Trends and Realities of Successful Organizations (Blog #1)

AI, Teams UC and Video.

Better Together to Optimize CX.

Blog Series #1 of 4: New decade! New approach? Not necessarily…

For some, it’s more of the same, but better.

With more advanced technologies being introduced across all industries – seemingly on a daily basis –  businesses are trying to determine what will be the best approach for them to improve their organization, to better interface with and satisfy their customers –  as cost-effectively and efficiently as possible. All this while respecting the reality of needing to work with and within existing workflows. Anything that dramatically or fundamentally changes how agents and staff do things, has been proven to lead to failure, more often than not*.

“Customer First” drives success. Everything else will fall into place thereafter.

Customer service has become the top business priority. Getting out in front of competitors, by emulating the most successful companies, will help shortcut timelines

The proof is in the numbers

• Successful companies** spend more (4% of revenue vs. 1.7%) on CX technology
• Today, customer satisfaction is the top business priority, but successful companies cite it as their 1 priority.
• 79.6% of the success group are already delivering results from their CX projects, whereas only 64.9% of all other companies have a CX project that has been completed, is underway, or is planned for implementation in 2021.

Trends versus Reality – Successful Companies Show How to Lead the Way

Lots of companies are exploring how to use Artificial Intelligence (AI), Microsoft Teams, Unified Communications (UC), and Video to meet the ever-increasing expectations of their customers, and by extension, how better to engage with their partners, suppliers, and even their own internal people.

With the proper application of these technologies, improvements are very tangible. Based on Metrigy’s recent industry surveys and the detailed analysis they’ve undertaken, specific technologies have been proven to deliver the benefits leading organizations are looking for:

Summary of technologies that optimize CX and drive business success – today and by the end of 2021

• Artificial Intelligence: 71.6% are using or planning to use for CX initiatives
• Microsoft Teams: 34.8% will have extended Teams to their contact center for voice and 31.1% for team collaboration
• Unified Communications: 76.3% have integrated or plan to integrate
• Video enablement: either use internally to manage remote agents, or externally for communications with customers. 43% using video for customer interactions, and 67.2% say video is vital for managing remote employees

Just a quick note on how best to deliver these capabilities.Successful companies more likely to use cloud services and are more successful when they do.

• Using cloud contact center platforms drives more revenue (54.1% vs. 39.5%) They’re more able to implement and optimize new capabilities, thereby also reducing costs
• Improves customer satisfaction ratings (39.2% vs. 32.3%). With improved access to Knowledge Bases, AI developed proactive solution proposals and better repetitive issue deflection, speeds up responsiveness and treats exceptional cases with the priority care they require
• Boost agent productivity (32.3% vs. 20.9%). Through the use of better tools, and more precise focus on agent scripting improvements

4 Key Considerations for CX Success

1. Make CX a strategic initiative with Executive level commitment. The prioritization of customer success projects, along with an unwavering commitment to planning, communications and ongoing oversight is a key determinant of success. ***
2. Seek out help to drive the project from the bottom up – and ensure execution focuses on delivering the best possible experience, the project should be run until its fully delivered, and then continually optimized.
3. Provide adequate budgets and resourcing. Skimping directly affects the probability of successfully hitting project timelines and achieving the expected results.
   • Focus on choosing and using the right technologies
   • Implement the right measurement and administrative tools and procedures
   • “Right-skill” customer-facing staff
4. Obtain ongoing customer validation, and then drive operational optimization. Rinse. Repeat.

Help make sure your organization delivers the service experience that exceeds customer expectations. Doing so will transform your contact center from a cost-center into a revenue generator.

Watch for our next blog in this series, coming January 26th

Video Enabled Contact Centers – The Benefits

Stay tuned for proof points that will help with your next project business case.

Register Now:

*IBM Services blog: Why digital transformation starts with workflows that unite people and technology

**Metrigy Research – defining the “Success Group” : Their most recent research “Customer Engagement Transformation: 2020-21 Research Study” of was undertaken in August – October of 2020, and reflects key learnings from their transformation accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic. They asked participants for their before-and-after business metrics on revenue, cost, customer ratings, and/or agent productivity for projects that use artificial intelligence (AI) or AI-enabled analytics to improve customer engagement. Those that were able to, provided detailed information on projects that they completed and had measured their success.  See our forthcoming Issues paper for more information.

*** McKinsey & Co – May 2020: McKinsey’s Framework for Digital Transformation Strategy