Outsourcing of Customer Service to the Interaction Center today
Many organizations don’t have the knowledge or resources to keep up with today’s customer interactions. Because of this, we see many companies telling their customers how they should interact instead of listening to the customer tell the company how they WANT to interact. Companies are also nervous about putting their customers in the hands of subcontractors. I’m here to show you how a top-tier US-based Engagement Center can be the answer to many of these problems.
Many companies view their customer service department as a cost center for their marketing departments. They see the “benefit” cost of not putting an 1800 number on their website or burying it so deep that customers are forced to try the self-service route.
In the age of social media, I can tell you that these decisions will prove detrimental to how it works.
Let’s allow the client to interact with us in the way they want. Let’s embrace this! Now it’s time for the Interaction Center.
This is one way to allow your contact center to now take on multiple channels of customer interaction. The contact center of the past allowed for inbound, outbound, chat, and email interactions with much ease. Today’s Interaction Center takes the paths of the contact center and adds WebRTC, Social CRM along with a fully integrated self-service IVR and application development.
WebRTC is a way for customers to connect to your hub directly through their browser with no downloads required. Google is behind WebRTC and it looks like WebRTC will be the biggest thing for customer service since the advent of smartphones. It’s web browser to big data casting for your contact center with no download required. amazing stuff. All available in today’s outsourced Interaction Center!
Social CRM is also a newer technology to be embraced. Imagine scanning tens of thousands of web searches, forums, Twitter and Facebook sites all at once for keywords that would lead to a sales lead or customer service opportunity and being able to instantly engage on that site with the customer or would be a customer. . POWERFUL!
That technology is available now and if your business is not using it then you are missing out on a lot of sales opportunities and customer interactions.
Many organizations think that Social CRM is simply having a Facebook or Twitter account where they SHOUT news, discounts or special promotions to their customers. That’s just a small piece of the social CRM pie and less every day.
Another Social CRM technique that can be very beneficial for companies is writing articles and blogs. Writing blogs and articles is another great way to get information in a “white paper” style. It offers more detail than just having quick information on your website.
The last piece of today’s Interaction Center is having a fully integrated self-service platform. As I mentioned earlier, too many companies think of this as the first step when in reality it should be a great add-on to the end of your engagement cycle. Many customers love the freedom of paying a bill, getting account information, or making a purchase without speaking to an associate. When done correctly, having a full-scale IVR and/or smartphone or desktop app is a huge necessity.
If any of this new technology scares you, fear not. Many subcontractors are doing this right now. Now is the time to show your customers how much they mean to you. The contact center is going to disappear in its current form. The Interaction Center will now be the new standard for world-class customer support.