The role of the Contact Centre in Businesses
Customer Operations executives are continually refining their service delivery models to accommodate for new digital strategies, new business growth, ever-increasing performance expectations of internal stakeholders or simply to cut further cost from their operating models.
Much of the demand is also consumer driven with expectations that are influenced by the most personalised and fast-paced digital transaction experiences.
From the contact centres perspective, engaging and servicing customers digitally via web chat and social media channels continues to evolve and customer self-service works well for many straightforward transactional processes.
Live voice will always be appropriate for more complex issues and for a percentage of customers who prefer the human touch
While many contact centre operations claim to have coherent omnichannel customer strategies in place, getting all of the channels synchronised is never easy. This may be because, in many instances, only a very small percentage of digital customer journey maps have been detailed.
Our research shows that 1 in 4 customers still use multiple channels in their quest for issues resolution.
Of those, 52% will then call the contact centre and put pressure on agents to address the initially poor customer experience while the business incurs a higher cost to serve.
This makes it more challenging for customer care agents to increase satisfaction levels while also looking to educate the customer on digital self-service options and creating advocacy.
What all this means is that, as the hub of CX intelligence, the role of the contact centre is changing.
The changing role of the contact centre
The contact centre is becoming increasingly strategic by playing a critical role in enabling stakeholder objectives and providing a unique upstream insight into customer behaviours, attitudes, pain points and opportunities.
However, on the flip side, with increased call complexity, non-integrated digital channels and heightened customer expectations, many operations are finding it harder to deliver.
We know that the ideal customer service channel mix of the future includes a high degree of digital self-service options combined with human-assisted digital care channels such as chat and social media monitoring, as well as traditional live voice agent services servicing more complex issues resolution ie, people, process, and technology working together delivering an efficient and optimised customer experience.
The importance of Customer Journey Maps
From our 30 years experience, the starting point always begins with detailed customer journey mapping that is both personalised and measurable.
Being able to measure and apply deep dive analysis into every step of the customer journey provides the data that drives insights and improvements such as digital process education and offloading, better FCR and Next Issue Avoidance as well as improved NPS and CSAT.
And ultimately, driving better resolution outcomes for customers.
Next steps
- Not sure how to design and implement a Customer Journey Map? See our upcoming courses on CX Skills.
- If you need help determining the right CX & Contact Centre strategy for your business we have a range of solution providers in our Business Directory including consultants, call centre outsourcers, technology suppliers, trainers and more.
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