Customer service is evolving to a more on-demand, self-serve online environment, but Covid-19 has dramatically accelerated its availability and utilization. In 2020, customer experience may have been lost in favor of efficiency along the way.
Organizations had to implement many changes in their customer service approach with lockdowns worldwide. Digital customer service, which many might say was impending, suddenly became the only reality. It caught several organizations off guard resisting a digital transformation, but the pandemic left them with little to no choice.
Since the pandemic, customer service has witnessed a drastic change and a significant rise in AI-driven service platforms. The pandemic has also spurred a reconsideration of what customer care means to people and the customer service teams who assist them. Examining customer journeys and satisfaction statistics to determine what customers want has suddenly given way to a compelling need to answer what they require.
What has not changed:
While a lot has changed in the last year, one thing has remained constant- the buyer’s experience. A buyer’s experience with your firm will be the most critical factor in choosing whether or not they will buy from you. Buyers are migrating online and expecting businesses to meet them there. As a result, in this current wave of competition, the ability and solutions to create a great buyer experience online will determine who wins the game.
High-speed digital change
Organizations responded quickly during the COVID-19 crisis, but not all of the habits they established were beneficial. There are two critical goals in digital transformation and knowledge management for customer service are getting end-users to accept new ways of working to create a structured environment for optimal productivity and safety.
Improving the buyer’s experience
The buyer experience must be customized, engaging, and intuitive at the most significant level. As per studies, buyers are increasingly demanding a self-directed experience. A growing number of buyers are eager to independently discover both complex and straightforward enterprise-grade solutions. As a result, major companies will need to put more money into these no-touch purchasing experiences.
They’ll be expected to provide self-service capabilities for interactions like discovery and solution fit, at the very least. This essentially provides the customer with information about the product or solution, such as pricing and the option to try it out for themselves through self-guided demos and customer surveys.
Customers expect you to recognize them and any previous activities they’ve taken. For example, the findings of any online assessments they’ve completed while exploring your products or services are expected to shape the next contact with a seller.
Enhancing the buyer’s experience
Sellers are no longer knowledge gatekeepers; they are instead trusted advisers that assist buyers in understanding complex technology and managing complicated acquisitions internally with their company’s stakeholders. Organizations must first enable salespeople to become advisers who can meet customers and provide relevant information to generate personalized customer experiences.
This starts with account information; sellers need a complete view of customer engagement with the brand, including what they bought and when. It records whether customers are getting value from it. Additionally, it shows the context of their most recent marketing engagement too. There is nothing more awkward than sending an upsell message to a consumer who isn’t getting value in the first place, which is why businesses must integrate their core data systems.
Sellers need technologies that can replicate the value of in-person experiences in a digital version to give these highly engaging interactions remotely. Customers could generate more interactive content in a self-serve model. Thus they need to be more interactive and dynamic. Delivering distinct customer experiences requires equipping sellers with intelligent content based on the person, industry, and account type.
Delivering this at scale involves personalized and easy-to-build engagement elements, such as presentations and demos, a challenge that demands creative collaboration between designers and technologists. The underlying technology that drives these experiences is a system of linked and intelligent data. A technology that provides proactive guidance to sellers, allowing them to act on the lessons learned from previous sales interactions.
Customers get more value from digital tools.
More than video chats and Powerpoint presentations come to mind when we think of digital selling. We need to rebuild the entire sales process to be digitally native, with unique experiences at essential points. Self-service customer-facing demands, such as early-stage product learning, can be met with digital tools, as can seller-facing needs, such as the ability to guide complex talks or construct offers.
When these tools are incorporated into current digital ecosystems, such as a CRM, sales representatives have a 360-degree perspective of their clients, allowing for personalized, data-driven conversations and scaling best practices across the entire business.
Many organizations were obliged to cease activities during COVID-19, which caused a brief disruption. At the same time, health and sanitation worries gave contactless technologies a new burst of life. COVID-19, in essence, sped up consumer acceptance of several pre-COVID technologies. Technology companies have created many solutions to make it safer for people to connect with technology.
As a result, a new era of intelligent technology through knowledge management has emerged, with limitless opportunities for technology solutions to improve corporate operations and give more fulfilling user experiences. The first focus is and will continue to be safe. Self-service technology like self-checkout is emerging as an essential competitive advantage for businesses. Especially when these businesses are trying to hit the “reset” button as buyers reevaluate their lives post-pandemic.
How can a business implement this technology?
The answer to this question is pretty simple. There is only one straightforward solution for this – knowledge management software.
A knowledge management platform backed by Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning opens an infinite number of possibilities. Knowledge management software helps you achieve the above-listed goals.
Knowledge management opens up self-service in the most interactive and engaging ways to customers, whether pandemic or regular functioning phase. Knowledge management provides self-service in modules like FAQs, decision trees for customer service, one-pager articles, and many more possibilities.
Conclusion
In the overwhelming challenge of COVID-19, customer experience has taken on a new meaning and complexity. Customer executives who care and innovate throughout this crisis, anticipating how consumers’ behaviors will change, will develop a stronger connection that will last long after the crisis has passed. Better late than never, digitally transform your workplaces to achieve the best productivity levels and improved customer experience.
