With the urgent shift toward the digital marketplace last year, both businesses and their respective customers are going to continue working and interacting remotely in 2021. With that comes a very important aspect—ventures should definitely place emphasis on a seamless customer experience.
Customer experience has become a silent game-changer in regaining customer inflow, especially for businesses that had to move away from physical, brick-and-mortar stores.
While customer experience was initially designed to provide support or troubleshoot problems for customers, it has now evolved into a deeper and dynamic understanding of what customers go through, especially amid lockdowns brought about by the pandemic.
Customer feedback has provided crucial insights and points of action for businesses to integrate as they build experiences that adapt to each customer’s needs.
“Designing experiences for customers now requires a more deliberate and ever-evolving approach – entailing precision, customization, and thoughtful details,” said Regional Vice President Rajiv Dhand of TELUS International, a leading digital solutions and customer experience provider.
“At a time like this, when companies like ours have access to insights from customer feedback, we treat them as a valuable stimulant to adapt to as we create a more personalized and unique experience for each customer, which is our goal for each and every interaction,” Dhand added.
TELUS International Philippines shares three important learnings on customer experience that can help businesses improve how customers experience their brands in the current situation and for the years to come.
1. Being digital-first should put a premium on data privacy and security
The swift migration of businesses to digital solutions heightened the focus on immediate accessibility and user experience. However, it can also leave loopholes in data security if done in haste. This movement paved the way for leaders in tech and CX to stress the need for firms to ensure that they have the proper IT and data security systems and tools to ensure that data and transactions are always secure.
2. Remote or hybrid set-ups demonstrate the power of cloud
Applying remote work setups happened faster than expected even with the limitation of stable internet infrastructure in the Philippines. Businesses were able to continue and adjust with the enforcement of skeletal capacity in workplaces with the aid of cloud-enabled platforms. Cloud solutions paved the way for smoother transitions and collaborations for users in different locations.
3. Conveying empathy and transparency through digital channels are an edge
Minimizing face-to-face interaction and boosting virtual ones does not mean losing empathetic forms of communications. In times of crisis, silence or canned responses may seem impersonal or out of touch, leading to customers’ disinterest or worse, mistrust. Companies need to level with that by bringing the same personal experience and empathetic messaging to any channel available to its customers.
“Through these learnings, we are able to go beyond simply delivering easy, real-time support to our customers. There is another layer of care and thoughtfulness that we add in the overall experience. While that might seem intangible, it makes a great difference,” said Dhand.
“In the years to come, the surge of innovations and omnichannel solutions will continue to define how customers experience different brands, but one thing that will remain constant is how, as a company, we can show our care and dedication as we design human-centric customer experiences.”