“This is my world, my world!”
These were the legendary words of Agent Smith, before he had come, flying at Neo in the Hollywood blockbuster – The Matrix. This movie raised a lot of eyebrows, but more than that it raised a lot of questions on reality, with its conclusive logic.
Fast forward more than 15 years, and a similar phenomenon is being observed in the customer service landscape, in the form of – Omnichannel mode of communication. And, what has brought this somewhat abrupt change?
Present day customers want a steady, high quality experience in all the mediums of interactions. Therefore, they might start looking for a product online, rave about it on social media, and finally choose to buy it in-store. Essentially, they want the customer experience to be uniform with all the mediums, and Omnichannel helps to bring all of these interactions under a single platform for agents, along with the ability to seamlessly toggle among them.
Now, I am not going to explain about the rich benefits that Omnichannel boasts of, rather I’ll make a sincere effort to break down the most preferred mediums of interactions of customers in the realm of Omnichannel.
Have you given a fair bit of thought on the top channels of interaction in Omnichannel customer service? If you haven’t, now is high time to do so, and one of the best ways is the go through the following 5 pointers.
- Mobile/Smartphone
Mobile and smartphones is one such object, which has made its presence a reality in developed and underdeveloped countries alike. This is the age of high speed internet, and increased use of mobile data. Smartphone have become the ‘go-to’ medium for almost all customer communications. This is especially pertinent with the onset of in-app features and support on mobile devices.
Mobiles have become the most used device to make a payment, order product/services, social media, fitness, and just about anything else. There is no denying the fact that mobile is the way forward for all businesses. This means all brands have to treat mobile as the primary mode for customer engagement and adopt a mobile-first strategy, now and in the times to come.
- Social Media
The medium of interaction started as means of networking among friends, acquaintances, and contacts, but has steadily emerged as one of the major mediums of interaction with customers. More or less, all brands have taken to social media to alleviate customer concerns and improve the entire customer experience. Thereby, organizations have been able to carve a great response strategy, and also convert irate customers on social media into loyal consumers.
With the identification of potential social media advocates, proper engagement tactics, adapting to social media behaviour changes, and lastly rapport building over social media – companies have been successfully able to create a holistic approach to one of the most favourite channels of customers.
- Chat/Instant Messaging
Earlier this year, Pew Research Center found that 36% of smartphone owners have reported using mobile messaging apps such as WeChat, Viber, and Facebook Messenger. On, the other hand social media usage has increasingly been a flat terrain. Instant Messaging (IM) apps hit a milestone this year, matching the number of users on social networks, i.e. – 2.125 billion. This presents a huge opportunity for businesses to market their products/services, along with providing prompt customer services on chat and IM. However, this does not necessarily mean that social media will disappear any time soon.
Believe it or not – email communication still has remained a favourite among customers. With the emergence of automated emails, email interaction has taken a big leap in ensuring that it stays a preferred mode of interaction. As per McKinsey, on an average a sales rep spends an estimated 28% of the workweek managing emails.
However, in present times you must add some value to your emails to boost your customer loyalty and build brand advocates, and here the essence of marketing email comes into fray. Standardized email templates can help in both, saving time and maintaining the quality of messages being sent to clients.
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Do you agree with our views on the subject? Let us know your thoughts on the most preferred channels of interaction among customers in the Omnichannel universe.
