With the business world progressing faster than ever, there are various areas that are undergoing innovation. One particular example are the new trends in customer service.
Four years ago, a Gartner study predicted that 50 percent of business organizations will be investing more money to improve customer experience. Not only were they right, but the percentage of businesses now investing in customer services has also superseded the previous prediction.
So what can businesses expect from the new trends in customer service? Let’s take a look.
Things to expect from the new trends in customer service
More Convenience
Convenience is everything for customers. If your organization isn’t easy to do business with, chances are that the customer will walk away. Make sure that your policies and processes do not inhibit a customer’s buying journey. In case they do, timely revisions can help save the day.
Personalization
Customers seek to connect with the businesses they are buying from. With these new trends in customer service, you can make use of feedback forms, live chat support, and other indicators to help determine their buying patterns. If a customer feels you cater to their specific needs better than other organizations, they’ll be willing to pay more.
More Self-service
Customers have an increasing need for self-service customer service. You can make things extremely easy for them in terms of your policies and procedures, but you also need to be there to resolve their queries in real time.
Customers not only want a quick answer to their questions and problems, but they’re also looking for a resolution that requires minimum effort.
Instead of phone calls, customers prefer live chat support to communicate their problems, so make sure you integrate live chat support into your online business to help nurture more leads and provide a winning customer experience.
Bettering Employee Experiences
How an organization operates is likely to penetrate into how it interacts with its customers. It’s important that you not only provide your employees with the necessary training and tools to interact with customers in a better way; in fact, you must also ensure a healthy working experience for them.
Keeping an employee happy will drive up their motivation and encourage a better attitude. An employee who is invested in the work you do will automatically be invested in bringing more business for your company.
This can involve following and nurturing leads, interacting with customers in a better way, and ultimately, driving up sales.
AI Will Have to Wait
Artificial Intelligence is slowly penetrating its way into business operations. It can help with things like creating invoice templates and tracking transactions.
However, it cannot take over customer service completely – at least not yet. Though, AI in chatbots has found place in customer service, it can only handle basic questions and requests.
At present, AI is more or less a support tool for a customer service agent, not a replacement. Live chat software is, still a superior customer service solution and is likely to remain the same for long time.
Given the dominating nature of customer service and the role it plays in driving up sales, businesses should try their best to implement customer-friendly practices. In the case of online businesses, live chat support will continue to play an integral role in determining success.