Top 10 Service Components Required to Deliver a Unified Customer Experience

Top 10 Service Components Required to Deliver a Unified Customer Experience A discussion paper from Numara Software Web-based software: The ideal platform for a multi-channel model Web-based Customer Support Automation May The multi-channel model is driving organisations to rethink their existing technologies and processes. In this new Improve Your Bottom Line world of eService, customers expect to be able to visit your • Self-service and assisted-service initiatives can increase web site to submit service requests, track issues, and even call center capacity by 20 percent to 30 percent (Forrester search through knowledge bases and frequently asked Research) questions (FAQs) for solutions – all without engaging a live • Consolidated Service Desk architecture has been proven agent. The end result is a positive customer experience that to save 46% of ‘general accounting functions’ in 30% of the rivals a direct customer-agent interaction. fortune 500 (English Institute of Chartered Accountants) Solutions that are built on a web-based architecture have • Reducing routine requests by increased self-service and the web can reduce the cost of phone service by 20 percent advantages in supporting multi-channel contact. They more (Forrester Research) easily integrate with email and chat modules and applications, which themselves are built on Internet protocols (POP, SMTP, • Automating and managing emails costs 70 percent less than and TCP/IP). Their inherent support of networking also the cost of phone calls (Forrester Research) allows them to link with telephony software and hardware, • Reduce incident support costs from $.45 per interactive voice data bases, security applications, and corporate directories response (IVR) phone transaction to $.24 per web self-service (such as LDAP). In short: web-based support software is the transaction (Gartner Group) ideal platform for a multi-channel support center. In the next section, we enumerate the major components required for an eService solution. 2. Audit Trails 1. Multi-Channel Customer Problem Your web-based customer service automation solution must provide a complete audit trail that documents all service and support Management activities. This includes agent-to-customer interactions, agent- to-agent interactions, and the respective solutions as a result of Giving customers choices with convenient ways to contact you, when these discussions. Having this historical view gives agents better and how they want to, separates good service from great service. information (and perspective) to resolve issues more effectively. It To support this initiative, your customer service automation solution also gives them the ability to search for root causes for recurring needs to aggregate all communications channels, including phone, instances. web, email, chat, and wireless devices. Having one centralised system to capture, route, track, manage, and report all incoming requests received by each channel enables your agents to streamline workflow processes, prioritise tasks, and react more efficiently – while controlling all aspects of the problem resolution lifecycle. Customers have more resources to request support, stay informed, and therefore get their issue resolved faster. 1. 3. Customer Self-Service Online for Instant Help 24/7 Furthermore, your organisation and workflow rules can be governed by change approval boards (CABs) so that major changes to According to the recent Forrester Research report, Eight Steps processes or systems can’t be made before the appropriate approval for Improving CRM Adoption of Self-Service Customer Support, is given. customers often prefer to help themselves. They find that self-service technologies afford them a comfortable pace for interacting with vendors while providing them with more support choices. Using the web and email, customers can submit and track their own requests at their convenience – from anywhere at any time. Through your web 6. Two-Way Email Management site, they can access and search your customer knowledge base, or third-party, professionally written knowledge bases with solutions Your web-based customer service automation solution must have and FAQs, to solve their own issues. In many instances, customers the ability to centrally manage and automate incoming and outgoing can resolve their own issues without requiring interaction with a live email. Simultaneously it should also offer advanced functionality customer service agent. As a result, call volume and first-level call to automatically generate trouble-tickets from incoming emails resolution can be greatly improved, freeing up resources and reducing – saving agents a great deal of time. This functionality provides incident handling costs. more personalised service to customers. With customisable email notifications and auto-respond features, you can send crucial acknowledgements and issue-tracking information to keep people informed and close the loop on service requests. 4. Knowledge Management Your web-based customer service automation solution should provide comprehensive knowledge management capabilities that can be easily accessed online by both customers and agents. Your solution should make it easy to access existing knowledge, publish and share 7. Telephony Integrationoched.” new knowledge and solutions, access reference information, and By integrating telephony into your web-based customer service store recorded processes. Separate knowledge bases can be created automation solution, calls are automatically routed to the right agent for agents and customers, offering customers access to light solutions and tickets are populated with customer contact information. As a and FAQs through your web site and giving agents access to more result, you will be able to reduce the amount of time customers spend comprehensive solutions knowledge and resources for solving more resolving problems, increase employee productivity, and reduce call complex problems. With the right solution, managers can review, handling costs. edit, and approve new additions before they are published to the knowledge base. This ensures that data published to the knowledge base is accurate, appropriate, and easily indexed to facilitate fast searches. Additional knowledge resources can be accessed through your customer service 8. Customer Data Management automation solution, such as to professionally written solutions Your web-based customer service automation solution should help knowledge bases for agents and customers and linked access to avoid one of the customer service department’s biggest pain points public knowledge bases, such as Microsoft® Technet and Google™ – data silos. With the right solution in place, you can track and Groups. record customer interactions. You can also integrate historical data to obtain (and maintain) a “360-degree customer view”, that includes history and other pertinent details. Integrating this capability with existing LDAP-based address books provides a way to dynamically 5. Workflow, Business Rule link existing contact records with the service desk. This corporate directory integration eliminates the need to update the same customer Optimisation & Approvals information when opening a customer record or issue, which accelerates the service process and eliminates data entry errors.