Over the last few years, companies have embraced the knowledge that CX (Customer Experience) is the key to success in every industry. Today’s consumers no longer make decisions based on which product is cheapest, or which brands they’re familiar with. They search consistently for the most personalised, convenient, and meaningful experiences.
73% of customers say CX is the top deciding factor in their purchasing choices, and around 59% of these consumers will walk away from a brand after being exposed to repeatedly bad experiences. Unfortunately, delivering interactions which meet consumer expectations is often easier said than done. We’re living in a world where clients have grown accustomed to incredible speed, sensational support, and phenomenal personalisation.
The only way for most brands to stay ahead of the curve, is to invest in technology capable of enhancing the experiences they have to offer on a fundamental level. Brands still relying on outdated, old-fashioned contact centres and disjoined data silos will inevitably fall behind. Here are the main reasons why every business should consider upgrading and updating their CX in 2023.
1. Adhere to Changing Customer Expectations
Increasingly, consumers are holding organisations to much higher standards than they did only a few years ago. Unfortunately, many companies are struggling to keep up with demand. While 73% of support leaders today say customer expectations are increasing, only 42% think they’re living up to those requirements. Old-fashioned technology in the CX space prevents brands from providing clients with the key factors they’re looking for in each interaction: speed, convenience, and knowledge.
Alternatively, modern CX tools pave the way for rapid improvements to the customer journey. For instance, up-to-date CCaaS software allows organisations to build omnichannel experiences for customers on the channels they prefer. These tools can transfer data from one environment to the next, so clients don’t have to repeat themselves, and open the door for more meaningful interactions through channels like video and text.
At the same time, new CX solutions allow companies to adhere to the growing demand for hyper-personalisation in the consumer landscape. With CRM tools built into contact centres, brands can provide their agents with in-the-moment insights into each customer they interact with.
2. Address Evolving CX Teams
It’s not just customers that have transformed significantly in the last few years, but the employees who serve them too. Since the pandemic, we’ve seen an astronomical rise of hybrid and remote working practices, implemented by companies searching for consistent business continuity. Up to 62% of companies have now embraced the hybrid work model, according to some studies.
This new future of work makes old-fashioned CX strategies ineffective and obsolete. Team members working at home can’t be reliant on in-office contact centre systems to interact with customers. They need to be able to access secure communication tools, customer data, and knowledge base articles wherever they are. At the same time, managers need new tools to help them manage and support their remote teams. Workforce management and engagement platforms are becoming increasingly important among brands working with distributed staff.
With modern CX tools, companies can ensure they’re keeping a close eye on the performance of their agents wherever they are, while also giving these team members access to the training, information, and resources they need on-demand.
3. Improve the Employee Experience
Upgrading the CX stack in 2023 doesn’t just pave the way for new workplace models like hybrid and remote work. It also gives businesses the opportunity to better engage and support their team members, in an environment where agent turnover is higher than ever. To deliver amazing customer experiences, brands need to find ways of attracting and retaining the best talent.
This means making technology investments which focus not just on CX, but “TX”: the Total Experience created by a brand. Investing in modern CX solutions helps to empower agents to perform more efficiently in any environment, with access to valuable, productivity-boosting tools. Virtual assistants can help agents access information more quickly on the move, while automation platforms remove repetitive tasks from their to-do-list.
CCaaS tools combining all of the applications and technology agents need into one convenient location also means employees are less likely to deal with the confusion and frustration of jumping between countless tools each day. In some cases, these solutions can even be aligned with the UCaaS environment, to allow for better collaboration between workers throughout the entire enterprise.
4. Collect Meaningful Insights
According to McKinsey, 57% of consumers in the US would happily share their data with companies if it meant accessing a better, more personalised experience. This number increased to 63% for consumers who are sharing data with a company that delivers a particularly valuable service. As customer expectations continue to transform and evolve, businesses need to be able to capture and understand as much data as possible to make the right decisions.
Increasingly, modern CX tools are beginning to feature built-in tools for collecting powerful insights about sentiment, intent, and the overall customer journey. Conversational analytics empowered by natural language processing and machine learning are helping brands to better understand their customers and their needs. These tools are also making it easier to detect which processes and behaviors generate the best outcomes for the business.
Modern CX tools focused on analytics and reporting can help organisations to collect the data they need to make important decisions about everything from staffing and training to which new products or services they should develop.
5. Create a Future-Proof CX Strategy
Even in the face of impending recessions and global cost of living crises, customer experience continues to determine which brands will thrive, and which will falter. 84% of companies who invest in their CX strategy say they increase their revenue as a result. However, to continue generating positive outcomes, businesses need to stay agile and up-to-date.
Already, we’ve seen that the companies embracing the latest CX technology generally report better outcomes than their peers. Brands with self-service solutions which help consumers to manage the customer journey on their own are more likely to retain customers than those with a simple phone-based contact centre. 90% of teams using AI for customer experience say they see improvements to processing speed, efficiency, and transaction volumes.
Updating the CX stack in 2023 will ensure businesses can stay on the cutting-edge of the landscape as new and improved methods of customer interaction emerge. Whether it’s embracing a CCaaS system which enables extended reality interactions in the metaverse, or using machine learning to gather useful insights about customer needs, brands need to be focused on the future of experience.
