Building a customer experience that is consistent, unified, and ready to adapt to changing customer expectations is no easy task. Especially, when customers are switching to social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter to voice their queries and concerns.

According to a study by Edison research, a third of customers prefer contacting brands through social media. More importantly, 42% expect a response within 60 minutes.

Engaging with customers in an efficient and speedy manner has become key to delivering the best possible customer experience across every organisation.

The question is: are your customer service teams prepared to facilitate changing customer behaviours and trends? Do they have the tools they need to meet and exceed customer expectations?

Firms think that they do. According to Accenture research, 80% of firms believe that they deliver great customer experiences, but only 8% of customers actually agree with them.

Below are three ways to ensure that your teams not only keep existing customers happy but help them to become advocates that attract new buyers, fuelling growth and profitability in today’s changing digital landscape.

Ensure issues go to the right agent
When every interaction matters, it’s important that end-customers are connected with the best-suited agent so that the right outcome can be achieved the first time round.

Shift further away from a one-size-fits-all approach to embedding personalisation into every experience. By making customer insights accessible through a 360-degree view of any case, you can segment customers better, prioritise cases and then move the needle forward on processing cross-channel requests expertly and efficiently.

It’s not just your customers that will feel the benefit of shorter, automated decision-cycles. Having tools in place that help to prioritise and route requests to available resources also supports employees. Managed workloads empower employees by enabling them to focus on more complex work and building long-lasting relationships with customers. Turning your customer service teams into experience centres first will ensure that your bottom line is also taken care of.

Build an efficient communication system
We all know that bad news travels fast. The negative effects of a poor communication system between customer and agent extends well beyond cost and the service experience; it impacts the organisation's revenue, growth prospects and overall profitability.

Today’s customers expect their requests to be handled efficiently and properly. Research shows that 32% of customers find it frustrating to repeat the same information multiple times. [Source: Global State of Customer Service, Microsoft]

Traditional working practices are no longer suitable to handle the huge amounts of data flooding into businesses. Organisations should look for a single platform with the ability to transform multi-channel information into business-ready customer data. Avanade has the right technology to provide a 360° customer view, using both historical data and updated datasources, and reduce average handling times to enable efficient, relevant communications across internal and external channels.

Facilitate predictions
No matter how customers choose to engage, they should consistently receive targeted messages and offerings. Integrating interactions and tracking data from internal and external channels provides a 720-degree view of your customers and their purchase history, meaning you avoid the risk of sending duplicate and irrelevant information about your products or service.

Implementing AI and machine learning tools can also help anticipate customer requests, adjusting messaging and content in real time. For example, if a customer calls about a delivery and there is a known delay, the Interactive Voice Response will proactively ask, “Are you calling about the delivery delay?”, enabling personalised experiences to flow seamlessly.

At Avanade, we have a range of customer service solutions that meet the evolving expectations of both customers and employees. With efficient processes and a path to personalisation, you’ll be on your way to meeting business targets and achieving profitable growth.

Wherever you’re at in your customer experience journey, we are here to help.