Written By: Riya Sander
The way most corporations handle customer support has changed considerably in the recent past. Over a decade ago, you could only contact a company by fax or phone. Nowadays, you can select your option; email, SMS, live chat, phone and the social media. The list seems endless. The major challenge for many establishments is not only to be available in these mediums, which is significant but for those avenues to deliver reliable and cohesive service quality.
According to a recent study by Aberdeen Group, businesses that offer a dependable service quality within multiple avenues keep 89% of their clients, while firms that do not provide a reliable quality retain only 33%. Delivering a unified service quality within various channels will extensively impact the revenue of your business, which is the reason why many corporations are investing heavily in omnichannel customer support.
What is Omni-channel Customer Service?
Omni-channel customer support combines text, email, instant and social messaging to give you an integrated brand experience to enable you to switch between multiple mediums and still experience quality service. Omni-channel customer service provides you with an opportunity to serve your customers in various ways which are not only handy and efficient but enhance the image and credibility of your brand.
The following are several omnichannel customer support tips to assist you in building a successful strategy for your company:
1. Ensure that your website is mobile-friendly
It’s evident that the Google Age is currently upon us as it has remained for many years. You can rely on the truth that after meeting someone, among the first things that most people do today is looking them up online. Moreover, more and more individuals are currently using their mobile gadgets to look for information, manage their daily activities, and purchase goods and services. Therefore, it is a fact that they also search for customer support on the same medium.
One of the greatest frustrations from clients is that most of the websites nowadays are not yet mobile-friendly. As a company, you should make it your priority to remain on top when it comes to your online game, or else, you will find yourself on the losing end, contrary to businesses who offer a notable deal of care concerning theirs.
2. Unify all your channels using a single outlook of the client
When a client asks for help, always remember that it never occurs to him that he is speaking to a separate department and through a different medium than he used when making his purchase. All the customer understands is that he’s conversing with a brand and needs his problem solved as smoothly as possible.
You don’t want the customer to feel like he has to go through a cluster of separate channels or people who don’t converse with each other to answer a fundamental question. That’s the quickest way to frustrate a client and ultimately lose him. Instead, each interaction should always be a part of the same chat. Whether the client contacts you via email, live chat, social media, online self-service or phone call, his service experience must be unified irrespective of the channel.
3. Enhance the response times of your social media
Social media can be a great customer support tool, leading to high client satisfaction rates. Nevertheless, most brands do not understand the expectations of the customer regarding offering service through the social media platform.
There’s a big gap between when a customer expects a response after initiating communicating and when a company responds. If you ignore your clients’ communications on the social media or fail to focus on response speed, you will get high churn rates due to client frustration. Increasing response time will not only reduce churn rates, but it will also lead to a positive experience for your customer and enhanced customer relationships.
4. Take advantage of customer self-service
Nowadays, many customers have developed a big deal of self-reliance which is why they anticipate corporations to make it effortless for them to find answers to their customer support problems themselves. Giving customers the opportunity to locate solutions and fix their issues at their own pace and time without waiting for an email or a call from a customer support agent will not only make the entire process expedient for them but can reduce the influx originating from the other customer service channels as well.
Having a reliable FAQ page where your customers can peruse through to get answers to commonly asked queries about a service or product helps facilitate the client experience. It will also reduce the duration of time it takes a support agent to solve a problem and the number of times your customer needs to talk to your customer service department giving you higher customer satisfaction and reduced company costs as well.
5. Test the functionality of your channels
A surprising number of companies spend a considerable amount of money and time developing omnichannel service but fail to test them, which a vital step. Checking the performance of your contact center as a service will give you a useful general view of the process, hence making the client experience your own. The call center software you use to develop your omnichannel digital experience will allow you to know the areas that are performing well and those that need some improvement.
As the omnichannel service increasingly becomes the go-to resolution for growing businesses, never forget the human bit that ties everything together. Having well-trained personnel assigned to address customer issues and give a positive image of your company is the secret weapon to offering top-quality customer service. You can also exceed the expectations of your customers and drive more revenue with cloud contact center solutions.
In conclusion, irrespective of the channels you decide to use in your customer support, your priority should always be to offer a beneficial and honest experience that will continually develop your relationship with your clients.
About the author: Riya is an inspired writer, passionate about traveling, lifestyle and encouraging startups. She understands the importance of productivity at work and never stopped finding new ways to create her work productivity. Connect with Riya on twitter, @sanderriya.
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