Hitting the Customer Experience Bullseye

Michael McClelland of Genesys discusses how to gain insight into the current customer experience and how to improve it.

Buzzwords and phrases — from call centre to contact centre to multichannel to omnichannel and digital optimisation — are meant to engage companies in deeper-level thinking about customer experience.

Add to that terms like cloud, robotics, artificial intelligence (AI), workforce optimisation, natural language processing, machine learning, deep learning, and customer journey analytics, and you have a virtual dartboard of technologies and concepts for sales, consultants and executives.

But end consumers might not actually care which technologies you select or terms you hit on that dartboard.

It’s time to think like a consumer in regard to customer experience.

When I call to schedule a truck roll for my cable service, a few factors come to mind. Personally, I don’t care about the tech behind that ask; I care that my daughter can record her favourite show before all hell breaks loose when her DVR is offline. If this service point fails, my Net Promoter Score (NPS) goes down and I create repeat-caller pressure on my provider.

Also, I start to consider other providers. I don’t think about what failed on the provider’s end — I focus on the fact that they provided a poor customer experience. They don’t seem to know why I’m unsatisfied and I want to know why the guy in the truck didn’t notify me that he wouldn’t show up on schedule.

The same goes for your contact centre. Your customer doesn’t care about all the systems and internal processes you followed to get to the end result. They just want to know you did your job and solved their problem.

The straightforward question you need to ask your consumers is: “Did we do our job and meet your needs?” And this simple NPS survey-type question lets you dive deeper into other customer experience issues.

To gain better insights into your customers’ satisfaction levels, ask the following key questions.

• Did we know who you were upon first contact?
• Did the agent know what products you own?
• Did we personalise your call in multiple channels, so you didn’t have to repeat yourself?
• Were agents aware of all your prior transactions historically and real time — no matter what channel you encountered?
• Was there context of your prior experiences, as well as active system or performance issues, so an agent can predict why you’re contacting them?
• Was your question, order or issue solved in the first encounter — with minimal interaction time and few transfers?
• Did someone proactively reach out to you with updates, confirmations and satisfaction levels?
• Were you connected with the right agent the first time?

The answers to these questions, not the technologies you use, are what matter to your customers. They don’t care how much you invest in technology. They just want to be served in real time with minimal call handling.

Also, they want to talk to someone who knows who they are and why they’re calling. Customers want consistency each time they call; they don’t want to learn a new experience or way to interact with you.

With the proliferation of digital engagement, consumers expect more from contact centre agents. They expect you to anticipate their needs before they even know what those needs are — and they want to be engaged in new offers that are unique to the products they use.

Consumers also want to make one contact — regardless of channel — to get their issues resolved. They don’t have time to spend hours establishing or selecting a service; they want you to guide them through the process.

Finally, if a service or product breaks down, they expect you to proactively communicate with them.

The contact centre dartboard has many rings. But being able to offer consumer awareness, responsiveness, and action enablement is the real bullseye to better customer experience.

Author: Robyn Coppell