No matter the size of your customer base, customer care is essential to your success. In today’s digital era, customers expect quick and easy access to customer support, and they want their issues resolved quickly. But if you’re not providing excellent customer care, be sure that your competitors are happily doing so.
What are common customer care pain points?
There are several customer care pain points that businesses need to address.
One is the long wait times and the difficulty reaching a live customer service representative. As we have said, customers want quick and easy access to someone who can resolve their issues. This means that businesses need to offer customer immediate assistance at times of the day and on multiple channels.
Another common pain point is the lack of personalization. Customers want to feel they are being heard as individuals and that their concerns are being addressed. They don’t want to feel they’re just one of the many tedious tasks your staff has to do. Instead, they expect to talk to someone who already knows their history and needs.
Finally, the customer care operators are often overburdened with tasks, many of which are not so important, with the risk of neglecting the really important issues.
How can digital transformation improve customer care?
Digital transformation is the process of using technology to create new or improved procedures, products, and services. Regarding customer care, this could be anything from developing a new customer-facing application to redesigning your website to be more user-friendly. By offering a better customer experiences, companies will be able to reduce customer churn and increase customer loyalty.
Digitalization can improve customer care in several ways.
- Automation
Automation can speed up customer service processes. For example, a preset of questions on your website allow you to route customer concerns to the appropriate customer service representative. This simplifies the work of your staff and, at the same time, makes the customer feel that they have more control over the problem they are facing. This is particularly important for customer onboarding, which is the process of getting new customers up-to-speed with your products or services. - Feedback and analytics
Customer feedbacks are the key to understanding if you are offering not only the right products and services, but the right customer experience as well. There are several digital technologies that allow you to collect feedback directly or indirectly.
On the other hand, analytics help you understand customer behavior and identify areas of improvement. For example, customer service data can be analyzed using Machine Learning softwares to define customer wait times, customer satisfaction levels, and customer churn rates. All this information can then be used to make changes to the customer care process. - Customization
Customers want to feel like their concerns are being heard and that their experiences are being personalized. Digital transformation can improve customer care by developing customer-facing applications that allow for customer input and feedback. Additionally, with customer service software you can create a customer profile that includes all relevant customer information. For example, if a customer has a history of long wait times, customer service representatives can proactively reach out to the customer to let them know that their issue is being addressed. - Communication
Communication is key in customer care. As we have already said, digital technologies allow you to collect and resume all relevant customer information. This customer profile can then be shared with the customer service staff so that they are better equipped to handle customer inquiries. But digital technology can improve also internal communication between customer care representatives. For example, through a customer service software representatives can easily share information about a customer and organize their work in a clear and quick way. - Availability
People want to be able to reach customer care when they need it, even a 3 AM, when your staff is sleeping at home. One benefit of automation is that it makes assistance available 24/7. For example, a chatbot can answer all day and night, as well as FAQs on a site or a tutorial on your YouTube channel are always available.
But customers do not expect only temporal availability, they expect channel availability. Indeed, some of them like to talk on the phone and others prefer live chats; some people prefer watching a video and other reading an instruction email. You have to offer all these support channels. You need to be reachable anytime, anywhere. - Scalability
Unlike a human operator, digital technologies are not only always operational but often allow you to assist multiple customers at the same time. Does this mean that you can go on without your staff? Absolutely no. In the most complex and delicate issues, humans are unbeatable, because they are capable of empathy. And in the long-term relationship with customers, the emotional connection matters more than anything else. However, it is clear that chatbots & co are solutions with not negligible economic advantages.
Digital tools to improve your customer experience
Here is a brief list of technologies that can help you implementing a satisfying customer service.
– Website: You can add a FAQ section and tutorials through which customers can find answers to their issues by themselves. Through a website, you can also collect customer feedback through surveys and contact forms which can give you an idea if your costumers are satisfied or not about you customer care.
– Social networks: They allow you to communicate directly with your community of customers or followers in real-time. You can share content and tutorials about your products, but also monitor their opinions, discover desires, answer or ask questions, and resolve customer complaints.
– AI: You can use Artificial Intelligence to improve customer care by developing chatbots and virtual assistants for your website. These tools are great for solving the easiest issues and directing the most complex ones to the right customer care operator. Additionally, AI can be used to analyze customer data and identify trends.
– CRM: Using customer service management software (CRM) helps your customer care operators to keep track of customer interactions, create customer profiles, and manage customer inquiries. Additionally, a CRM can be used to automate customer service processes. In other word it make the work of your operator easier.
– Apps: You can develop a support app that allows customers to contact customer service, submit feedback, and view FAQs whenever they want, wherever they are, directly from their smartphone.
Digital transformation is changing customer care by making it more customer-centric, responsive, and efficient. Through the use of digital tools, you can collect customer data, understand their needs, and provide better customer service. However, digital transformation is an ongoing process, so in the future, we will see new tools, such as the metaverse, which can be useful to further improve customer care and customer experience, and strengthen the long-term relationship with users, as well as their brand loyalty.
