The Digital Experience – at the Center of Today’s Contact Center

There once was a time when the only expectation placed on support agents was to deliver fast answers to pressing questions. But thanks to new and emerging technology solutions, customers now expect a fully digital experience when they reach out for support.

The stakes are high: Following a bad customer experience, 82% of respondents say that they have stopped doing business with a brand, according to an Ovum  survey on omni-channel support. And 45% of consumers expect a response to queries in under 1 minute.

Highly demanding and increasingly impatient, these customers are putting unprecedented pressure on contact center agents to satisfy demands. The good news is a growing number of critical components can help agents deliver a compelling digital experience for faster first-contact problem resolution and more satisfied customers.

• Live chat: Self-service portals and chatbots can ease agent workloads. But many customers prefer the support of a live person when shopping online. In fact, when asked what they would improve in customer service, 53% of respondents selected faster access to live representatives, according to the Ovum survey. By letting consumers inquire about new product features, troubleshoot software, and update contact information with a live customer service agent, contact centers can simultaneously cut supports costs and boost customer satisfaction.

• Rules engines: Determining the right time to engage a visitor in a live chat can be tricky. Fortunately, a rules engine removes the guesswork by automatically issuing an invite based on predetermined factors, such as website interaction, pages visited, and buyer type.

A rules engine can also help agents cater to mobile consumers’ unique needs. For example, a contact center can set up routing rules to direct mobile consumers to a specific group of agents dedicated to mobile chats, or automatically move mobile customers to the top of the queue for faster service. The result is a proactive – not reactive – approach to mobile engagement.

• Intelligent automation: Self-help portals, virtual personal assistants, chatbots – they all rely on intelligent automation capabilities to quickly and efficiently handle basic customer questions. For instance, AI-powered bots can reset passwords or update customer addresses without needing a live agent. Contact centers win by freeing up agents to focus on more complex issues. Customers win by avoiding lengthy queues to get answers to simple inquiries quickly. In fact, Forrester reports that 84% of customers turn to self-service channels to get their questions answered.
• Mobile engagement: When consumers have a good mobile experience, 72% report that they are likely to do business again with the same organization. That’s a good incentive for contact centers to establish a strong mobile engagement strategy. For some, this involves superimposing chat windows directly on a visitor’s page for uninterrupted service. For others, automatically recognizing a customer’s device type and size is key to delivering quick and quality service. Either way, the secret is to design experiences specifically for mobile visitors.

Customers are becoming more demanding by the day. But with the right contact center capabilities, support agents can deliver smarter, faster service.

Discover the key components that can transform your contact center into a competitive edge. Download The Playbook to Activating Customer Engagement.