The recent report of PwC stated, almost 73 percent of people identify customer experience as one significant factor towards their buying decisions, just after product quality and price. Yet it is just 49 percent of the global consumers are of the opinion that brands provide a good customer experience in today’s market. PwC came with a series on consumer intelligence – “Experience is Everything”, where they conducted a survey of 4,000 Americans from Gen Z to the Baby Boomers plus some 11000 customers from 11 different countries. Customer feedback is of paramount significance today for businesses to multiply their revenue.
The numbers achieved show a lot of opportunity for enterprises to take their market share from competitors towards building loyal relationships with each of their customers. Consider the following:
- If you are experienced, you are at a competitive advantage – Most of the businesses still need improvement in their customer experience, the study of U.S. survey states. For those having got it right, this is a great opportunity of getting new customers from customers and strengthening their existing ones as they are doing business with the right firm.
- Your customers trust you also spend more with you as you give them a better customer experience – You receive a truly rewarding return when you invest in a great experience from your company to your customer. Customers are ready to spend as good as 16% and more on products and services with companies offering a better experience and are usually more loyal. Moreover, 63% of the consumers are ready to share more info about a company offering an excellent experience. Customers only trust you with their information owing to the experience you have created.
- One bad experience costs a lot – Almost 32 percent of your consumers will leave the brand they have loved only after one instance of a bad customer experience. In South America, the figure jumps to almost 49 percent. Your customers will always expect you to get it right at the first chance.
- You can never negotiate the basics of customer service – Certain things will never go old-fashioned. Customers are still looking for convenience and speed. They are expecting friendly and helpful people. The PwC survey suggests that over and above 70 percent of customers find these nonnegotiable and basic concepts of customer service working at the top of their list. Customers might appreciate cutting-edge and unique experiences or rather interesting design and cool technology, yet the old-fashioned customer service still dominates.
Now that we have these facts and stats ready, certain trends need to be considered as you focus on creating better customer experience. Also, thanks to the customer feedback software, enterprises are fast recognizing what value their product or service holds.
- When you think of customer experience and service, customers are smarter than ever before and they are expecting more than they did before – While most companies are at their best in serving their customers, they are nowhere near the big brands like Amazon, Uber, Flipkart, etc. These big players keep raising their bars to create higher customer expectations for one and all. The customers these days are no longer comparing you with direct competition rather with those who deliver awesome service experiences.
- With personalization you can improve the customer experience – Data has the power to drive personalization that can help you in tracking the individual likes and dislikes of your customers. Artificial Intelligence (AI) has the ability to categorize the consumers into groups having the same kind of buying patterns, support problems, and more, the allows the company to create highly relevant suggestions to provide a conducive customer experience. For instance, while visiting Amazon, the site will immediately recognize you, welcome you, and give you suggestions on the basis of what you bought earlier. In the business’ support section, the customer service representative may have the customer’s record, something that comes with all history including earlier inquiries, purchases, questions, and complaints. The right system would help you understand your customer, without your being intrusive or creepy.
- If you can create an effective self-service solution, it could lead to a great customer experience – The self-service solution you create has to be functional and come with common problems and questions customers have. A properly arranged and robust FAQ section on your website is a good plan if it is easily navigable and comes with the right information. Videos remain an excellent tool also. For instance, you could upload videos on YouTube for your self-service solution. However, it is just that when your self-service solution fails, your customer can fall back to the old-fashioned human support in the form of customer support.
- You no longer have the option of social customer care – It is expected. Social customer service is not merely about complaints response on the review and social media sites, it’s regarding making engagements with everyone. Immediate response to questions and complaints within minutes and not days is the requirement. Other comments may wait, however, don’t linger for long. A couple of hours may be acceptable, but not for a day or two. Not responding or failing to respond to any of your customers may cost you permanent loss of the business.
- Deploying the right kind of technology is important, however, it is not the sole thing – Chatbots and AI are good for many lower strata support tasks such as address change or updating credit card payment. This kind of frees up your core team from everyday day casual customer support to higher-level support. The best companies understand that they need to strike a balance between the human and digital. Your people have to be willing plus ready and active to step in quickly when technology begins causing friction.
Get your customer experience right the first time, as your customer won’t give you many chances. Higher expectations of the customers mean they demand more from the brands they are interacting and doing business with. Both small and large companies are gathering the significance of a level of customer experience and service along with the role of customer feedback apps to keep the customers coming back. It’s time you move ahead in action instead of merely thinking or recognizing it.
