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Improve on Your Communication Channel For Good Customer Experience Even in this world of technology, no customer desires to learn from machines, but wants fellow human beings to solve their problems

By Sawaram Suthar

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Communication is the key to today's successful business. The better the communication between your business and your clients, the better chance you have of retaining your customers.

In a world where news travels faster than the speed of light, it becomes imperative for your business to stay up-to-speed when communicating with your customers.

Communication Key to Good Customer Experience

Simply stated, communication is the key to a good customer experience. Research suggests that 83% of all clients would, on any particular website at one time or another, be in need of customer service. It is precisely this service that would be responsible for making or breaking a deal for your business.

To help you enhance your customer's experience, we've prepared a short guide to assist you with optimizing your communication channels:

1. Offer Your Customers Consistency.

As easy as it may sound, developing a strong, trust-worthy rapport with your customers can be quite a task. If you've ever had the opportunity to set foot in a room that's discussing communication channels and customer service, you'd hear the term "human touch' quite often.

Even in the fast-paced, ever-growing world of technology and globalization, no customer desires to learn from machines; preferring instead to allow fellow human beings to solve their problems.

This fact is important and should never be forgotten. Consider the situation where a business owner accesses your online customer service centre to get his product-related queries resolved. To achieve a better customer-service result, try following these steps:

  1. Begin with the basics — Learn what the client wants to do and then try to understand the problem they are encountering.
  2. Analyze the problem.
  3. Provide an in-depth solution in as little time as possible. If on a phone/video call, try resolving the problem within a few minutes. If having an e-mail conversation, try resolving the problem within a few hours.
  4. Follow up — This is the most crucial step of them all. Following up shows consistency. It also shows your client that you care.

2. Achieve Best-in-class Performance.

While this should be quite obvious, delivering superior performance is one of the best ways to stay on top. Clayton Holmes, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway, has been researching the idea of using advanced data and analytics to solve the problems posed by their customers.

Getting your customers to learn the value of the solutions you provide for them is an extremely insightful practice as helps them learn. Any customer, who comes to you for resolution of a problem, is likely to be willing to learn new information. This should provide you with enough leverage to interact with your customers while still providing best-in-class performance based on an in-depth analysis.

3.Provide a Seamless Communication Channel.

Providing the ultimate customer experience involves a variety of steps, including end-to-end, seamless support through a variety of communication methods. These channels are live video chats, voice calls, and even screen sharing capabilities, which allow for an exceptional interface between your business and your clients.

  1. Screen sharing and co-browsing — Allow your customers to show your CRM experts the problems. Let them see what is on your screen so they can provide a solution in real-time. This two-way communication allows for an exceptionally responsive, intuitive, and immersive experience for mutual understanding.
  2. Live voice call capabilities — Develop a shortcut for allowing your customers to communicate with your business any time of the day, with simply a click of a button. That's the solution for a good, seamless form of voice call communication; a single button that works with all browsers and devices which help you to better cater to your customers.

4.Use Chatbots That We Interact With Via Text or Voice Interface.

Now plenty of other messaging services have followed suit including, Kik, WhatsApp, Snapchat, and Skype. The messaging platform Slack has also incorporated a number of chatbots with the aim that these will eventually help clients manage their calendars, to-do lists, schedule meetings and streamline other aspects of their businesses.

Introducing Chatbots Through Facebook

Using platforms such as Facebook Messenger, various forward-thinking brands are already introducing chatbots into their customer service approach. For example, The Guardian introduced its chatbot on November last year, as a way for readers to access the latest headlines and manage their subscriptions more easily.

The travel brand Skyscanner also has its own chatbot, which will help you find flights without having to search yourself.

There are also some really cool chatbot-powered start-ups appearing, such as DoNotPay — the world's first robot-powered lawyer; Joy, which helps you track your moods; and Niki, a personal assistant that will help you book cabs, recharge phone credit, and even order takeaway.

Chatbots taking on Complex Tasks

The possibilities are huge, particularly as the bots are learning from every conversation, taking on more complex tasks and conversations over time. They're being tipped to revolutionize a range of industries, particularly those that rely on high levels of regular customer contact, such as banking, insurance, and utilities.

Chances are it won't be long before we'll be able to check our bank accounts, make insurance claims and give our gas or electricity readings to chatbots.

Businesses Must Tap New Communication Channels

When you consider that 45.8 per cent of consumers would rather connect with a business through messaging than through email, it's clear that businesses need to utilize new communication channels if they want to retain their customers.

Unlike impersonal email exchanges, messaging apps allow brands to connect with people in an intimate, personalized way.

Unfortunately, maintaining intimate communication channels, using human employees is challenging, for a number of reasons. With technological automation, chatbots can be used to deliver a personalized experience, without additional human labor costs.

Wrap up

These easy-to-follow and exceptionally useful changes to your communication channels will ensure improvement in communicating and dealing with customers. They will also enhance your overall performance with the customer experience.

Sawaram Suthar

Head of Marketing, Acquire

Sawaram Suthar is head of marketing at Acquire, and also a founder of Jagat Media. A digital marketing consultant, he has experience in things including branding, promotions and page optimization, along with research and strategy. He has an MBA from the University of Pune. 

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