the room to pass the Turing Test for understanding Chinese but he does not understand a word of Chinese.”

This is a simple but powerful thought experiment. For decades now, other philosophers have attempted to shoot holes into the argument, e.g. claiming that while the operator him- or herself might not understand Chinese, the room as a whole actually does. Yet all of these replies are eventually refutable, at least according to Searle, so the argument is being discussed and studied to this day.

Strong AI is of course not necessary for practical systems. As an excellent example of that, consider the social chatbot Mitsuku. (A “social bot” has no purpose other than to chat with you, as opposed to what you could call functional or transactional chatbots, such as customer service bots.) Mitsuku is a five-time winner (and now a Guinness World Record holder) of the Loebner Prize, an annual competition for social bots. She is entirely built on fairly simple “IF-THEN” rules. No machine learning, no neural networks, no fancy mathematics or programming whatsoever. Just a myriad of pre-written answers and some basic contextual memory. Her creator is Steven Worswick, who has been adding answers to Mitsuku since 2005. The chatbot, who you can chat with yourself, easily beats Alexa, Siri, Google, Cortana, and any other computer system that claims it can have conversations with us. (Granted: none of the commercially available systems do claim that social banter is their main feature.) Certainly, Mitsuku by no means aims to be an example of strong AI. It produces something that on the surface looks like a human-to-human conversation, but a computer running the IF-THEN rules is of course nowhere near a thinking machine. This example, however, shows that it neither requires a machine that “truly thinks”, nor a corporation with the purchasing power of an Amazon, Apple, or Google, to build something that serves a meaningful purpose: a single individual with a nighttime and weekend passion can accomplish just that. And Mitsuku, with its impressive ability to chitchat for long stretches of time, is meaningful to many, according to the creator.

 

It is easy to get distracted by technological advancements and accomplishments, and the continuous hype cycles we find ourselves in will never cease to inspire us. But let’s make an attempt to not let them distract us from what fundamentally matters: that the tools we build actually work, and perform a given task. For chatbots, that means that they first and foremost need to be able to have a meaningful conversation in a given context. Whether they are built on simple rules or the latest generation of neural network algorithms shouldn’t matter. Despite that concession, it will probably remain forever human to marvel at advances towards solving what might be the biggest philosophical question of all: can we ever build a machine that can truly understand?

How Desktop Automation Improves Agent Performance

Desktop automation has a major impact on the customer service industry. Contact center agents use automation to finish tasks faster and quickly access data, which leaves plenty of energy for delighting customers and providing top notch service.

How Desktop Automation Tools Work

• Hotkeys or triggers immediately start a specific workflow on the computer. By triggering a workflow with just one click, agents save a lot of time that used to be spent on manual processes.
• Desktop automation software usually comes with standard workflows that you can start using right away. You’ll also have the option to customize the workflows or create brand new ones.
• Different apps trigger different actions based on how the customer interacts with it, all without requiring the agent to be logged in at the moment.

Sample Desktop Automation Workflow

Step 1: Software identifies and authenticates the customer.

Step 2: A live agent listens to the customer and then determines that they need to provide more information.

Step 3: The software collects the additional data.

Step 4: The live agent reconnects with the customer to verify that the information has been received and to finalize the conversation.

This may sound clunky if you think of it in terms of a calling customer ­– transferring a customer back and forth between a computer system and an agent is frustrating. However, if it’s happening on live chat, the customer probably won’t realize when they’re speaking with a chatbot as opposed to a real agent.

Benefits of Desktop Automation

• Desktop automation puts robots next to agents so they can carry out simpler tasks. The robots are unobtrusive – they’re a tool for the agents, not something that gets in the way.
• Automation tools also handle the tasks that are more prone to errors when in the hands of live agents.
• Desktop automation tools don’t get tired. They’ll continue making the same decisions no matter how long they’ve been working. Agents are then free to connect on an emotional level with customers and they’ll have the energy needed to do so.

Contact center systems can be complex, with multiple applications for different needs. This is why so many contact centers are streamlining operations with desktop automation. Existing applications can be combined into one user-friendly platform to ease workflows and automate tasks. Agents no longer have to spend time on data entry or get stuck navigating complex systems.

3 Barriers to a Winning Digital Strategy

When it comes to your contact center’s digital strategy, there’s a never-ending amount of information to wade through and technology to choose from. All of these options can make it almost impossible to decide what you need to change or update and how to prioritize everything. When you do start planning, you can get so wrapped up in the digital side of things that you forget your very real audience.

Let’s go over three common barriers to creating a digital strategy that serves your customers.

Barrier #1: Assuming You’re Behind Everyone Else

One of the biggest assumptions about digital strategy is that every other contact center is doing it better. You know you have to create or improve your digital strategy but, feeling like you’re already behind your competitors, your don’t have the drive to do it.

Think of it this way, though – you wouldn’t skip over writing a business plan just because every other business has one, right? The same is true for creating your digital strategy, which is an integral part of your broader IT and business strategies.

Barrier #2: Focusing Solely on the Technology

Digital strategy is about so much more than the specific technologies you’re going to use. When you focus only on the tech, you can miss the bigger picture: connecting with people in the digital age. Your agents, employees and business partners have different expectations than in the past, and that’s due to the digital environment we now live, work and communicate in. Digital strategy has to take this into consideration. Instead of a replacement for relationship building, tech is best when used to uncover the better ways to connect and customize that connection.

Barrier #3: Converting Through Digital Interactions Alone

Your digital strategy only truly works if it makes your customers happy, right? If customer satisfaction goes down, you’re not really making progress, even if your contact center is operating in a high tech way. Since there are so many digital channels your customers are using, it can feel like the best way to spend your marketing budget is on more digital transactions. This is counterintuitive, though. Your digital strategy should leverage technology to help both your agents and your customers while leaving enough room for live, person-to-person communication.

How have you created a digital strategy that puts your customers first? Tell us in the comments.

Is the Contact Centre Part of Your Digital Transformation Programme?

By Chris Ezekiel, Founder & CEO

I say this every year, but the Technology Innovation Showcase webinar Creative Virtual does with CRMXchange is one of my favourite webinars to present. This was the fifth year running that we’ve participated in the webcast series, and it was our most popular one yet with a record-breaking number of registrations. I love this webinar because it gives me a chance to share more live demonstrations than slides, and I know the best way to understand how our technology works and what it can do for customers and organisations is to see it in action.

For this year’s Showcase, I focused on the theme of ‘Chatbots, Virtual Agents and Your Contact Centre’. There’s so much buzz and hype, as well as unrealistic expectations and disappointments, around artificial intelligence (AI) and chatbots that it can be difficult to know how best to deliver, implement and support these types of solutions. My goal during the webinar was to showcase best practices in deploying chatbots in conjunction with human assistance for customer support and sales. I selected my demonstrations specifically to show how the virtual and real can work in perfect harmony to meet business objectives.

A few key takeaways from my presentation:

• Artificial intelligence on its own is not the answer for customer support. Companies like Microsoft and IBM have been responsible for setting false expectations in regards to how AI can be deployed for customer service. Chatbots and virtual agents should blend human curation of content with machine learning. This hybrid approach enables the system to continually improve while also allowing control over the reliability of responses.
• Every organisation is in the midst of digital transformation programmes and the contact centre needs to be a key part of that, although that’s not always the case today. In the future, the contact centre will be the centre of excellence for the knowledge used across customer support channels and organisations need to put the necessary tools in place to facilitate that change. By including the contact centre as part of this transformation instead of allowing it to become a siloed and outdated entity, it benefits from lower costs, reduced staff turnover and more engaged, skilled and happier agents.
• Customers are starting to specifically demand chatbots for digital self-service, with research showing that many would choose to interact with a chatbot before a human to get instant answers. To meet the demands of customers, organisations need more than just chatbots and virtual agents that are available 24/7 though. Over the past several years providing an effortless way to interact with your company has become more and more important. Instead of offering a wide range of support options for customers to choose from, you need to offer one place for customers to ask a question and for that system to be the intent matcher. Then, once you understand the intent, immediately provide the most appropriate method for assistance. You also need to provide a seamless experience that’s available on any device, can easily switch between languages and provides personalised responses.

I invite you to watch the recording of the webinar on-demand to understand more about these three points and to see the live demonstrations of chatbots, virtual agents and live chat solutions that are currently being used by some of our customers around the world.

My thanks to Sheri Greenhaus and CRMXchange for organising and hosting another successful Technology Innovation Showcase for us. I’m already looking forward to presenting again next year.