3CLogic's Contact Center Blog

As consumers continue to gravitate towards alternative digital touch points such as online knowledge bases, social media, and web chat for customer service, many contact centers have unsurprisingly experienced a noticeable shift in the volume and nature of their calls. In fact, according to the 2016 Global Contact Centre Benchmarking Report, contact centers have seen a 13.2% decrease in call volume in the past year. And while a transition to lower cost alternatives certainly helps improve an organization’s bottom line and customer experience, it also presents the call center with its own unique set of challenges—increased call complexity, to be specific.

These days, customer experience is everything—in fact, 89% of today’s businesses want to compete primarily on the basis of customer experience, versus only 36% four years ago. But while the vast majority of CEOs believe they are delivering a superior customer experience, only 8% of their customers agree, indicating that there is a large disconnect between the service businesses think they are delivering, and how those on the receiving end feel. And as customer preferences continue to evolve and additional communication touch points emerge, businesses are finding it increasingly difficult to stay ahead of their clients’ growing demands. Add in the complexity of maintaining compliance with the latest industry standards and adhering to strict business requirements, and managing it all can feel like a juggling act.

In today’s screen-centric society, where devices are becoming increasingly complex, having all of the tools to connect with your customers is key. According to Gartner, “by 2020, the customer will manage 85% of the relationship with an enterprise without interacting with a human.” Your customers need to be able to reach you, regardless of whether they are on the go, sitting at their laptop, or sitting in an airport. The more conversations you can have with your customer, the better the relationship you can build, but you need to be able to cater to their lifestyle, and put a personality to a name and number. And it all starts by syncing your database management solution or CRM, which house limitless amounts of customer information, with your communication channels. Check-out the following benefits:

The retail industry has undergone a long list of changes over the past decade, as technology and consumer preferences continue to rapidly evolve. What was once an industry largely centered around brick-and-mortar store locations, the rise of Internet, multichannel communications, and SaaS solutions has quickly expanded retail into the virtual world. To put it into perspective, online retail is currently growing at a global rate of 19% per year. And as this has happened, brick and mortar store locations have slowly diminished—in fact, the amount of retail space opened annually has dropped from over 300 million sq. feet in 2010 to 43.8 million in 2013. And as consumers become increasingly connected, informed, and time sensitive, retailers have been forced to reevaluate their business processes/operations, shopping channels, and technology to meet the changing expectations of today’s tech-savvy shoppers.

We all remember the early forms of chat: AIM Messenger and high maintenance chatbots or “virtual agents” that frustrated consumers 20 years ago. In a world where immediacy is almost necessary, and many customers are on the go, real-time chat has become a mainstream form of communication and more prevalent in customer service platforms, especially in the contact center world. Whether it be texting, instant message chats through email, Skype, and even Facebook messenger, this type of communication is often utilized daily by customers, and often from their smart phones. So what are the benefits of this “new chat” and why should you reevaluate this form of communication?