Having a multi-channel framework to unlock the significant benefits that can be achieved

Seizing the multi-channel opportunity

Customer service operations often struggle with the reality of multi-channel service. It isn’t easy. Done right, however, the benefits can be considerable, with improved first contact resolution, improved customer satisfaction and ultimately increased customer retention. Some organisations are of course getting it right, but it’s probably fair to say that most companies’ multi-channel service capabilities haven’t kept pace with the growing consumer requirement to contact organisations when and how they want to. Almost half the UK’s consumers now have an expectation of near instant response, irrespective of the channel they’re using.

It’s certainly not smart to ignore this major shift and assume that, just because a majority of your customers are still using voice as their primary channel, then that’s the way it’s always going to be. Some organisations already receive over half of their customer contact by email, and consumers are broadening their own channel use. According to recent research, over 10 per cent of consumers have already used web chat to communicate with a contact centre, one in five have used SMS messaging, while almost a quarter suggested they would like to have the option of using online chat instead of voice. Consumers also clearly have strong views about the channels they use, and most of us react negatively when we feel that the companies we deal with are forcing us down our least preferred channels.

Integrating your channels – adopting the right approach

Many organisations overlook the importance of approaching channel integration from both a strategic and a technology perspective. The good news is that today there really aren’t any significant technology barriers to effective multi-channel integration – and there really shouldn’t be since it’s now almost 20 years since the introduction of CTI solutions that first brought computers and telephony together. The technical integration challenge has also become significantly simpler with the advent of the latest Web Services components and SIP open standards.

However, while the technology side of things has become easier, this has opened up more challenges for organisations. Just because you can support a channel doesn’t mean you necessarily should from a business perspective. For example, a mobile phone company might have a large volume of customers on pre-pay plans, but their customer management goal for these customers is far more likely to be directed towards self-service rather than the expensive and real time handling of Instant messaging or SMS texts by agents.

It’s also important to make sure you operate a coherent and consistent approach across multiple customer channels. It’s fairly simple to set up triggers to let you know if a customer that you’re about to target with an outbound call has contacted you in the last few days or weeks. Technology can play an important part here in helping to break down many of the silos that used to exist between distinct parts of the business such as Collections and Customer Service.

Need for a more joined-up service approach

One of the key reasons that organisations are investigating the unified, customer-centric, multi channel route is because they’re looking to reap the benefits of offering a more positive, joined-up experience for their customers, and – ultimately – from improvements in key performance indicators such as customer loyalty. In terms of ongoing operational costs, it’s also potentially much more cost-effective to manage such a joined-up approach.

Many businesses have successfully taken the first key step to multi-channel by opening up their operations on the web. However, most are still some way behind the curve when it comes to offering a fully blended inbound and outbound experience across key channels such as email, SMS, webchat as well as existing voice and the web channels.

That’s why it’s so important for organisations to acknowledge the technical and operational complexities of offering such an approach. Today, for example, it’s difficult for a business to justify offering a high quality email response service if it is going to cost more per interaction than a traditional voice call. Every business needs to make their own judgement calls - channel by channel.

We also need to acknowledge that any successful unified, customer-centric, multi-channel experience should be evolutionary and co-exist with a business’ existing IT and telephony infrastructure. Once you’ve got such a framework in place, you can start to unlock some of the undoubted benefits that an effective multi-channel solution can offer.

Moving away from traditional ‘silo’ structures

Part of the challenge for organisations is that separate functions such as the call centre and e-business operations have been treated as distinct business operations, run by different management teams and often one-step removed from core corporate functions such as sales, marketing, fulfilment and billing/collections. Quite often the contact centre isn’t viewed  - as we might all hope - as an essential hub for all a company’s customer-facing activities, but rather as just a part of broader customer support mix and a necessary cost of operation. The good news is that this kind of more traditional thinking is changing.

Another key requirement if businesses are to make the most of their multi-channel investment is to ensure that when you introduce a new channel it will be properly resourced and handled in a way that’s appropriate to the channel itself. With IM and webchat for example, it’s pointless and potentially brand damaging to offer the service if the response isn’t going to be real time or delivered by agents trained to communicate through these channels. We increasing expect that the same workforce optimisation disciplines that organisations employ to support their voice activities will start being applied to the web, email, webchat, IM and other emerging channels as organisations start to understand the resourcing implications of running parallel multiple channels.

Increasing importance of real time channels such as webchat and IM

When it comes to supporting newer real time channels such as webchat and instant messaging, it’s easy to understand why some businesses are hoping to leave these to one side as they wait for their markets to recover from the downturn. We believe that would be a mistake – particularly when you consider the channel preferences of today’s younger generations. Sabio has, for example, worked closely to develop an integrated multi-channel solution for The Student Loans Company, where 90 percent of their customers are between 18 and 23. Among this group, 76 percent currently use IM, and webchats are an increasingly significant channel for the business. The way this age group communicates will become the norm for the rest of the market over the next few years.

The different devices that customers use as their primary communications channel will invariably impact channel take-up. A growing percentage of mobile phones can now handle email and Web, and will provide a useful tool for organisations in delivering ‘assisted’ service to customers, potentially across multiple channels.

For organisations this is clearly going to present a challenge in terms of cost, staffing and training, and we’re expecting to see an increased requirement for an increasingly cross-channel Workforce Management discipline that takes account of all these different customer service level expectations and agent training requirements.

Addressing the challenge of web forums and social networking

Web forums are also proving to be an increasingly important component of an integrated customer management approach, and represent a potentially double-edged proposition for many of today’s major organisations. Customer service organisations need to move away from thinking they can ‘police’ or control forums, and instead adopt a model that focuses on positive engagement.

In the technical sector particularly, we’ve seen how active forums can provide customers with access to the technical solutions they need – often to a better quality, and faster than traditional corporate service channels. They can also serve as an immediate and global channel for customers to communicate and propagate their dissatisfaction either with defective products or poor quality service. Real-time short messaging services such as Twitter also have a place in the multi-channel puzzle, along with successful social networking sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn. However, these channels are in their infancy and sites such as Twitter are still evolving as the business realises the impact of its ingenuity and moves to build on its initial success.

Organisations need to consider which channels are most important for their own business, and work out how much effort, resource and cost is needed to support their key channels. It’s also very easy to get distracted by new channels, while overlooking the real business benefits that can be achieved simply by tightening web/contact centre integration, or developing an effective ‘assisted service’ approach.

Next steps – multi-channel in action

Sabio has recently worked closely with Informa, the specialist conferencing and publishing group, where over 50 percent of its contacts are email. Sabio’s solution has helped them to achieve a consistent way of resourcing and managing these interactions, significantly reducing its interaction-to-order rate by over 40 percent and increasing first contact resolution for customers. Sabio is also working closely with major organisations such as The Student Loans Company, where  one of the UK’s most advanced multi-channel customer contact technology solutions is being implemented, incorporating webchat, secure email and SMS – in addition to traditional voice and whitemail channels.