Customer Relationship Management tools are one of the most valuable tools in a customer experience strategy. These software solutions provide insight into customer trends, expectations, and satisfaction levels. You can also use your CRM technology to ensure that you’re building on the loyalty your clients feel.
CRM solutions deliver insights and valuable information to your business by gathering data from your interactions with clients. That means that if you want to get the best results from your CRM solution, you need something that can pull data from all points in the customer journey.
In the age of the omni-channel customer experience, are you sure that your CRM is optimised?
Customer Relationship Management in the Omni-channel World
A properly implemented solution for customer relationship management can give you and your employees a behind-the-scenes look at the journey that your clients take when interacting with your brand. Now that customers are spending more time jumping between channels when interacting with your brand, it’s increasingly important to take an omni-channel approach to CRM software.
An omni-channel CRM solution looks at the full end-to-end picture of your customer’s journey across every channel they might use, from social media to text messages, and even audio conversations. This full picture view increases your chances of accurate customer insights and reduces the risk of blind spots or gaps in your CX strategy.
So, how do you optimise the CRM to be ready for the omni-channel world?
- Choose the right software: The first step is choosing a CRM solution that’s flexible and open enough to connect with multiple channels. A solution that offers API access or integrations will make it easier for you to align all the components of the customer journey as accurately as possible. Most contact centre solutions can integrate with leading CRM products, but make sure that you can integrate your service desk, ticketing solution, email strategy and other tools too
- Train your employees: The right software is just the first step; your employees also need to know how to use an omni-channel CRM successfully. Make sure you provide training on how to access insights and information about specific customers or groups. Show your staff members how to share leads and customer information with teams, and how to contribute to valuable data collections when the time is right. Your staff should also have plenty of guidance on how to make sure they remain compliant when dealing with customer information
- Adapt and evolve: Today’s leading CRM solutions come with plenty of opportunities for businesses to customise their services. You should be able to adjust the dashboard in your CRM so you can keep an eye on the most important information first. You might even be able to implement automation rules based on the information you gather. A strong connection between your contact centre and your CRM could even make it easier to route calls to the right agent or provide employees with valuable information about a customer when they need it most
Is Your CRM Solution Ready for Omni-channel?
Now that customers are spending more time on multiple channels, companies need to ensure that they’re prepared to follow and support clients on their journey. An omni-channel contact centre is a good start, but your CRM needs to be optimised with omni-channel in mind too. What can your CRM provider do to help you align your teams with the path of their customers?