Whether or not a customer stays loyal to your brand, becomes a brand advocate, or moves to a competitor depends on many things, with customer experience being front and centre. While many companies are focusing on improving the experience that customers have at every touchpoint, not enough are paying attention to what happens after the transaction is completed.
“Different teams often use different methods to communicate with customers. While contact centre staff may be using online chat tools and emails, marketers will be using blog posts and social media, while sales representatives are using in-person communication tactics. This inevitably leads to information being siloed, and it means that nobody in the business has a holistic view of the customer,” Michelle Storey from Tradeway.
Research conducted by Forrester Research on behalf of SAP showed that a collaborative team approach could improve the customer-experience value chain. Both service and sales oriented businesses can tap into consumers’ natural affinity for social technology when using a social collaboration platform. Some of the added benefits include being able to tap into informal communities, promote information sharing, and using the feedback they get on social media to change business practices and customer experience processes for the better.
Besides being able to gain insights about customers, the research also showed that these tools can be used to disrupt sectors and industries in a few key ways:
Greater efficiency
Instead of employees spending hours sorting through emails and looking for relevant customer information, a social collaboration tool can make employees more efficient in finding the information they need to cross-sell and up-sell. The research showed that employees were 15% more efficient when using this tool instead of traditional information channels.
Sell more
Leads are usually assigned to sales representatives, who then follow up on leads in order to meet their sales targets. A social collaboration tool can align their leads with experts in the business so that they have quick and easy access to insights that they may need to help them close the sale. Whether the person they need to contact is in customer service or product development, sales reps can engage them from a single source. According to Forrester’s research, this can improve their sales rates by 9%.
Reduced call centre costs
The social collaboration tool gives call centre agents access to the information and expertise they need to handle questions and queries quickly and efficiently, which can drive down support call costs.
As a business owner, you should be focusing on how you can unite the different areas of your business to offer a better customer experience with your brand. Contact Tradeway to learn more about brand management and customer experience today.